This history of the books of Reading Abbey covers the period from the abbey's foundation to its dissolution, and follows up the dispersal of the book collections to c.1610. It provides valuable material on the ways in which books were used, and about the intellectual life of medieval monastery. Alan Coates makes an important contribution to our understanding of the fate of monastic books and book-collecting in the post-Dissolution period.

The study of medieval literature has experienced a revolution in the last two decades, which has reinvigorated many parts of the discipline and changed the shape of the subject in relation to the scholarship of the previous generation. 'New' texts (laws and penitentials, women's writing, drama records), innovative fields and objects of study (the history of the book, the study of space and the body, medieval masculinities), and original ways of studying them (the Sociology of the Text, performance studies) have emerged. This has brought fresh vigour and impetus to medieval studies, and impacted significantly on cognate periods and areas. The Oxford Handbook of Medieval Literature in English brings together the insights of these new fields and approaches with those of more familiar texts and methods of study, to provide a comprehensive overview of the state of medieval literature today. It also returns to first principles in posing fundamental questions about the nature, scope, and significance of the discipline, and the directions that it might take in the next decade. The Handbook contains 44 newly commissioned essays from both world-leading scholars and exciting new scholarly voices. Topics covered range from the canonical genres of Saints' lives, sermons, romance, lyric poetry, and heroic poetry; major themes including monstrosity and marginality, patronage and literary politics, manuscript studies and vernacularity are investigated; and there are close readings of key texts, such as Beowulf, Wulf and Eadwacer, and Ancrene Wisse and key authors from Ælfric to Geoffrey Chaucer, Langland, and the Gawain Poet.

"An elegant anthology. The specialist will not miss the quiet sophistication with which the music has been selected and prepared. Some of it is printed here for the first time, and much of it has been edited anew." "Notes" This treasury of 47 vocal works edited by Noah Greenberg, founder and former director of the New York Pro Musica Antiqua will delight all lovers of medieval and Renaissance music. Containing a wealth of both religious and secular music from the 12th to the 17th centuries, the collection covers a broad range of moods, from the hearty "Blow Thy Horne Thou Jolly Hunter" by William Cornysh to the reflective and elegiac "Cease Mine Eyes" by Thomas Morley. Of the religious works, nine were written for church services, including "Sanctus" by Henry IV and "Angus Dei" from a beautiful four-part mass by Thomas Tallis. Other religious songs in the collection come from England's rich tradition of popular religious lyric poetry, and include William Byrd's "Susanna Farye," the anonymously written "Deo Gracias Anglia" (The Agincort Carol), and Thomas Ravenscroft's "O Lord, Turne Now Away Thy Face" and "Remember O Thou Man." Approximately half of the songs are secular, some from the popular tradition and others from the courtly poets and musicians surrounding such musically inclined monarchs as Henry VIII who himself is represented in this collection with two charming songs, "With Owt Dyscorde" and "O My Hart." Among the notable composers of Tudor and Elizabethan England represented here are Orlando Gibbons, John Dowland, and Thomas Weelkes. "

This book situates the medieval manuscript within its cultural contexts, with chapters by experts in bibliographical and theoretical approaches to manuscript study.

Essays exploring different aspects of late medieval and early modern manuscript and book culture. Late medieval manuscripts and early modern print history form the focus of this volume. It includes new work on the compilation of some important medieval manuscript miscellanies and major studies of merchant patronage and of a newly revealed woman patron, alongside explorations of medieval texts and the post-medieval reception history of Langland, Chaucer and Nicholas Love. It thus pays a fitting tribute to the career of Professor A.S.G. Edwards, highlighting his scholarly interests and demonstrating the influence of his achievements. Carol M. Meale is Senior Research Fellow at the University of Bristol; the late Derek Pearsall was Professor Emeritus at Harvard University and Honorary Research Professor at the University of York. Contributors: Nicolas Barker, J.A. Burrow, A.I. Doyle, Martha W. Driver, Susanna Fein, Jane Griffiths, Lotte Hellinga, Alfred Hiatt, Simon Horobin, Richard Linenthal, Carol M. Meale, Orietta Da Rold, John Scattergood, Kathleen L. Scott, Toshiyuki Takamiya, John J. Thompson.

This book presents a series of narratives that reflect the compelling and sometimes dangerous allure of the world of books - and the world in books - in late-medieval Britain. It envisions the confines of medieval manuscripts as virtual worlds: realms that readers call forth through imaginative interactions with books' material features.

'The Bestiary' is a book of animals. The 'Second-family' bestiary is the most important version. This study addresses the work's purpose and audience. It includes a critical edition and new English translation, and a catalogue raisonne of the manuscripts.

The cults of the saints were central to the medieval Church. These holy men and women acted as patrons and protectors to the religious communities who housed their relics and to the devotees who requested their assistance in petitioning God for a miracle. Among the collections of posthumous miracle stories, miracula, accounts of holy healing feature prominently and depict cure-seekers successfully securing their desired remedy for a range of ailments and afflictions. What can these miracle accounts tell us of the cure-seekers' experiences of their journey from ill health to recovery, and how was healthcare presented in these sources? This book undertakes an in-depth study of the miraculous cure-seeking process through the lens of Latin miracle accounts produced in twelfth-century England, a time both when saints' cults particularly flourished and there was an increasing transmission and dissemination of classical and Arabic medical works. Focused on shorter miracula with a predominantly localised focus, and thus on a select group of cure-seekers, it brings together studies of healthcare and pilgrimage to look at an alternative to medical intervention and the practicalities and processes of securing saintly assistance.

This rich and varied collection of essays by scholars and interviews with artists approaches the fraught topic of book destruction from a new angle, setting out an alternative history of the cutting, burning, pulping, defacing and tearing of books from the medieval period to our own age.

A compact collection of focused introductions to and inquiries into medieval England, representing both history and literature.