In this dissertation I examine the missionary experiences of Franciscan friars in the lands of Islam—including a number that resulted in martyrdom—and the ways that Franciscans remembered, elaborated and transformed these encounters through the construction of a martyrology developed in literature, liturgy and images from c. 1220 to c. 1440. I seek to illuminate these particular Christian-Muslim interactions, while suggesting the broader significance of martyrology in Franciscan life and thought in this period. While often contrasted with the crusades, these missionary encounters were themselves episodes of interconfessional conflict, raising issues of blasphemy, apostasy and martyrdom. Francis of Assisi directly engaged in this conflict in his effort to follow the footsteps of Christ in the lands of Islam; and while he sought to circumscribe missionary action and the witness of martyrdom, he left a difficult legacy for his followers. Contextual examination of subsequent episodes of missionary martyrdom reveals that these events often took place in climates of social unrest and even open violence between Christian and Muslim communities. Though initially grounded in expressly evangelical terms, Franciscans developed their martyrology within the confrontational mentality of the crusading era. In their discussions of martyrdom Franciscans combined their evangelical zeal and active work in the Holy Land with contemplative interests closely associated with the order, namely, meditations and devotions focusing on the passion of Christ. Franciscans heralded their unparalleled commitment to martyrdom in the process of justifying their religious vocation and the place of their institution within the Church, defending themselves from the internal and external challenges that confronted the order throughout this period. Such preoccupations with martyrdom distinguished the Friars Minor from their Dominican contemporaries. I argue that the martyrology developed by the Franciscans over these two centuries was neither a direct product of Francis, nor a betrayal of his interests, but rather an evolving Franciscan tradition fusing evangelical missiology with institutional martyrology. As this tradition took shape during the later part of the fourteenth century, Franciscan chroniclers came to project the history of their missionary efforts through the lens martyrology, privileging the extreme act of voluntary provoked martyrdom as a central expression of Franciscan missionary witness and part of the legacy of St. Francis, an interpretation reiterated by later generations of Franciscans.

I begin with an analysis of the missionary ideals of Francis of Assisi in the context of earlier Christian missionary traditions and encounters with Islam. In my second chapter I examine the ways in which Franciscan hagiographers, including Thomas of Celano and Bonaventure, elaborated upon Francis’s missionary experience, linking his mission and exposure to martyrdom with his reception of the wounds of the stigmata, establishing an enduring motif linking Francis with martyrdom. I then look at the missions of the early Franciscans martyred in North Africa in the 1220s, tracing the legacy of the Franciscan ‘Protomartys’ through the figure of St. Anthony of Padua, who converted to the order through their example. I show how thirteenth-century Franciscan martyrology intersected with crusading interests. Next I examine missions across Mongol Asia, c. 1290-1340. Focusing on the martyrdom of four Franciscans at Thana, India, I show how Franciscans translated this experience from India to Italy, noting the important role of the famous travelogue of Odorico da Pordenone, while distinguishing the different ways that the disputing factions of Spiritual and Conventual Franciscans appropriated these ideas at this time. In my last chapter I discuss missionary activities in Mamluk Egypt, Syria and the Holy Land, c. 1350-1440, charting the formation of a more aggressive promotion of voluntary martyrdom as demonstrated in the martyrdom of Nikola Taveliæ and companions at Jerusalem in 1391, and in later reiterations of this approach by figures such as Alberto da Sarteano and those behind an anonymous Tractatus de martyrio, c. 1437. In an epilogue I trace out implications of this Franciscan martyrial tradition in two formal canonizations of Franciscan martyrs in 1481 and in 1970.