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Origin of the Franciscan Order in Colombia
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 December 2015
Extract
The Renowned Tertiary of St. Francis, Christopher Columbus, aided by another tertiary, Queen Isabel of Castile, and the Franciscans of La Rábida, discovered the New World on October 12, 1492. It is not established whether or not on his first journey he was accompanied by a priest, although there are several statements to this effect; but it is now historically certain, with the investigations of Father Angel Ortega, O.F.M., that on his second voyage (1493) the Admiral was accompanied by the Franciscans, Fray Rodrigo Pérez, Fray Juan Bermejo and Fray Juan Tisín, and, quite probably, Fray Juan Pérez also (the Guardian of La Rábida, who was the first to recognize and patronize his genius), as well as Fray Antonio de Marchena, cosmographer, Provincial and his counsellor at the Court. Of the latter the Admiral later wrote to the Catholic Kings: “To him Your Majesties owe the possession of the Indies.” These were the auspicious beginnings of the Seraphic Order in the New World.
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- Copyright © Academy of American Franciscan History 1949
References
* Editor’s note: For a discussion of all phases of the relations of Columbus with the Franciscans, the reader is referred to the article by Francis Borgia Steck, O.F.M., “Christopher Columbus and the Franciscans,” THE AMERICAS, III, 3 (January, 1947), 319–341.
1 Ortega, Angel O.F.M., La Rábida, Historia Monumental Crítica (Sevilla, 1925), II, 333.Google Scholar
2 Ibid.
3 Simón, Pedro O.F.M., Noticias Historiales de las conquistas de Tierra Firme en las Indias Occidentales (Bogotá, 1892), III, 220. (For a knowledge of the history of the Province of Colombia, this work of Padre Simón is indispensable.)Google Scholar
4 Ortega, op. cit., III, 226.
5 For the various early missions in Colombia, cf. Ortega, op. cit., loc. cit.
6 Colección de Libros y Documentos referentes a la Historia de América (Madrid, 1904–1919), XIV, 245–246. Cf. also Archivo Ibero-Americano, XX, 102–103.
7 Esteban de Asensio, O.F.M., Historia Memorial (edited by Atanasio López, O.F.M., in Archivo Ibero-Americano, XV, 67–94; 129–151), 74.
8 Ibid.
9 Francisco de Ocaña, Relación acerca del presente feliz estado de las Indias Occidentales (1635), edited by J. M. Pou y Martí, O.F.M., in Archivo Ibero-Americano, XXX, 33–34.
10 Torquemada, Juan de O.F.M., Monarchia Indiana (Madrid, 1723), Part III, ch. vii, p. 12.Google Scholar
11 Francisco de Ocaña, O.F.M., op. cit., loc. cit., 52.
12 Sospitello, Dominicus de Gubernatis a O.F.M., Orbis Seraphicus (Rome, 1684), IV, 399.Google Scholar
13 Gonzaga, Franciscus O.F.M., De Origine Seraphicae Religionis Franciscanae ejusque progressibus (Rome, 1582), IV, 1311.Google Scholar
14 Francisco de Ocaña, O.F.M., op. cit., loc. cit., 52, note 5.
15 Manuale Historiae Ordinis Fratrum Minorum (Freiburg, 1906), Bk. I, Part II, 353.
16 Origen de la Santa Provincia de los Doce Apóstoles del Perú. Tomo II. MS bearing the following explanatory legend: “Su autor el Reverendo P. Lector Jubilado, Doctor Teólogo por la Real Pontificia Universidad de San Marcos de Lima, excustodio i Cronista de dicha santa Provincia de los Doce Apóstoles, Fray Fernando Rodríguez Tena. Escrito en la ciudad de Lima, año de MDCCLXXIII.”
