Remembering the Martyrdom of Saint Francis of Paola: History, Memory and Minim Identity in Seventeenth-Century France

Abstract

On April 7, 1562, Protestant forces sacked the Minim monastery on the grounds of the royal chateau at Plessis outside Tours in France. During the looting iconoclasts forced open the tomb of the order’s founder, Saint Francis of Paola, and burnt his remains. This study examines the processes through which oral accounts within the Minim community concerning the “martyrdom” of Saint Francis were committed to writing during the first quarter of the seventeenth century. It sheds new light on the relationship between individual, collective and historical memory in the formation of Minim identity and how the iconoclastic violence of the French religious wars was remembered by religious communities.