Francis, a Portuguese priest, and almoner to Emanuel, king of Portugal, flourished about the beginning of the 16th century. He was sent ambassador from Portugal to David prince of Abyssinia; and after a residence of six years in that country, returned with letters of friendship from David to Juan, who had succeeded Emanuel, and of submission to Pope Clement VIII. At Bologna, in the year 1523, he gave a narrative of his expedition to the pope, in the presence of the emperor Charles V. In the year 1549, he published the relation of his journey in one volume folio, in the Portuguese language. He gives a plain and accurate description of this empire; and we are indebted to him for the first of the kind that ever was published. This work was translated into Latin, under the title of De Eide, Regionie, Moribus Ethiopum, by Damien Goez, a Portuguese gentleman; and it has often been reprinted and translated into other languages. The information of Alvarez is not, however, to be received with implicit credit, because he does not always speak from his own observation, and he frequently exaggerates. (Dict. Hist.)