Andreas Masius

Who was Andreas Masius?

Andreas Masius was a Catholic priest, humanist and one of the first European syriacists.

He was born in Lennik, Flemish Brabant.

Following his education, and after a short period of training at Leuven Masius worked as secretary for the bishop of Constance, Johannes von Weeze. Later, among other things, he became the diplomatic representative in Rome for the Abbot Gerwig Blarer of Weingarten. On behalf of Wilhelm, Duke of Jülich-Cleves-Berg in 1555 he requested permission from the Pope for the establishment of a university at Duisburg. After leaving the priesthood and marrying, in 1559, he settled in Zevenaar and in the last years of his life published several works.

Masius studied Hebrew in Leuven, Arabic in Rome with Guillaume Postel and in 1553 Syriac with Moses of Mardin, a priest of the Patriarchate of Antioch in Syria. In the same year in Rome he translated two creedal documents from Syriac for Yohannan Sulaqa, the patriarch-elect of the Church of the East. In 1554, probably in Germany, he made a Latin translation of the Syriac 'Basilius-Anaphora' for Julius von Pflug, the last Catholic bishop of Naumberg-Zeitz. These were printed together with Masius' translation of the treatise De Paradiso of Moses Bar-Kepha.