Dithmar

, Ditmar, or Diethumar, bishop of Mersburgh, in Misuia, was the son of Sigefroy, count of Saxony, and was born in the year 976. In his eighteenth or twentieth year, he embraced the monastic life, in the convent of St. John of Magdeburgh; and after he had executed the office of prior in another religious house, the emperor Henry II. advanced him in 1018, to the bishopric of Mersburgh. In 1027 he began his Chronicle, in seven books, which includes the history of the emperors Henry I. Otto I. II. and III. and Henry II. which is thought to be very faithful and accurate. Reinar Reineccius published an edition of it at Francfort, in 1584, fol. with a life of the author; and it has been also added to the collection of the German historians. Other editions, Francfort, 1600, and Helmstadt, 1664, followed; but the best is that of Leibnitz, among his writers on the history of the house of Brunswick, Hanover, fol. It was also translated into German, and published in 1606, 4to. Dithmar, after holding his bishopric a little more than ten years, died Oct. 1, 1028, revered for his piety. ²