ABSTRACT
The brother in the infirmary, recalled in the Vitae fratrum, who took the pulse of a dying friar, was most likely to have reflected the presence in the Dominican convent of the frater medicus, the friar who was a physician. Any restrictions on medical practice by members of religious Orders in the mediaeval period have usually been associated with the prohibitions of church councils and it will be shown that many of the Dominican chapter acta did indeed strongly reflect the content of some parts of conciliar legislation. The involvement of the Dominican friars with medicine can be divided into three areas: their theoretical knowledge of medicine, their medical practice on secular patients, and the care of sick friars within the convent. A number of friars are understood to have been medici before entering the Order and it is among these that the practising physicians were most likely to be found.
