Hutter, Jacob

(d. 1536)

   Denomination Founder and Martyr.

   Hutter was the leader of an Anabaptist group which established settlements in Moravia. These were based on the ideals of pacifism and the common ownership of property. As Anabaptists they also refused to accept infant baptism and reintroduced the practice of believer’s baptism. The sect was much persecuted and Hutter himself died a martyr’s death three years after he had assumed the group’s leadership. It was forced to move from Moravia to Transylvania, then to the Ukraine and fi- nally to the United States of America. Small colonies still exist in South Dakota and more recently in Canada, where they are known as Hutterites.

   J.W. Bennett, Hutterian Brethren (1967);

   R. Friedman, Hutterite Studies (1961);

   G.H. Williams, The Radical Reformation (1962).