Saint Clare of Assisi was an Italian saint and one of the first followers of Saint Francis of Assisi. She founded the Order of Poor Ladies, a monastic religious order for women in the Franciscan tradition, and wrote their Rule of Life—the first set of monastic guidelines known to have been written by a woman. She is also known for her extreme devotion to poverty and her steadfast resistance to the attempts of the Roman Catholic Church to impose a rule on her order that would have allowed them to own property.