My project examines the establishment of a few Franciscan friars and female tertiaries in Jerusalem c.1291-1517. It explores the ways in which this small and largely powerless Christian group living under Islamic rule reshaped the decisions of virtually every great power of the Mediterranean, much as a well-placed pawn influences the moves of even the mightiest pieces on a chessboard. Considering the dynamics that developed between this puny Franciscan community and the kings, queens, bishops, knights, and towered city-states of the late medieval period, my project is a study of how the actions of the weak shape those of the strong. But as such, it is also a study of how the place of the weak can make them strong, how a pawn’s importance is defined by the square it occupies and how the square’s significance is determined by the state of the game. Vital to my work are unedited registers in the Vatican archives, which I seek to revisit with the aid of a Rome Prize to finish my book.