Heretical networks between East and West: the case of the Fraticelli

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article explores the links between the Franciscan heresy of the Fraticelli and the Latin territories of Greece in the thirteenth to the fifteenth centuries. It argues that the early involvement of Franciscan dissidents, like Angelo Clareno, with the lands of Latin Romania played an important role in the development of the Franciscan movement of dissent, on the one hand by allowing its enemies to associate them with the disobedient Greek Church and on the other by establishing havens where the dissidents were relatively safe from the persecution of the Inquisition and whence they were also able to send missionaries back to Italy to revive the movement there. In doing so, the article reviews all the known information about Fraticelli communities in Greece, and discovers two hitherto unknown references, demonstrating that the sect continued to exist in Greece during the Ottoman period, thus outlasting the Fraticelli communities of Italy.