Published by Primary Source Microfilm

This esteemed collection presents in full all 271 of the College's pre-1700 manuscripts--ranging from rare Anglo-Saxon texts and a 13th-century Bestiary from York to William Laud's Diary. Other celebrated items include Ben Jonson's copies of Terence and Juvenal and the setting copy of Wynkyn De Worde's edition of the Siege of Thebes, bound with Caxton's editions of Chaucer's Troilus & Criseyde and The Canterbury Tales.

In addition to these highlights, this major collection offers an unusually large number of 12th and 13th century manuscripts from more than 30 former monastic libraries. These rare manuscripts give researchers the opportunity to examine the script, illumination and products of the scholarship of these pre-Dissolution religious houses, from Jervaulx in Yorkshire to Witham in Somerset.

Also included are all 83 of the illuminated manuscripts, dating from the 10th to the 16th centuries, described by Alexander and Temple in their standard work. This unrivalled collection reproduces the manuscripts in full, allowing manuscript art to be considered in the context of overall book and page design and in relation to the development of script. A printed guide is included.

75 reels