GEILER (or GEYLER), VON KAISERSBERG, JOHANN "the German Savonarola," was born at Schaffhausen on March 16, 1445, but in 1448 went to live at Kaisersberg in Upper Alsace. He studied at Freiburg university where he afterwards lectured until 1478 when he accepted a call to the cathedral of Strasbourg. There his sermons—bold, in cisive, denunciatory, abounding in quaint illustrations and based on texts by no means confined to the Bible—won for him a well deserved fame. Geiler died at Strasbourg on March 1 o, I 51 o.
The genuineness of the numerous works ascribed to Geiler has been investigated by E. Martin in the Allgemeine deutsche Biographie. See also F. W. von Ammon, Geyler's Leben, Lehren and Predigten (1826) ; L. Dacheux, Un Rif ormateur catholique a la fin du XVe siecle, J. G. de K. (1876) ; R. Cruel, Gesch. der deutschen Predigt. (1879) ; P. de Lorenzi, Geiler's ausgewdhlte Schriften (4 vols., 1881) ; T. M. Lind say, History of the Reformation, i. (1906) ; and Herzog-Hauck, Real encyklopadie, vi.