Nikola Tavelić

Saint Nicholas Tavelic, O.F.M., and companions
Religious, priests and martyrs
Born	c. 1340 probably Šibenik, Kingdom of Croatia and Dalmatia
Died	November 14, 1391 Jerusalem, Mamluk Sultanate
Venerated in	Roman Catholic Church (Croatia & the Franciscan Order)
Beatified	1889 & 1966, Rome, Kingdom of Italy, & Vatican City, by Pope Leo XIII & Pope Paul VI
Canonized	June 21, 1970, Vatican City, by Pope Paul VI
Feast	November 14

Nicholas Tavelic (Croatian: Nikola Tavelić) was a Franciscan missionary who died a martyr's death in Jerusalem on November 14, 1391, a Croatian friar. He was beatified as part of Nicholas Tavelic, O.F.M. and companions, which included friars from Italy and France. All four members of his group have been declared saints by the Catholic Church, making Tavelic the first Croatian saint.

Most sources mention Šibenik as Tavelic's birthplace, but another possible location is Velim near Stankovci. In 1365, Tavelic became a friar in Bribir, the seat of the Šubić, a powerful Croatian noble family.

Tavelic was among 60 friars from various Franciscan provinces who answered an appeal by the Bosnian guardian, motivated by a papal bull, Prae cunctis, issued in 1291 by Pope Nicholas IV, himself a Friar Minor, to work as missionaries in Bosnia, combating the perceived heresies of the Bosnian Church. Tavelic spread Catholicism around Bosnia for 12 years. In his report to the pope, the Bosnian guardian later said that the missionaries converted around 50,000 members of that Church.

In 1384, Tavelic went to serve in the Custody of the Holy Land where he met the friars Deodatus Aribert of Rodez, Peter of Narbonne and of Cuneo. The four lived at the Monastery of Mount Zion, the ancient friary maintained by the Friars Minor in the city, where they spent several years learning Arabic and serving at the holy sites connected to Jesus' life, which had been entrusted to the care of the Order of Friars Minor and which still drew pilgrims from Christian Europe.

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Wikipedia