The Order of Saint Augustine, (Latin: Ordo Fratrum Sancti Augustini) abbreviated OSA, is a religious mendicant order of the Catholic Church. It was founded in 1244 by bringing together several eremitical groups in the Tuscany region who were following the Rule of Saint Augustine, written by Saint Augustine of Hippo in the fifth century.

At the time of the Grand Union of 1256, some of the constituent congregations already had houses established north of the Alps. The Williamites had already expanded into Hungary. The Hermits of St. Augustine spread rapidly, partly because they did not radiate from a single parent monastery, and partly because, after conflicts in the previously existing congregations, the active life was finally adopted by the greater number of communities, following the example of the Friars Minor and the Dominicans. A few years after the reorganization of the Augustinian Order, Hermit monasteries sprang up in Germany, and Spain. Foundations were made in Mainz (1260), Zurich (1270), and Munich (1294). The first Augustinian houses in France were in the area of Provence. In 1274 the Fratres Saccati were dissolved and the Augustinians were given a number of their houses. By 1275 there were about a half dozen friaries stretching in a line along the southern coast. Eventually, France had four Augustinian provinces.[6] The presence of the Augustinian Order can be dated securely in Venetian Candia to the early fourteenth century when they rebuilt the convent of San Salvatore in Heraklion.[7] At the period of its greatest prosperity the order comprised 42 ecclesiastical provinces and 2 vicariates numbering 2000 monasteries and about 30,000 members.[3]




Augustinian Order