One of the anecdotes about the life of St Francis of Assisi concerns his doubts about whether his vocation was to carry the Gospel to the piazze of his native Umbria or to be a hermit living in isolated places, pledged to a life of contemplation. When he enlisted the prayers of St Clare at San Damiano and Fr Sylvester on Monte Subasio, their answer was that he should espouse the apostolate of preaching. None the less, while he followed this advice, his attraction to the eremitical life persisted and his preaching tours were interspersed with periods of prolonged prayer in remote locations, culminating in the reception of the stigmata in September 1224. Some of this tension between the active and contemplative life was communicated to his followers whose early communities were often associated with hermitages, whence they emerged to evangelise the towns. The ways in which the friars responded to the devotional roots of their vocation are addressed in this attractive volume, the fourth in the series concerning the Franciscans in the Middle Ages. This monograph is edited by Timothy J. Johnson and its sixteen contributors include many of the most distinguished figures in the scholarship on the Franciscan order.

The five sections of this book address the early witnesses to prayer; contemplation and the academy; mysticism, orthodoxy and polemics; the portals to the sacred; and traditions in time. The book commences with Michael Blastic's examination of the theme of prayer in the writings of the inspirational founder and concludes with William Short's study of the place of recollection among the sixteenth-century friars in Spain. The intervening contributions examine the place of prayer in the writings of St Clare of Assisi, the hagiography of Thomas of Celano, St Bonaventure in three contributions, John Duns Scotus, Angela of Foligno, Iacopone da Todi, the Beguins, Alsono de Espina, eremitical prayer, the images of prayerful ascent in the upper basilica of St Francis in Assisi, liturgical prayer and treatises on prayer produced by friars. This collection of studies offers a treasure trove of information about major figures in the order's history and it illuminates many aspects of that tradition. The contributions on scholastic friars demonstrate the way in which the Franciscan school strove to dovetail theological study with a prayerful spirit intent on wisdom rather than the mere accumulation of knowledge. The canonisation of Bonaventure da Bagnoregio and the beatification of John Duns Scotus exemplify the spirit in which the friars undertook their teaching in the schools and universities in the thirteenth century.

While the scholastic training of the friars has generated much admirable research over the last century, other aspects of their training have attracted less attention. This defect is remedied by Bert Roest's splendid study which is entitled ‘The disciple of the heart: pedagogies of prayer in medieval Franciscan works of religious instruction’. The contemplative dimension to the friars' lives is stressed before Roest goes on to deal specifically with the literature prepared for novices. The earliest extant constitutions of the order laid down guidelines for newcomers to the order: they were to be weaned from secular ways and groomed in the discipline and traditions of the religious life after the insights of their canonised founder. A small group of friars produced materials for the guidance of those who were new to the religious life. Prominent among these was David of Augsburg, who filled the post of master of novices for three decades. The chapters of his Formula de compositione hominis exterioris ad novitios are summarised. Bonaventure's brief treatise, Regula ad novitios, one of the least studied parts of his corpus of writings, is also introduced. Another contributor to this genre was Bernard of Besse's Speculum disciplinae, which was also compiled for the edification of novices. The appeal of some of these texts can be gauged by the appearance of vernacular translations; there were German translations of some of the writings of David of Augsburg. This fine study closes with an exploration of comparable literature circulating among the members of the Capuchin reform, especially in the sixteenth century.

Bonaventure's Legenda maior observes that the cross was St Francis's only book and the focal point of his meditations (iv. 3). Scenes of the crucifixion were a central feature of Franciscan churches, as the constitutions of Narbonne ordained in 1260. Beautiful crucifixes, best exemplified by Giunta Pisano's cross which is now in the museo di Santa Maria degli Angeli (Fig. 13), were commissioned for these churches, whose number multiplied in the later thirteenth century. The decoration of the friars' church of Santa Croce in Florence forms the basis of Amanda D. Quantz's stimulating study entitled ‘At prayer in the shadow of the tree of life’. She shows how Bonaventure's Lignum vitae provides ample material for Christians who applied the lessons of the cross to the trials of urban life. Taddeo Gaddi's lignum vitae, executed for the refectory at Santa Croce (Fig. 1), provided the friars with food for their meditations and prayers as well as a practical history of their order. This theme was also developed by both the monastic and other mendicant orders who depicted their founders wrapped in devotion at the foot of the cross. There are some typographical errors: ‘can ultimate’ for ultimately, p. 56; ‘anew in [the] life of the faithful person, p. 57; ‘Apula’ for Apulia, p. 66; a ‘wondering’ preacher for wandering preaching, p. 76; Francis's canonisation occurred on 16 July 1228 rather than on 19 July of that year, p. 87 n. 145; Dominican, and the Dominican martyr, Peter of Verona, pp. 287–8; ‘better know’ for ‘better known’, p. 311; Innocent iii was pope from 1198 to 1216 and not 1201, p. 387; ‘vane’ thoughts instead of vain, p. 419; ‘it's’ significance rather than its, p. 447.