WESTENRIEDER, LORENZ VON. - Priest and historian, b. in Munich, Bavaria, 1 Aug. 1748, d. there 15 March 1829.
Ordained priest in 1771, he was called to teach poetics and rhetoric at Landshut and subsequently at Munich, where he spent his whole life, entirely devoted to teaching and historical studies. A member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences, censor of books published in Bavaria, inspector of the schools of Munich, and canon of the Cathedral, W. was a man of piety and learning, who placed his profound culture at the service of the humbler classes, thus deserving the title of “popular teacher of his homeland.” From 1787 to 1815 he published annually a Bayerische historische Kalender (20 vols., Munich 1787-1815) in order to spread among the people knowledge of national history, viewed and explained in a Catholic sense and supplemented with wise moral maxims. The ten volumes, published between 1788 and 1817, essays on Bavarian history and literature, likewise served this purpose.
Of a more scholarly character were the Geschichte der bayer. Akademie der Wissenschaften (2 vols., ibid. 1784-1807) and the Deutsch-latein. Glossarium mittelalterl. Ausdrücke (ibid. 1816).