LEMMENS, LEONHARD. - Franciscan, born at Bocket (Rhineland) on 19 Nov. 1864, died at Rome on 10 Feb. 1929. In 1899 he was called to Rome to continue the *Annales Minorum* of Wadding; in 1901 he moved to teaching history at the College of St. Anthony (later the Pontifical Antonian Athenaeum), and from 1903 to 1906 at Quaracchi as president and prefect of studies at the College of St. Bonaventure. Returning to Germany in 1907, he undertook various scholarly journeys to Russia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Austria, France, and in 1914 to the Holy Land, where his presence was invaluable in saving several Franciscan sites in Syria from Turkish threat. From 1921 he was general archivist of the Order, and from 1924 professor of the history of missions at the College of St. Anthony.
As a man of culture, he took an active part in debates on early Franciscan literature. His literary output is rich and of high value, notable for critical editions of medieval texts (the writings of St. Francis, of Brother Leo, the *Speculum perfectionis*, etc.), of documents: *Acta S. Congregationis de propaganda Fide pro terra Sancta* (2 vols., Quaracchi 1921-22), the life of St. Bonaventure (1909 in German, 1921 in Italian), and above all his valuable *Geschichte der Franziskanermissionen* (Münster in W. 1929).