AUGUSTINS, or AUGUSTINIANS, one of the four mendicant orders in the Church of Rome, so called from St. Augustine, whose rule they observe. The Augustins, popularly also called Austin friars, were originally hermits, whom Pope Alexander IV. first congregated into one body, under their general Lanfranc, in 1256. Soon after their institution this order was brought into England, where they had about thirty-two houses at the time of their suppression. The Augustins dress in black.