Editing Josias Simmler

{{Short description|Swiss theologian}}
{{Infobox person
|name        = Josias Simmler
|image       = Josias Simmler.jpg
|caption     = Simmler engraving after Heinrich Pfenninger
|birth_date  = 6 November 1530
|birth_place = [[Kappel am Albis|Kappel]]
|death_date  = {{death date and age|df=yes|1576|7|2|1530|11|6}}
|death_place = [[Zürich]]
|nationality = [[Republic of Zürich|Zürich]] 
|occupation  = Theologian, humanist scholar  
|spouse      = 
|parents     = 
|children    = 
|signature   = 
}}

'''Josias Simmler''' ('''Josiah Simler'''; {{langx|la|'''Iosias Simlerus'''}}) (6 November 1530 &ndash; 2 July 1576) was a [[Switzerland|Swiss]] theologian and classicist, author of the first book relating solely to the [[Alps]].

==Life==
[[Image:Zürich - Grossmünster - Haus zur Sul IMG 1314.JPG|thumb|«Haus zur Sul»: Official residence of [[Ulrich Zwingli]] (1522–1525) and his co-workers [[Jakob Ceporin]] (1526) and [[Conrad Pellicanus|Konrad Pellikan]] (1526–1556), and later of [[Peter Martyr Vermigli]] (1556–1562) and Josias Simmler (1563-1576), professors at the [[Carolinum, Zürich|Carolinum]], the academy of the [[Grossmünster]].]]The son of the former prior of the [[Cistercian convent]] of [[Kappel am Albis|Kappel]] (Canton of Zürich), he was born at [[Kappel am Albis|Kappel]], where his father was the [[Protestant]] pastor and schoolmaster till his death in 1557. In 1544 Simmler went to [[Zürich]] to continue his education under his godfather, the reformer, [[Heinrich Bullinger]]. After having completed his studies at [[Basel]] and [[Strasbourg]], he returned to Zürich, and became pastor to the neighboring villages.

In 1552 he was made professor of [[New Testament]] [[exegesis]] at Zürich's [[Carolinum, Zürich|Carolinum]] academy, where he also taught [[mathematics]] and [[Ptolemaic system|Ptolemaic]] [[astronomy]], and in 1560 became professor of [[theology]].{{sfn|Wellisch|1975}} In 1555 he published a new edition of [[Conrad Gessner|Conrad Gessner's]] ''Epitome'' of his ''[[Bibliotheca universalis]]'' (a list of all authors who had written in [[Greek language|Greek]], [[Latin]] or [[Hebrew language|Hebrew]]), a new edition of the ''Bibliotheca'' itself, and in 1575 an annotated edition of the ''Antonine Itinerary''. Later, he would become deacon to St Peter's, Zürich. and translated many of Bullinger's works into Latin, and write his biography.{{sfn|Wellisch|1975}} In  1559 he had his first attack of [[gout]], a complaint which would eventually kill him.

==Contributions to Swiss studies==
About 1551 he conceived the idea of making his native land better known by translating into Latin parts of the great ''Chronik'' of [[Johann Stumpf (writer)|Johann Stumpf]]. With this view he collected materials, and in 1574 published a specimen of his intended work in the shape of a monograph on the Canton of the [[Valais]]. He published in the same volume a general description of the Alps, as the Introduction to his projected work on the several Swiss Cantons. In this treatise, entitled ''De Alpibus commentarius'', he collected all that the classical authors had written on the Alps, adding a good deal of material collected from his friends and correspondents. This ''Commentarius'' is the first work exclusively devoted to the Alps, and sums up the knowledge of that region possessed in the 16th century.

It was re-published by the Elzevirs at [[Leiden]] in 1633, and again at Zürich in 1735, while an elaborate annotated edition (prepared by Mr Coolidge), with French translation, notes and appendices, appeared at [[Grenoble]] in 1904. Another fragment of his vast plan was the work entitled ''De Helvetiorum republica'', which appeared at Zürich in 1576, just before his death. It was regarded as the chief authority on Swiss constitutional matters up to 1798. In 1566 he wrote a biography of his friend [[Conrad Gessner]], shortly after his death the previous year.{{sfn|Wellisch|1975}}{{sfn|Backus|2016}}{{sfn|Simler|1566}}

==Works==
{{refbegin|30em}}
* ''De aeterno Dei filio.'' Zürich, 1568 ([[VD 16]] S 6498). 
* [https://books.google.com/books?id=wS88AAAAcAAJ&pg=PT2 ''De Republica Helvetiorum Libri duo''.] Zürich: Christoph Froschauer, 1576 (VD 16 S 6510).
* [https://books.google.com/books?id=1S88AAAAcAAJ&dq=De%20Republica%20Helvetiorum%20libri%20duo&pg=PP1 ''De Republica Helvetiorum Libri duo.''] Zürich, 1577 (VD 16 S 6511). 
* ''Regiment Gemeiner loblicher Eydgnoschafft.'' Zürich, 1576 (VD16 S 6512)
* {{cite book|last1=Simler|first1=Josias|author-link=Josias Simmler|title=Vita clarissimi philosophi et medici excellentissimi Conradi Gesneri Tigurini a Josia Simlero Tigurin. Item epistola Gesneri de libris a se editis (VD16 S 6520)|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=38l1FHwo-Y4C|date=1566|publisher=C Froschoverum|location=[[Tiguri]]}}
* ''Vallesiae descriptio, libri duo: de alpibus commentarius.'' Zürich, 1574 (VD16 S 6519).
{{refend}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

== Bibliography ==
{{refbegin}}
* {{cite book|last= Backus|first=Irena|title=Life Writing in Reformation Europe: Lives of Reformers by Friends, Disciples and Foes|chapter=3: Zurich lives in the latter part of the sixteenth century - The biography of Gesner by Simler|pages=157–161|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QjgfDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT157|date=2016|publisher=[[Routledge]]|isbn=978-1-317-10518-3}}
* {{cite journal|last1=Wellisch|first1=Hans (Hanan)|title=Conrad Gessner: a bio-bibliography|journal=Journal of the Society for the Bibliography of Natural History|date=June 1975|volume=7|issue=2|pages=151–247|doi=10.3366/jsbnh.1975.7.2.151}}
{{refend}}
* Marabello, Thomas Quinn (2023) "The Origins of Democracy in Switzerland," ''Swiss American Historical Society Review'', Vol. 59: No. 1, Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/sahs_review/vol59/iss1/4. See Pg. 97-99.

==External links==
* {{HLS|15794|Josias Simmler|author=Bruno Schmid}}
* {{Cite ADB|34|355|358|Simmler, Josias|Georg von Wyß|ADB:Simmler, Josias}}
* {{BBKL|s/simler}}
* [http://www.digital-collections.de/index.html?c=autoren_index&l=en&ab=Simmler%2C+Josias Works of Simmler] in the [[Munich Digitization Center]]
*{{EB1911|wstitle=Simler, Josias|volume=25|last= Coolidge |first= William Augustus Brevoort |author-link= William Augustus Brevoort Coolidge| page=123}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Simmler, Josias}}
[[Category:1530 births]]
[[Category:1576 deaths]]
[[Category:People from Affoltern District]]
[[Category:Swiss Calvinist and Reformed theologians]]
[[Category:16th-century Swiss writers]]
[[Category:16th-century Calvinist and Reformed theologians]]
[[Category:Academic staff of Carolinum, Zurich]]