17 The original canonical title of the Custody of Peru was not “Madre de Dios,” which was the civil title of the provinces, but “The Peruvian Custody,” as the General Chapter of Nice, in the year 1535, expressed it officially in these formal words: “Custodia Peruviana vocabitur” (Gubernatis, op. cit., III, 282). Wadding, in giving the decree of the Chapter of Nice, confirms this when he says: “in regno Peruviano nova instituitur custodia, sub titulo Peruviae” (Annales Minorum, Quaracchi, 1933, XVI, 457). In the course of time, naturally, another name may have been given. That, upon becoming a province, it was called not “the Province of Peru” (its original canonical title), but the “Province of the Twelve Apostles,” or at least that it had this name before the division into four provinces, is clear from the testimony of the General Chapter of Valladolid (1565): “Ciuitas Regum … cum toto districtu Audientiae erit Prouincia duodecim Apostolorum; in qua reservatur nomen antiquum” (cf. text cited in full infra.)
18 Op. cit., 1311.
19 Op. cit., XX, 267.
20 Registro 15, part III, Document I. It is dated at Santiago de Chile and signed by the Provincial, Fray Melchor Elorregui, with the author.
21 Córdoba, Antonio S. C. O.F.M., Síntesis histórica de la Provincia franciscana del Rio de la Plata (Manuscript, 1943).Google Scholar
22 Gubernatis, op. cit., III, 353, col. 1. This decree we shall present in its entirety infra.
23 Ibid.
24 Op. cit., chap. II, 74–75.
25 Marion A. Habig, O.F.M., says (THE AMERICAS, II, 2 [October, 1945], 198) that upon the erection of the Province of, the Twelve Apostles, the Custody of Santa Fe was made dependent on it. However, the truth is that the General Chapter of Salamanca of 1553, according to the Chronologia Historico legalis (Naples, 1650) of Father Michael of Naples, does not mention this important fact; even though Gonzaga (op. cit., 1321) writes: “illique annexa” (“joined to it”), referring to the Custody of Quito in relation to that of Lima, and though the list of the General Chapter of 1565 expressly says in regard to the Province of Peru: “dividitur in quinque prouincias.”
26 Gubernatis, op. cit., III, 369, col. 2.
27 Op. cit., chap. IV, 77–78.
28 Simón, op. cit., II, 7th Noticia, chap. II.
29 Chap. I.
30 Op. cit., XVIII, 290.
31 Op. cit., chap. IV, 77–78.
32 Ibid., chap. XXXV, 139–140.
33 Archivo Franciscano de Santa Fe, Legajo of 36 folios, sig. A, Leg. 1 de la letr. D., n. 3.
34 Ibid. Since in the MS copy of this report preserved in the Archivo Franciscano de Santa Fe (cf. footnote 33 supra), the statement (parecer) of the Audiencia is missing, we present here the report as published in the Archivo Ibero-Americano, XXI, 26–63.
35 Ibid., XXI, 45–46.
36 Op. cit., III, 155.
37 Ibid., III, 187.
38 “Exposición de Servicios del P. Aguado,” MS in the Archivo General de Indias, Sevilla. Santa Fe, Sec. 5, VIII.
39 MS in the Archivo de Santo Domingo: “Historia Civil,” t. VII, fols. 22–23. Published in Boletín de Historia de Cartagena, I, 12.
40 “Descripción oficial de 30 de mayo de 1610.” In the Colección de Documentos inéditos del Archivo de Indias (Madrid, 1868), IX, 442.
41 Asensio, op. cit., chap. XXXV, 139.
42 Op. cit., III, chap. I.
43 Ibid, III, 160–161.
44 Op. cit., chap. 28, 131.
45 Wadding, op. cit., XX, 516.
46 Wadding mistakenly gives this as Tubuth. See his version of this “Tabula”, op. cit., XX, 22.
47 Tabula Capituli Generalis. Printed in 10 folios (Rome, 1572). Cf. Registro XXXVII of the Archivo de la Provincia de los Doce Apostoles.
48 Asensio was not the first Provincial, as Habig says (THE AMERICAS, loc. cit., 199), but the Commissary who put into effect the decree of the Chapter, and the presiding officer of the Chapter of 1566 which elected Padre Jiménez the first Provincial. As we have already said, no history of the Province of Santa Fe can be written without reference to the work of Padre Simón, and Father Habig, since he fails to cite it in his bibliographical note, evidently did not have it at hand.
49 Op. cit., chap. 8, 79–80.