- The Letters of Adam Marsh
The current volume is the continuation and conclusion of an edition and translation project that has been received favorably because of the quality of the textual criticism and the English rendering of the Latin (and to a small degree also French) texts. The second volume, which contains letters no. 110 to no. 245, offers a continuation of the text without further introductory remarks. The correspondence represents its writer’s wide range of interests and extensive network of correspondents, including Queen Eleanor; Sanchia, her sister and countess of Cornwall; Eleanor de Montfort, countess of Leicester; Aymer de Valence, half-brother of King Henry III; Simon de Montfort, earl of Leicester; Peter, count of Savoy; John of Lexington, steward of the royal household; and Sewal de Bovill, archbishop of York. The twenty letters in this volume addressed either to Simon de Montfort or to Eleanor, [End Page 105] his wife and sister of King Henry III, are testimony of the intense contact between them and the Franciscan scholar. Further letters were sent to two Franciscan ministers general, Blessed John of Parma and St. Bonaventure of Bagnoregio, and to the English provincial, William of Nottingham, who received at least thirty-nine letters. Not all letters to aristocratic correspondents deal with the great affairs of state. It is true that the friar Adam Marsh tried to help overcome Henry III’s resistance to the appointment of a new bishop of St. Asaph in 1249 (no. 124) and that he informed Simon de Montfort of his conversation with the king about the earl’s affairs (no. 138). However, Marsh knew the limits of his influence. Much of his correspondence to magnates focuses on issues such as a request to return the vicar of the chancellor of Salisbury after the earl of Leicester had taken the vicar abroad. The vicar had the cure of souls in Odiham, and his absence left the village without an adequate ministry. Other letters feature cryptic admonitions to the earl to maintain the peace in his household or to control his steward (no. 141). For some of these letters it would have been helpful if further detail on the particular issues had been provided. It should be noted, however, that in many instances the editor provides helpful references to personal names and placenames as well as additional information on events.
Although the material is not unknown—the letters were published for the first time in the nineteenth century—they offer insights into Franciscan life and work in thirteenth-century England that are not provided by other sources. Marsh’s fame could be converted into influence and patronage, and letters with requests for assistance to relatives and other people close to him form another important part of the collection. They deal mostly with petitions for help with career development; exoneration of ill officials from the duties and burdens of their office; and even admonitions to repay debts, as the friar attempted to mediate between the particular parties with the hope to avoid litigation. To his English confrères, Marsh was not merely a prominent intellectual. They also wanted to use his contacts and apparently asked him to intervene on behalf of outsiders, as Marsh stated in a letter to William de Beauchamp, sheriff of Worcestershire and a member of one of the kingdom’s great aristocratic families (no. 148).This example of the petitioner as recipient of petitions from his fellow friars reveals a hierarchy that had emerged among the Franciscans by the middle of the thirteenth century. Bonaventure held Marsh in high esteem. Although they planned to meet, it never occurred, and the English friar’s sphere of influence does not seem to have exceeded the boundaries of his province. His request for confirmation of the re-election of his friend William of Nottingham as English provincial minister in 1254 was not granted because the general chapter of that year had already absolved William from office...