Francis Solanus was a 16th-century Spanish Franciscan friar and missionary who dedicated his life to evangelizing South America. Born in Montilla, Spain, he joined the Order of Friars Minor and lived a rigorous, penitential life. After serving as a preacher and confessor in Spain, he traveled to the New World in 1589. He spent two decades ministering to indigenous populations in regions such as Paraguay and Tucuman before eventually serving as a guardian in Lima, Peru, where he died in 1610.