Jan Gruter (Latinized Janus Gruterus) (3 December 1560 – 20 September 1627) was a Dutch

Netherlands

The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

 critic

Critic

A critic is anyone who expresses a value judgement. Informally, criticism is a common aspect of all human expression and need not necessarily imply skilled or accurate expressions of judgement. Critical judgements, good or bad, may be positive , negative , or balanced...

 and scholar.

Life

Jan Gruter was Dutch on his father's side and English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 on his mother's, and was born at Antwerp. To avoid religious persecution his parents came to England while he was a child, and for some years he studied at Caius College, Cambridge, after which he went to Leiden, where he graduated with an M.A.

Master of Arts (postgraduate)

A Master of Arts from the Latin Magister Artium, is a type of Master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The M.A. is usually contrasted with the M.S. or M.Sc. degrees...

In 1586, Gruter was appointed professor of history at the University of Wittenberg, but, as he refused to subscribe the formula concordiae, he lost his position. From 1589 to 1592, he taught at Rostock

University of Rostock

The University of Rostock is the university of the city Rostock, in the German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.Founded in 1419, it is the oldest and largest university in continental northern Europe and the Baltic Sea area...

, after which he went to Heidelberg, where in 1602 he was appointed librarian

Librarian

A librarian is an information professional trained in library and information science, which is the organization and management of information services or materials for those with information needs...

to the university.

Works

Gruter's chief works were his Inscriptiones antiquae totius orbis Romani (2 vols., Heidelberg, 1603), and Lampas, sive fax artium liberalium (7 vols., Frankfort, 1602–1634).