n many
lands the institution of blood-money, and the wergild offered the
wrong-doer a mode of escaping from his enemies' revenge. The Mosaic law
recognized the right of vengeance, but not the money-compensation. The
Koran, on the contrary, while sanctioning the vengeance, also permits
pecuniary commutation for murder.

AVENGERS, or VENDICATORI, a secret society formed about 1186 in Sicily to
avenge popular wrongs. The society was finally suppressed by King William
II., the Norman, who hanged the grand master and branded the members with
hot irons.

AVENTAIL, or AVANTAILLE (O. Fr. _esventail_, presumably from a Latin word
_exventaculum_, air-hole), the mouthpiece of an old-fashioned helmet,
movable to admit the air.

AVENTINUS (1477-1534), the name taken by JOHANN TURMAIR, author of the
_Annales Boiorum_, or _Annals of Bavaria_, from Aventinum, the Latin name
of the town of Abensberg, where he was born on the 4th of July 1477. Having
studied at Ingolstadt, Vienna, Cracow and Paris, he returned to Ingolstadt
in 1507, and in 1509 was appointed tutor to Louis and Ernest, the two
younger sons of Albert the Wise, the late duke of Bavaria-Munich. He
retained this position until 1517, wrote a Latin grammar, and other manuals
for the use of his pupils, and in 1515 travelled in Italy with Ernest.
Encouraged by William IV., duke of Bavaria, he began to write the _Annales
Boiorum_, about 1517, and finishing this book in 1521, undertook a German
version of it, entitled _Bayersche Chronik_, which he completed some years
later. He assisted to found the _Sodalitas litteraria Angilostadensis_,
under the auspices of which several old manuscripts were brought to light.
Although Aventinus did not definitely adopt the reformed faith, he
sympathized with the reformers and their teaching, and showed a strong
dislike for the monks. On this account he.was imprisoned in 1528, but his
friends soon effected his release. The remainder of his life was somewhat
unsettled, and he died at Regensburg on the 9th of January 1534. The
_Annales_, which are in seven books, deal with the history of Bavaria in
conjunction with general history from the earliest times to 1460, and the
author shows a strong sympathy for the Empire in its struggle with the
Papacy. He took immense pains with his work, and to some degree anticipated
the modern scientific method of writing history. The _Annales_ were first
published in 1554, but many important passages were omitted