TOMMASO of PAVIA. - Franciscan chronicler, b. c. 1122 at Pavia, d. c. 1280. Biographical details come from his chronicle and that of Salimbene (MGH, Script., XXXII, pp. 429 sg.), with whom he lived for some time in Ferrara.
He taught theology at Parma, Bologna, and Ferrara; he attended the Council of Lyon in 1245. His travels took him to Romania, Dalmatia, Bohemia, and Germany. Elected minister of the Franciscan province of Tuscany around 1258, he resided almost always in that region. In September 1260 he was a witness to the battle of Montaperti, fought between the Ghibellines of Siena and the Guelphs of Florence. In 1267 he accompanied Charles I of Anjou on his expedition into Tuscany. Around 1278–79 he compiled the Gesta imperatorum et pontificum (MGH, Script., XXII, pp. 490–528). A respected orator, T. also composed, as Salimbene notes, a magnum opus in theology, which he himself called Bovis because of its size; it is found among the manuscripts of the Laurentian Library in Florence under the titles Dictiones et Dictionarium Bovis. The work is a vast alphabetical repertory of preachable topics. Also attributed to him is a fragment of the life of Stefano da Narni, companion of St. Francis (Archivum Francisci. Hist., 12 [1919], pp. 344–382–84). The attribution to him of the Dialogus de gestis s. Fr. Minorum and of the Legenda «Assidua» of St. Anthony of Padua lacks foundation.