LAURENTIUS

laurentius, paul (1554-1624), lutheran divine, was born on the 30th of march 1554 at ober wierau, where his father, of the same names, was pastor. from a school at zwickau he entered (1573) the university of leipzig, graduating in 1577. in 1578 he became rector of the martin school at halberstadt; in 1583 he was appointed town's preacher at plauen-im-vogtland, and in 1586 superintendent at oelnitz. on the 20th of october 1595 he took his doctorate in theology at jena, his thesis on the _symbolum athanasii_ (1597), gaining him similar honours at wittenberg and leipzig. he was promoted (1605) to be pastor and superintendent at dresden, and transferred (1616) to the superintendence at meissen, where he died on the 24th of february 1624. his works consist chiefly of commentaries and expository discourses on prophetic books of the old testament, parts of the psalter, the lord's prayer and the history of the passion. in two orations he compared luther to elijah. besides theological works he was the author of a _spicilegium gnomonologicum_ (1612). the main authority is c. schlegel, the historian of the dresden superintendents (1698), summarized by h. w. rotermund, in the additions (1810) to jocher, _gelehrten-lexicon_ (1750). (a. go.*) lauria (luria or loria) roger de (d. 1305), admiral of aragon and sicily, was the most prominent figure in the naval war which arose directly from the sicilian vespers. nothing is really known of his life before he was named admiral in 1283. his father was a supporter of the hohenstaufen, and his mother came to spain with costanza, the daughter of manfred of beneventum, when she married peter, the eldest son and heir of james the conqueror of aragon. according to one account bella of lauria, the admiral's mother, had been the foster mother of costanza. roger, who accompanied his mother, was bred at the court of aragon and endowed with lands in the newly conquered kingdom of valencia. when the misrule of charles of anjou's french followers had produced the famous revolt known as the sicilian vespers in 1282, roger de lauria accompanied king peter iii. of aragon on the expedition which under the cover of an attack on the moorish kingdom of tunis was designed to be an attempt to obtain possession of all or at least part of the hohenstaufen dominions in naples and sicily which the king claimed by right of his wife as the heiress of manfred. in 1283, when the island had put itself under the protection of peter iii. and had crowned him king, he gave the command of his fleet to roger de lauria. the commission speaks of him in the most laudatory terms, but makes no reference to previous military services. from this time forward till the peace of calatabellota in 1303, roger de lauria was the ever victorious leader of fleets in the service of aragon, both in the waters of southern italy and on the coast of catalonia. in the year of his appointment he defeated a french naval force in the service of charles of anjou, off malta. the main object before him was to repel the efforts of the angevine party to reconquer sicily and then to carry the war into their dominions in naples. although roger de lauria did incidental fighting on shore, he was as much a naval officer as any modern admiral, and his victories were won by good manoeuvring and by discipline. the catalan squadron, on which the sicilian was moulded, was in a state of high and intelligent efficiency. its chiefs relied not on merely boarding, and the use of the sword, as the french forces of charles of anjou did, but on the use of the ram, and of the powerful cross-bows used by the catalans either by hand or, in case of the larger ones, mounted on the bulwarks, with great skill. the conflict was in fact the equivalent on the water of the battles between the english bowmen and the disorderly chivalry of france in the hundred years' war. in 1284 roger defeated the angevine fleet in the bay of naples, taking prisoner the heir to the kingdom, charles of salerno, who remained a prisoner in the hands of the aragonese in sicily, and later in spain, for years. in 1285 he fought on the coast of catalonia one of the most brilliant campaigns in all naval history. the french king philippe le hardi had invaded catalonia with a large army to which the pope gave the character of crusaders, in order to support his cousin of anjou in his conflict with the aragonese. the king, peter