The Early Story of Fra Anselm Turmeda

«O de les tres lletres mestre» : The search for knowledge of a 14th century Franciscan from Mallorca
Abstract by Mansur Boase:

This seminar about the early life, education and search for knowledge of the 14th century Franciscan Anselm Turmeda is on behalf of my late father Roger Boase whose final book is a biography of Turmeda's life. Born in Mallorca around 1353, Turmeda studied natural sciences and astrology in Lleida and theology in Bologna, before travelling to Tunis where he took the name Abdallah at-Tarjuman after his conversion to Islam. As an interpreter and customs official, he continued to engage with European merchants, through whom he passed on his writings in Catalan including his Cobles de la divisio del Regne de Mallorques and his Disputa de l'Ase, burned by the Inquisition but fortunately surviving in French translation. Although written in Tunis, these are profoundly Christian works, but promoting reformation ideas a century before the Reformation. Together with his 1423 autobiography in Arabic late in life, and a 1418 letter in Latin only re-discovered last year by Jaume Puig i Oliver, these offer snippets about his life and his intellectual journey from Franciscan astrologer and self-proclaimed doctor in Hebrew to his conversion to Islam. «O de les tres lletres mestre» or master of the three written languages is the epithet Turmeda uses for himself when addressed by the Lady signifying the island of Mallorca. I will discuss Turmeda’s origins in Mallorca, education at the University of Lleida and at the Franciscan monastery of Montblanc near Tarragona, and the intellectual doubt which set Turmeda on a path to Tunis.