THIETMAR

also spelled Dietmar, or Dithmar born July 25, 975, Hildesheim, Saxony [now in Germany] died Dec. 1, 1018, Merseburg, March of Thuringia bishop of Merseburg and chronicler whose history of the three Ottos and Henry II, Saxon kings of Germany and Holy Roman emperors, is an important medieval Saxon document. The son of John Siegfried, Graf von Walbeck, and a relative of the royal house, Thietmar spent his youth in Magdeburg, joined the brotherhood of the church of Magdeburg in 991, was made prior of the convent of Walbeck in 1002, and became bishop of Merseburg seven years later. Between 1012 and 1018 he wrote an eight-book chronicle based on German annals from 908 to 1018. Having accompanied Henry II on military expeditions against the Slavs, he attributed to him the recovery of Saxon lands from the Slavic peoples. He was one of the first scholars to employ the word Teutonici to distinguish the German people from non-Germans within the Holy Roman Empire and to develop a vague concept of imperialism in contrast to traditional tribalism.