Thomas of Celano (Italian: Tommaso da Celano; c. 1200 – c. 1265) was an Italian friar of the Franciscans (Order of Friars Minor), a poet, and the author of three hagiographies about Saint Francis of Assisi.Thomas was from Celano in Abruzzo. The first of his works on Francis was Vita Beati Francisci ("The Life of Blessed Francis", often called the "First Life"), a work on the saint's early life, commissioned by Pope Gregory IX in 1228 at the time Francis's canonization.