Lawrence of Portugal was a

Franciscan The Franciscans are a group of related Mendicant orders, mendicant Christianity, Christian Catholic religious order, religious orders within the Catholic Church. Founded in 1209 by Italian Catholic friar Francis of Assisi, these orders include t ...

friar and an envoy sent by

Pope Innocent IV Pope Innocent IV ( la, Innocentius IV; – 7 December 1254), born Sinibaldo Fieschi, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 25 June 1243 to his death in 1254. Fieschi was born in Genoa and studied at the universitie ...

to the

Mongols The Mongols ( mn, Монголчууд, , , ; ; russian: Монголы) are an East Asian ethnic group native to Mongolia, Inner Mongolia in China and the Buryatia Republic of the Russian Federation. The Mongols are the principal membe ...

in 1245. A letter survives in the ''Register'' of Innocent IV, dating Lawrence's departure from

Lyon Lyon,, ; Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city and second-largest metropolitan area of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of t ...

to 5 March 1245. The letter, published in ''

Monumenta Germaniae Historica The ''Monumenta Germaniae Historica'' (''MGH'') is a comprehensive series of carefully edited and published primary sources, both chronicle and archival, for the study of Northwestern and Central European history from the end of the Roman Empire ...

'' and usually referred to as ''

Dei patris immensa __NOTOC__ ''Dei patris immensa'' was a letter written by Pope Innocent IV to the Mongols (the Pope also wrote other letters to the Mongols, which are known as ''Cum non solum'' and '' Viam agnoscere veritatis''). It was written on March 5, 1245, wa ...

'', suggests that his mission was primarily religious in character. Lawrence was to have approached the Mongols from the

Levant The Levant () is an approximate historical geographical term referring to a large area in the Eastern Mediterranean region of Western Asia. In its narrowest sense, which is in use today in archaeology and other cultural contexts, it is eq ...

. Nothing is known of his fate, and the possibility remains that he never left.Gregory G. Guzman, "Simon of Saint-Quentin and the Dominican Mission to the Mongol Baiju: A Reappraisal" ''Speculum'', Vol. 46, No. 2. (April., 1971), p. 234. A second Franciscan mission, led by

Giovanni da Pian del Carpine Giovanni da Pian del Carpine, variously rendered in English as ''John of Pian de Carpine'', ''John of Plano Carpini'' or ''Joannes de Plano'' (c. 11851 August 1252), was a medieval Italian diplomat, archbishop and explorer and one of the firs ...

, left Lyon on 16 April 1245 and arrived in the Mongol capital of

Karakorum Karakorum (Khalkha Mongolian: Хархорум, ''Kharkhorum''; Mongolian Script:, ''Qaraqorum''; ) was the capital of the Mongol Empire between 1235 and 1260 and of the Northern Yuan dynasty in the 14–15th centuries. Its ruins lie in the ...

more than a year later.

References

{{Authority control Portuguese Friars Minor Diplomats of the Holy See Portuguese explorers Explorers of Asia 13th-century explorers 13th-century Portuguese people 13th-century Roman Catholics Year of birth unknown Year of death unknown

See also

References