CAPISTRANO, SAINT JOHN OF Italian theologian and inquisitor, was born in Capistrano in the Abruzzi. He became a magistrate, but on the death of his wife (1416) , joined the Franciscans where, under the direction of Bernardino of Sienna, he defended the ideal of strict observance. He was charged with various missions by Eugenius IV. and Nicholas V.; as legate or inquisitor, he persecuted the last Fraticelli of Ferrara, the Jesuati of Venice, the Jews of Sicily, Moldavia and Poland, and, above all, the Hussites of Germany, Hungary and Bohemia ; his aim in the last case was to prohibit conferences between the representatives of Rome and the Bohemians, for every attempt at conciliation seemed to him to be conniving at heresy. After the taking of Constantinople, he gathered troops for a crusade against the Turks (1455), which at least helped to raise the siege of Belgrade, then blockaded by Mohammed II. He died on Oct. 23, 1456, and was canonized in 169o.
See E. Jacob, Johannes von Capistrano (Breslau, 19o3—o5) ; and Dict. de Theol. Cath. (i904)•