Roger Bacon writes Opus Majus

1267

Under a commission from Clement IV, the English Franciscan produced a sprawling treatise advocating experimental science, language study, and mathematical astronomy. He wrote it in secret against his order's hostility and sent it to the pope, who died before reading it. Bacon's insistence that observation and experiment outranked textual authority placed him centuries ahead of his time and earned him the suspicion of his superiors.