Francis of Assisi: Early Documents, Volume I: The Saint (review)

Francis of Assisi: Early Documents, Volume I: The Saint. Edited by Regis J. Armstrong, O.F.M. Cap., J. A. Wayne Hellman, O.F.M. Conv., and William J. Short, O.F.M. (Hyde Park, New York: New City Press. 1999. Pp. 624; 11 colored maps. $49.00 cloth; $29.95 paper.)

At the end of the nineteenth century, the work of Sabatier, among others, stimulated interest in Franciscan sources. By mid-twentieth century the prompting of the Second Vatican Council to religious orders, urging that they be faithful to the spirit of their founders, gave further momentum to the work of Franciscan scholarship. The publication of Francis of Assisi: Omnibus of Sources in 1973 proved a landmark in the service not only of scholars but also of the English-speaking Franciscan family at large. The editors of Francis of Assisi: Early Documents envision a projected three-volume series, Volume I of which is here under consideration, as superseding the Omnibus at the threshold of the twenty-first century.

The volumes not only provide a chronological ordering of the texts but also situate Francis and the Franciscan movement according to what the editors describe as "underlying leitmotifs uniting the texts of each volume" (Vol. I, p. 12). In Volume I, The Saint, foundational texts celebrate the person of Francis of Assisi in the years 1228-1238. The succeeding volumes reveal the formation of the movement, 1240-1276 (Volume II: The Founder), and the later, often controversial years of development in the fourteenth century (Volume III: The Prophet).

Notable is the General Introduction (Vol. I, pp. 11-31), which serves not only to introduce the series but also grounds the reader in the Franciscan movement and its historiography. The editors also provide an introduction to each major work or cluster of texts.

The first volume offers new translations of familiar texts as well as translations of works previously unavailable in modern English. For example, the reader will recognize the writing of Celano anew but discover the epic Versified Life of St. Francis by Henri d'Avranches. The editors caution that the series cannot claim to be exhaustive, noting the omission of Bartholomew of Pisa, The Conformity of the Life of the Blessed Francis to the Life of the Lord Jesus, and indicating their hope for a translation of this neglected but significant fourteenth-century work as a future undertaking (Vol. I, p. 31, n. 71).

An appendix with a useful gazetteer and maps concludes this first volume. One notices the need for sharper proofreading in future reprints. For some scholars, the apparatus may not suffice, but the wide audience for which these translations are intended will be well served. The wait for a complete index to the series at the end of Volume III should be brief. English translation of the texts, the work of many contributors, proves reliable over all, despite the special challenge of poetic verse.

Those who have looked forward to this long-awaited series, as well as those new to Franciscan texts, will find much to appreciate and applaud here. The documents limn Francis and the Franciscan movement as well as provide entry to medieval culture, from spirituality to popular religion.

Kenneth M. Capalbo, O.F.M.
Office of the Provincial
St. Louis, Missouri

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