This volume has assembled a group of scholars eminently qualified to assess the influence of William of Ockham on his contemporaries and successors. The critics of Ockham covered are Walter Chatton (Sonja Schierbaum), William Crathorn (Aurélien Robert); Ps-Richard of Campsall and Richard Brinkley (Laurent Cessali); John Wyclif (Alessandro Conti); Walter Burley (Nathaniel Bulthuis); John Buridan (Thomas Dewender); Gregory of Rimini (Isabelle Mandrella); Nicole Oresme (Stefano Caroti); Peter of Candia (Stephen Brown); Francis of Prato (Christian Rode); Stephan of Rieti (Fabrizio Amerini). The last article (Isabel Iribarren) deals with Ockham's dealings, principally with Pope John xxii, during his sojourn in Avignon between 1324 and 1328 after which he fled from Aigues-Mortes in the company of Francis of Aesculo and Michael Cesena.

The principal foci of Ockham's critics were his theory of cognition and his Logic regarding signification, supposition and appellation. Regarding his epistemology, this reviewer would have preferred that Ockham be ‘labelled’ a conceptualist as the ‘founder’ of twentieth-century studies on Ockham, Philotheus Boehner, had suggested. It may be of interest to note that Philotheus Boehner ofm had to flee Germany having preached against Hitler. He was invited to be a professor specialising in the thought of Ockham at Toronto's Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies by Étienne Gilson. However, once Canada had declared war on Germany Boehner became a persona non grata and ‘migrated’ to St Bonaventure University where he was the co-founder of the Franciscan Institute. It was Boehner's preliminary research which laid the groundwork for the critical editions of Ockham's philosophical and theological works (Franciscan Institute Publications 1974–86).

Ockham's view, that universals qua universal were gleaned from similar individuals and were simply mental constructs and as such had no extra-mental ontological existence, was regularly opposed by the ‘realists’ such as Walter Burley. Similarly, the Venerable Inceptor's view that relations had no extra-mental existence, pace Henry of Ghent who held that creatures were related to God by ‘real’ relations whereas God to creatures by relations of reason. Ockham had been summoned to a provincial chapter to explain his view on relations which he subsequently defended in his Quodlibet vi (G. Etzkorn, ‘Ockham at Avignon: his response to critics’, Franciscan Studies lix [2001], 9–19).

As far as this reviewer could tell, Ockham's opponents, while disagreeing on many points of cognition and logic, were also often in agreement in such matters with their fellow nominalist.

Regarding the last article, Isabel Iribarren's ‘Ockham and the Avignon papacy’ reference might have been made to Nicolaus Minorita's Chronica (ed. G. Gal-D. Flood, Franciscan Institute Publications 1996, p. l85) which documents the presence of Ockham, Francis of Esculo, Michael Cesena and Bonagratia de Pergamo in Avignon. Likewise since much of Ockham's dispute had to do with whether Christ and the Apostles owned property or simply had the use of the goods of the earth, reference might have been made to the ‘pseudo’ debate organised by Pope John xxii where the Franciscans were pitted against the secular masters, the Dominicans, the Benedictines, the Cistercians, the Augustinians and the Carmelites where the outcome was a foregone conclusion, as found (among others) in cod. Vat. Lat. 3740 (cf. G. Etzkorn, Iter Vaticanum Franciscanum, New York–Leiden 1996, 41–7).

Finally, in this reviewer's opinion, it would have been interesting had Claude Panaccio, Paul Spade and Sten Ebbesen been persuaded to contribute to this important survey of Ockham's legacy. If they could be so persuaded, their contributions could be matter for a subsequent study.