Gruter (or Gruytère), JAN (1560-1627), a critic and scholar of Dutch parentage by his father’s side and English by his mother’s, was born at Antwerp on the 3rd of December 1560. To avoid religious persecution his parents while he was still young came to England; and for some years he prosecuted his studies at Cambridge, after which he went to Leiden, where he graduated M. A. In 1586 he was appointed professor of history at Wittenberg, but as he refused to subscribe the formula concordiae he was unable to retain his office. From 1589 to 1592 he taught at Rostock, after which he went to Heidelberg, where in 1602 he was appointed librarian to the university. He died at Heidelberg on the 20th of September 1627.
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).
