HUTTEN, L'utten voN (1488-1523). A seholf.r, poet, and reformer of the German Renaissance, one of the most celebrated of the Humanists. He was descended from an ancient and noble family, and was born at the Castle of Steekellyr1.7. in Hesse. April 21. MSS. At the age of ten lie was placed in the neighbor ing monastery of Fulda. but. disliking this mode of life. fled in 1505 to Cologne, where lie met froo7straten. Johannes P,heg.ins, and other schol ars of the day. In Lino he came to Erfurt. but soon after rejoined Rhegius at Frankfort-on-the Oder. There lie took his master's degree and published his first poem. In 1507 he followed Rhegius to Leipzig. He was stricken down with the pestilence in the following year, but recov ered, and at Wittenberg in 1511 published his Ars I crsifieatoria. During these years he led the life of a wandering poet, subsisting on the bounty of those who admired his talents or feared his mordant wit. In 1512 he went to „Pavia to study law. Ile had been there only a short time when the city was plundered by the Swiss, and Hutten was deprived of all he possessed. For a short time he served as a soldier in the Impe rial army, but soon returned to Germany, where he boldly entered into a quarrel with the Duke of Wurttemberg. who had murdered a kinsman of Ulrich's, and brought about, the Duke's punish ment. In the dispute between Reuehlin (q.v.) and the Dominicans, Ilutten came to the support of the former, and displayed no small learning and great power of satire. He went again to Italy in 1515, to take the degree of doctor of laws, and returned to his native country in 1517. He was crowned with the poets' laurel crown at Augsburg by the Emperor Maximilian, who conferred on hint the honor of knighthood. While in Italy Hutten had become imbued with a fierce hatred for the Papacy, which he bitterly attacked in his preface to an edition of Lanrentius Valla's De Donatione Constantini, published in 1517. In the following year he accompanied his patron. Albert, Archbishop of Jlainz, to the Diet of Augs burg, where Luther had his famous conference with Cajetan. Subsequently he established a
small printing press of his own, and employed himself in putting forth pamphlets written in the German language violently attacking the Pope and the Roman clergy. The Archbishop Albert denounced hint at Rome. whereupon Hut ten took sides with Luther. whom he had hitherto affected to despise. Persecuted by bis enemies. he availed himself of the protection of Franz von Siekingen, but was forced to flee from the latter's castle after a two years' residence (1520 22). Going to Basel, he was coldly received by Erasmus, who did not approve of his extreme measures, and a breach took place between the two men which culminated in a great literary quarrel. From this time Mitten was compelled to adopt a wandering life. lie died August 23. 1523, on the island of Ufnau in the Lake of Zurich. Hutten was more open in the expression of his opinions than any other man. probably, of his age. He did much to prepare the way for the Reformation and to promote it. lie was a master of the Latin language. and excelled in satirical and passionate invective. His literary life is generally divided into three periods: (I) Period of Latin poems 11509-16) (2) period of letters and orations (1515.171 (3) period of dialogues and letters in Latin and German (1517-231. In all he published some forty-five different works, but his most noteworthy contribution to litera ture was his portion of the immortal Epistola. Obsrurorum l'irorutn (q.v.). Hutten's collected works, Opera Omnia, were published at Leipzig in seven volumes (1859-70) under the editorship of Backing. Aimingseveral biographies by Ger man authors that by Strauss (6th ed.. Bonn, 1895). abridged in English by Sturee (London. 19741, is especially to he reeommended. Consult also: the monographs by Reiellenbach (Leipzig. 1877), and Sehall (Halle, 18901 ; and Szama tolski. Ulrich von flutten's deutsche Schriften (Strasburg, 1891). A good brief sketch in English is Jordan, "A Knight of the Order of Poets," in The Story of the Innumerable Com pany (San Francisco, 1S96).