Fritzlar

Fritzlar (probably from Frideo lare =domus pacis) is a city of Prussia, situated on the shores of the Eder, and one of the oldest seats of the Church in Central Germany. Here Boniface founded in 732 a church dedicated to St. Peter, and a small convent, with a school chiefly intended for the accommodation of clerical students. He first directed it himself, but afterwards gave up the charge to his countryman Wigbert, who thus became the first regular abbot of the institution (t 747). The second abbot was Tatian; the third, Wigbert II. The school soon gained a great reputation. Sturm, abbot of Fulda, and Megingoz, bishop of Wiirzburg, were among its first scholars. The institution remained for centuries at the head of both clerical and secular education. Under Charlemagne, Fritzlar was in 774 burned down by the heathen Saxons, and the church alone escaped. As it stands at present, it is in the Roman style of the 12th century. Fritzlar was for a time a bishopric (in 786), but was soon joined to that of Mayence. See S. Schminke, De antiquitat. Friteslariens. diss. (Marburg, 1715, 4to). — Herzog, Real- Encyklop. 4:612.