Andreas Helwig (Helwich, Helvigius) (1572–1643) was a German classical scholar and

linguist Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...

. His ''Origines dictionum germanicarum'' (1622) was a pioneer

etymological Etymology ( ) is the study of the origin and evolution of words—including their constituent units of sound and meaning—across time. In the 21st century a subfield within linguistics, etymology has become a more rigorously scientific study. ...

work of the

German language German (, ) is a West Germanic language in the Indo-European language family, mainly spoken in Western Europe, Western and Central Europe. It is the majority and Official language, official (or co-official) language in Germany, Austria, Switze ...

Life

Helwig was rector of the

University of Berlin The Humboldt University of Berlin (, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin, Germany. The university was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of Wilhelm von Humbol ...

from 1611 to 1614, then professor of poetry from 1614 to 1616. Subsequently he taught at the Gymnasium at

Stralsund Stralsund (; Swedish language, Swedish: ''Strålsund''), officially the Hanseatic League, Hanseatic City of Stralsund (German language, German: ''Hansestadt Stralsund''), is the fifth-largest city in the northeastern German federal state of Mecklen ...

.David Brady, ''The Contribution of British Writers Between 1560 and 1830 to the Interpretation of Revelation 13.16-18'' (1983), pp. 84-6.

Works

In 1602 he published a

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

etymological dictionary. In his period at Berlin, he published ''Antichristus Romanus'',''Antichristus Romanus, in proprio suo nomine, numerum illum Apocalypticum (DCLXVI) continente proditus'' (Wittenberg, 1612) an anti-papal work including the numerical formula identifying ''

Vicarius Filii Dei ''Vicarius Filii Dei'' (Latin: ''Vicar'' or ''Representative of the Son of God'') is a phrase first used in the forged medieval '' Donation of Constantine'' to refer to Saint Peter, who is regarded as the first Pope by the Catholic Church. Origin ...

'', an alleged title of the

Pope The pope is the bishop of Rome and the Head of the Church#Catholic Church, visible head of the worldwide Catholic Church. He is also known as the supreme pontiff, Roman pontiff, or sovereign pontiff. From the 8th century until 1870, the po ...

, reduced to its

Roman numerals Roman numerals are a numeral system that originated in ancient Rome and remained the usual way of writing numbers throughout Europe well into the Late Middle Ages. Numbers are written with combinations of letters from the Latin alphabet, eac ...

and summed to

666 666 may refer to: * 666 (number) * 666 BC, a year * AD 666, a year * The number of the beast, a reference in the Book of Revelation in the New Testament Places * 666 Desdemona, a minor planet in the asteroid belt * List of highways numbered 6 ...

. Brady mentions a theory of

Johann Christoph Wolf Johann Christoph Wolf (February 21, 1683, at Wernigerode – July 25, 1739, at Hamburg) was a German Christian Hebraist, polymath, and collector of books. He studied at Wittenberg, and traveled in Holland and England in the interest of science, c ...

that Helwig had already published this observation in an anonymous work of 1600. Such cryptograms were not uncommon; Brady comments on (from

Richard Bernard Richard Bernard (1568–1641) was an English Puritan clergyman and writer. Life Bernard was born in Epworth, England, Epworth and received his education at Christ's College, Cambridge, where he matriculated in 1592, obtained his BA in 1595, a ...

's ''Key of Knowledge'' of 1617) the phrase ''Generalis Dei Vicarius in Terris'' likewise treated, and

Thomas Beard Thomas Beard (d. 1632) was an English clergyman and theologian, of Puritan views. He is known as the author of ''The Theatre of Gods Judgements'', and the schoolmaster of Oliver Cromwell at Huntingdon. Life He was, it is believed, a native of Hu ...

’s 1625 permutation ''Vicarius Dei Generalis in Terris'', perhaps influenced by Helwig. This became ''Vicarius Dei Generalis in Terris'' with Hezekiah Holland in 1650. But interest in Helwig’s formulation has outlasted the others.

Notes

External links

Entries of Andreas Helwig
in

Rostock Matrikelportal The Rostock Matrikelportal (matriculation portal) disseminates about 186,000 individual-level datasets drawn from the student registers of the University of Rostock from its establishment in 1419 to today. Each entry is faithfully transcribed and l ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Helwig, Andreas 1572 births 1643 deaths 17th-century German scholars 17th-century German linguists People from Friedland, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern