John of Wales was an important Franciscan scholar active in the mid-to late thirteenth century. Until recently, we knew relatively little of his career, and although more intensive study of his works has enabled us to fill the gaps, we are still far from knowing the whole story. In this chapter I seek to detail all we know of John's career, and then to discuss the dating of some of his works.

First John's birth: as is often the case with medieval scholars, we know nothing of this. In John's case, Pantin estimated that it fell between 1210 and 1230. The appellation ‘John of Wales’ suggests that John was born a Welshman, and there is other evidence to support this. We know from a Cambridge MS that John belonged to the Franciscan custody of Worcester, which included North Wales. That John had some knowledge of Wales and the Welsh is also indicated by his spell as ambassador to Llewellyn in the 1280s.

A list of eminent entrants to the Franciscan Order describes John as a Bachelor of Theology from Oxford, so he was one of the many young scholars whom the Franciscans attracted during the early to mid-thirteenth century. We cannot date John's first arrival in Oxford, or his move into the Franciscan Order, but we can deduce that both occurred sometime before 1258.