BERTRANDO DE TURRE. - Franciscan, cardinal, homiletic writer, b. ca. 1265-70 into the noble family de la Tour at Camboulit near Figeac (Lot), d. at the end of 1332 or at the beginning of 1333. Having entered the Franciscan Order while still young, he studied at Toulouse and Paris, where he became Master in Theology. In 1314 he was regent master in the Order’s studium at Toulouse; from 1312 to 1319 he was Provincial of Aquitaine and as such in 1315 conducted the trial of five “Spirituals” (v.) in his province. John XXII on 29 Jan. 1317 sent him, together with Bernardo Guidonis, as a peace-maker to Upper Italy. The report which the two drew up on their legation was published by S. Riezler, Vatikanische Akten zur deutschen Geschichte (Innsbruck 1891, pp. 22-39), analyzed by A. Ratti [Pio XI] in Rendiconti del R. Istituto lombardo di scienze e lettere, 2a serie, 25 (1902), pp. 985-96. In 1318 the same two were charged with pacifying the Flemings with the French. Their missions met with little success. B. was appointed Archbishop of Salerno (3 Sept. 1320) and in the following December cardinal of S. Vitale, a title which in 1323 he exchanged for that of Tusculum (Frascati). He took part in the controversy over the poverty of Christ and the Apostles without losing the favour of John XXII, who appointed him administrator of the Franciscan Order (1328-29).
Among scholastics he bore the name of Doctor famosus, probably on account of his widely circulated homiletic works, partly edited: Sermones de tempore et de sanctis cum quadragesimali epistolari (2 vols. in 4°, Strasbourg 1501 under the pseudonym Berbardus Cura). Cardinal Pitra (Analecta novissima Spicilegii Solesmensis altera continuatio, II, Tusculum 1888, 466-512) lists the titles of the sermons contained in cod. Vat. lat. 1240-42. In the Strasbourg edition, I, f. cclxix sqq. are inserted 32 sermons on the Eucharist, which may perhaps be by St Albert the Great. A summary of the treatise on the poverty of Christ was edited by F. Tocco, La quistione della povertà nel secolo XIV (Napoli 1910, pp. 64-74).