Editing Franciscans (section)

====Reform of Johannes de Vallibus====
This was founded in the hermitage of St. Bartholomew at Brugliano near [[Foligno]] in 1334. The congregation was suppressed by the Franciscan general chapter in 1354; reestablished in 1368 by Paolo de' Trinci of Foligno; confirmed by Gregory XI in 1373, and spread rapidly from Central Italy to France, Spain, Hungary, and elsewhere. Most of the Observantist houses joined this congregation by degrees, so that it became known simply as the "brothers of the regular Observance." 

It acquired the favor of the popes by its energetic opposition to the heretical [[Fraticelli]], and was expressly recognized by the 1415 [[Council of Constance]]. It was allowed to have a special vicar-general of its own and legislate for its members without reference to the conventual part of the Order. Through the work of such men as [[Bernardino of Siena]], [[Giovanni da Capistrano]], and [[Dietrich Coelde]] (b. 1435? at Munster; was a member of the [[Brethren of the Common Life]], died December 11, 1515), it gained great prominence during the 15th century. By the end of the Middle Ages, the Observantists, with 1,400 houses, comprised nearly half of the entire Order. 

Their influence brought about attempts at reform even among the Conventuals, including the quasi-Observantist brothers living under the rule of the Conventual ministers (Martinianists or ''Observantes sub ministris''), such as the male Colletans, later led by Boniface de Ceva in his reform attempts principally in France and Germany; the reformed congregation founded in 1426 by the Spaniard Philip de Berbegal and distinguished by the special importance they attached to the little hood ({{lang|la|cappuciola}}); the Neutri, a group of reformers originating about 1463 in Italy, who tried to take a middle ground between the Conventuals and Observantists, but refused to obey the heads of either, until they were compelled by the pope to affiliate with the regular Observantists, or with those of the Common Life; the Caperolani, a congregation founded about 1470 in North Italy by [[Pietro Caperolo|Peter Caperolo]], but dissolved again on the death of its founder in 1481; the Amadeists, founded by the noble Portuguese Amadeo, who entered the Franciscan order at Assisi in 1452, gathered around him a number of adherents to his fairly strict principles (numbering finally twenty-six houses), and died in the odor of sanctity in 1482.