Cardinal, historian, and canonist, born Würzburg, Germany, 1824; died Mehrerau, 1890.
In 1852 he was appointed professor of canon law and church history and in addition lectured on patrology.
He was particularly interested in the origin of the Greek Schism and as a result of his twelve years research published his classic, "."
In the meantime he had written numerous historico-canonical and historico-apologetic treatises, and as early as 1861 had opposed the dangerous tendencies of Dollinger and Michelis.
In 1868 he was called to Rome to prepare the way for the Vatican Council, writing his "" in reply to Dollinger's notorious work, "Janus."
His "," 1872, in a great thesaurus of information on the politico-ecclesiastical conflicts of the past.
Besides supplementing Hemle's "" with two volumes, he wrote a manual of church history in 1876.
He was raised to the cardinalate in 1879, and appointed first cardinal-prefect of the Apostolic archives when these Vatican treasures were opened to scholars by Pope Leo XIII.
New Catholic Dictionary