This book presents the content of a 1623 catalogue of manuscripts in Worcester Cathedral library created by Patrick Young (1584-1652).

Old English prose before the late tenth century is examined in this collection of hitherto unpublished essays. Using a variety of techniques, the authors explore well-known and lesser-known texts in search of a better understanding of why, how, and by whom the manuscripts were produced. Part I of the collection contains six studies of Alfredian prose—the Soliloquies, the Pastoral Care, and Consolation of Philosophy—all of which are translations traditionally associated with King Alfred.

The Letterbooks of John Evelyn, a collection of more than eight hundred letters selected by Evelyn himself, constitutes an essential new resource for scholars of seventeenth-century England.

The cardinal role of Anglo-Saxon libraries in the transmission of classical and patristic literature to the later middle ages has long been recognized, for these libraries sustained the researches of those English scholars whose writings determined the curriculum of medieval schools: Aldhelm, Bede, and Alcuin, to name only the best known. Yet this is the first full-length account of the nature and holdings of Anglo-Saxon libraries from the sixth century to the eleventh. The early chapters discuss libraries in antiquity, notably at Alexandria and republican and imperial Rome, and also the Christian libraries of late antiquity which supplied books to Anglo-Saxon England. Because Anglo-Saxon libraries themselves have almost completely vanished, three classes of evidence need to be combined in order to form a detailed impression of their holdings: surviving inventories, surviving manuscripts, and citations of classical and patristic works by Anglo-Saxon authors themselves. After setting out the problems entailed in using such evidence, the book provides appendices containing editions of all surviving Anglo-Saxon inventories, lists of all Anglo-Saxon manuscripts exported to continental libraries during the eighth century and then all manuscripts re-imported into England in the tenth, as well as a catalogue of all citations of classical and patristic literature by Anglo-Saxon authors. A comprehensive index, arranged alphabetically by author, combines these various classes of evidence so that the reader can see at a glance what books were known where and by whom in Anglo-Saxon England. The book thus provides, within a single volume, a vast amount of information on the books and learning of the schools which determined the course of medieval literary culture.

The ninth-century Book of Cerne offers a fascinating insight into Insular culture and is the only surviving illuminated manuscript that can be firmly attributed to the powerful Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia.

The period between the late Renaissance and the early Enlightenment has long been regarded as the zenith of the "republic of letters", a pan-European community of like-minded scholars and intellectuals who fostered critical approaches to the study of the Bible and other ancient texts, while renouncing the brutal religio-political disputes that were tearing their continent apart at the same time. Criticism and Confession offers an unprecedentedly comprehensive challenge to this account. Throughout this period, all forms of biblical scholarship were intended to contribute to theological debates, rather than defusing or transcending them, and meaningful collaboration between scholars of different confessions was an exception, rather than the norm. "Neutrality" was a fiction that obscured the ways in which scholarship served the interests of ecclesiastical and political institutions. Scholarly practices varied from one confessional context to another, and the progress of 'criticism' was never straightforward. The study demonstrates this by placing scholarly works in dialogue with works of dogmatic theology, and comparing examples from multiple confessional and national contexts. It offers major revisionist treatments of canonical figures in the history of scholarship, such as Joseph Scaliger, Isaac Casaubon, John Selden, Hugo Grotius, and Louis Cappel, based on unstudied archival as well as printed sources; and it places those figures alongside their more marginal, overlooked counterparts. It also contextualizes scholarly correspondence and other forms of intellectual exchange by considering them alongside the records of political and ecclesiastical bodies. Throughout, the study combines the methods of the history of scholarship with techniques drawn from other fields, including literary, political, and religious history. As well as presenting a new history of seventeenth-century biblical criticism, it also critiques modern scholarly assumptions about the relationships between erudition, humanistic culture, political activism, and religious identity.

Machine generated contents note:pt. OneCatalogue of the Manuscripts and Early Printed Editions --pt. TwoThree Studies --A.Key Findings on the Major Textual Families --B.'Extra' Texts for Saints in Some Manuscripts --C.Key Findings on Liturgical Regulation and the Dating of These Manuscripts --Conclusion.

These papers reflect the long and distinguished career of Professor Jane Roberts in the field of medieval English studies, and especially her pioneering work on A Thesaurus of Old English, which provides novel source material for several of the contributions to the volume. Many of the papers deal with aspects of early lexicology and lexicography, while others focus on linguistic and literary features of Old and Middle English texts and their interpretation. They will thus be of interest to researchers in many areas of early English. A special introductory article describes the interlinked development of A Thesaurus of Old English, The Historical Thesaurus of English, and the proposed Thesaurus of Middle English. Contributors include: Rosamund Allen, Janet M. Bately, Carole P. Biggam, Michelle Brown, Julie Coleman, Janet Cowen, Jodi-Ann George, Joyce Hill, Rosemary Huisman, Giovanni Iarmartino, George Kane, Éamonn Ó Carragáin, Michiko Ogura, Peter Orton, Jeremy J. Smith, E.G. Stanley, Paul Szarmach, Ronald Waldron.

This volume celebrates Peter Edbury’s career by bringing together seventeen essays by colleagues, former students and friends which focus on three of his major research interests: the great historian of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, William of Tyre, and his Historia rerum in partibus transmarinis gestarum and its continuations; medieval Cyprus, in particular under the Lusignans; and the Military Orders in the Middle Ages. All based on original research, the contributions to this volume include new work on manuscripts, ranging from a Hospitaller rental document of the twelfth century to a seventeenth-century manuscript of Cypriot interest; studies of language and terminology in William of Tyre’s chronicle and its continuations; thematic surveys; legal and commercial investigations pertaining to Cyprus; aspects of memorialization, and biographical studies. These contributions are bracketed by a foreword written by Peter Edbury’s PhD supervisor, Jonathan Riley-Smith, and an appreciation of Peter’s own publications by Christopher Tyerman.