GILSE, JAN VAN: Dutch theologian; b. Oct. 19, 1810; d. at Amsterdam May 24, 1859. At the age of eighteen he entered the Mennonite institute at Amsterdam, and after receiving his degree, eight years later, served as pastor at Koog and Zaandyk, and finally at Amsterdam. On the death of Koopman, Gilse was chosen his successor as professor of theology in Amsterdam representing the Mennonites, and held this position from Oct. 9, 1849, until he died. His collected essays and an anthology of his sermons were edited after his death, with a comprehensive biography, by P. J. Veth (Verspreide en nagelaten schriften, 5 parts, Amsterdam, 1860). Special mention may be made of his studies on the Muratorian Canon (q.v.), and on the meaning of the phrase "Catholic Epistles," which he believed to connote the epistles recognized by the Church Catholic and received as writings of importance among the books of the New Testament.

(C. Sepp.)

GIRALD DE BARRI, called Giraldue Cambrensia: Welsh ecclesiastic; b. at Manorbier Castle (5 m. s.e. of Pembroke), Pembrokeshire, Wales, 1146 or

1147; d. after 1216. Ile was educated in Paris,

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returning to Wales in 1172. His abilities and family connections with the Welsh and Irish nobility made him a fitting agent of the English crown in the effort to extend its power in Wales and to introduce the Roman hierarchy. The archbishop of Canterbury commissioned him to reform the diocese of St. Davids, particularly to introduce celibacy and to collect tithes. He carried the work through with a high hand and, as a reward for his success, was made archdeacon of Brecknock (1175). In 1176 the chapter of St. Davids chose him to succeed his uncle, David Fitzgerald, as bishop of that see, hoping that he might attain to metropolitan rank, independent of Canterbury. Owing to English opposition he retired and till 1180 lectured with much approval on canon law in Paris. He was commissary to the bishop of St. Davids, as royal chaplain attended Prince John in Ireland (1185-1186), and in 1188 accompanied Archbishop Baldwin through Wales, preaching the crusades. He did good service in keeping Wales peaceful and loyal after the death of Henry II (1189). In 1198, while he was living in retirement in Lincoln, the chapter of St. David again nominated him for bishop, but, as before, the archbishop of Canterbury would not have a Welshman. For four years Girald prosecuted a suit to obtain the see; he visited Rome three times, suffered many hardships and vicissitudes, but finally yielded, became reconciled with the king and archbishop, and spent the remainder of his life in retirement, devoted to literary work.

Girald wrote many works which are a strange mixture of truth and fiction, trivialities and important facts; his value as a historian is impaired by his vanity, partizanship, credulity, and use of legend and fable. Nevertheless he presents a picture of his time, and his information has importance in the absence of anything better. His descriptions of Ireland and Wales (Topographia Hibernia, Itinerarium Cambrite, Descriptio Cambritv) furnish about all that is known of land and people in his period. In hiss Speculum ecclesim and Gemma ecclesiastics he scourges the monastic life as he knew it. The Expugnatio Hibernim is the most important of his historical works. In De jure et stato Menevensis ecclesia he seeks to justify his claims to the bishopric. The De rebus a se gestis, De inr vectionibus liber, and Speculum electorum (letters, poems, addresses) are autobiographical and display his vanity and self-confidence. There is an excellent complete edition of his works, ed. J. S. Brewer, J. F. Dimoek, and G. F. Warner (Rolls Series, no. 21, 8 vols., London, 1861-91). The Itinerarium Cambritv has been published with translation and sketch of his life by Sir R. C. Hoare (2 vols., London, 1804-06; the transl. is also in Bohn's Antiquarian Library, xli.).

(C. Schöll.)

Bibliography: A valuable work is J. Lynch, Cambrenaia Everaue, ed. M. Kelly, 3 vols., Dublin, 1848-52; also by the same editor, S. White, Apologia. pro Hibernia adveraua Cambri Calumniaa, ib. 1849. Consult Brewer's preface to the ed. of the works mentioned in the text; Lanigan, Beef. Hist., cf. Index; Gerold le Galloia, in Mémoires de facadEmxe sea sciences . . . de Ca en, 1887-88, pp. 117-180, 1889, pp. 3-73; H. Owen, Gerald the Welshman, London, 1889