An Annotated Bibliography of Printed and Online Primary Sources for the Middle Ages

Contents: Series and Texts Entered

Selection criteria and problems of sources:

The following is a list of series and publishers whose works have been entered into the database.

Anglo-Saxon Texts
Ed. Andy Orchard, Boydell and Brewer series, 1999-.Editions of Anglo-Saxon texts. 4 published; all in database.

Canterbury and York Society
Ed. R.L. Storey, now Boydell and Brewer, originally published by the Society, 1909-. English ecclesiastical records, primarily bishop.s registers. All medieval volumes have been entered into the database.

Cistercian Fathers Series
Cistercian Publications, 1970- . Modern editions of texts by Cistercians. 18 of 65 texts entered.

Cistercian Studies Series
Cistercian Publications, 1969- . Only about 50 of the 204 printed primary sources in this series are medieval texts; 8 have been entered thus far.

Early English Text Society Original Series
EETS, 1864-. In progress. Critical editions of texts in Old and Middle English. Over 200 texts are in the database.

Focus Library of Medieval Women
Ed. Jane Chance, 1990- . Now published by Boydell and Brewer, 1997-. Short books with translations of the texts by medieval women (mostly mystics). All 13 volumes up to 2002 are in the database.

Henry Bradshaw Society
Ed. Michael Lapidge, Boydell and Brewer, 1891-. Transcriptions of British liturgical documents. Volumes 1 (1891) through 30 (1905) are in the database.

The I Tatti Renaissance Library
Ed. James Hankins. Harvard University Press. Collections of primary texts centered around Reniasance (especially humanistic) themes. 15 of 15 texts are in the database.

Irish Texts Society
1899-. Publishes philological works, dictionaries, and primary sources, some in translation. 8 medieval texts of about 40 medieval volumes are in the database.

Manchester Medieval Sources Series
Eds. Rosemary Horrox and Janet L. Nelson, Univ. of Manchester Press. Tend to contain longer introductions and explanatory material in each volume. Once they have been out for four or five years, they are also made available online. 15 volumes are in the database.

Mediaeval and Modern Irish Series
Begun by the Irish Stationery Office in the 1930s and continued by the Irish Manuscripts Commission and the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies. Publications include medieval Irish texts, few of which have been translated into English; about 10 of the c. 25 medieval texts in the series have been entered.

Medieval Chronicles
Ed. Maria Myers, Boydell and Brewer series, 1999-. 3 published; all in database.

Medieval Texts and Translations
Boydell and Brewer series, 1992-. 5 published; all in database.

Middle Ages Series
Ed. Ruth Mazo Karras, University of Pennsylvania Press. Contains documentary collections on specific themes, as well as monographs. All 32 volumes of medieval texts have been entered into the database for period 1972-1996.

Monumenta Germaniae Historica
1826-. Sources for the study of German history from the end of the Roman Empire to roughly 1500. 69 texts are currently in the database.

Oxford Medieval Texts
Oxford University Press, 1967-. Modern editions, usually with translations. Publishes mostly chronicles and saints lives; 53 of 65 volumes are in the bibliography.

Penguin Classics
Penguin Press, ~1940-. Medieval titles are numerous; about 100 have been entered into the database.

Readings in Medieval Civilizations and Cultures
Broadview Press. Publishes translations of documents on particular themes. 8 of 8 volumes are in the database.

Records of Civilization, Sources and Studies
Columbia University Press, 1915-. Many but not all are medieval; many published in Norton paperback editions, and the contents of many which went out of copyright are available online on the Internet Medieval Sourcebook. All 23 of the medieval volumes are in the database.

Records of Early English Drama
Centre for Research in Early English Drama, University of Toronto, 1979-. REED examines the historical MSS that provide external evidence of drama, secular music, and other communal entertainment and ceremony from the Middle Ages until 1642. 13 titles are in the database.

Rolls Series
Published by the British Government under the official title "The Chronicles and Memorials of Great Britain and Ireland during the Middle Ages," c.1850-1900. Collects chronicles and other historiographical works relating to British history, as well as some literary and hagiographical works and documentary evidence. All 99 texts, contained in over 200 volumes, are in the database.

Selden Society
c.1890-. The Selden Society is devoted to the study of English legal history, and publishes British legal documents. Roughly 60 texts are in the database.

Scriptores Latini Hiberniae
Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1955-1998. Latin texts written in Ireland. 10 of the 14 volumes are in the database.

TEAMS Middle English Text Series
1990- . Transcriptions of Middle English texts designed for classroom use and non-specialists, available as books or online. All 40 volumes published up to 2003 are in the database.

Traditio
Fordham University Press, 1945-. Journal of ancient and medieval history which frequently includes editions of medieval texts. All relevant texts from 1946-1948 are in the database.

Translated Texts for Historians
Liverpool University Press, 1985-. 43 texts published, at least half are medieval; 28 published 1988-2002 are entered in the database.

Translations and Reprints of the Original Sources of European History
Published for the Dept. of History, University of Pennsylvania, 1894-1907. 21 medieval selections in 7 volumes are in the database.

Online Sources

The following websites contain many primary sources, all of which have been entered separately into the database. In addition to these, dozens of websites containing one or a few texts are also in the database.

British History Online
A digital library containing some of the core printed primary and secondary sources for the medieval and modern history of the British Isles. Includes roughly 30 medieval texts, all of which are in the database.

CELT (The Corpus of Electronic Texts)
A website of Irish texts in original and in translation, maintained by the University College, Cork, Ireland. 24 texts (of c. 100 medieval texts) are in the database.

Corpus of Middle English Prose and Verse
Most of the Middle English works on this site, maintained by the University of Michigan, are electronic editions of public domain volumes of the Early English Text Society. Contains 60 texts in Middle English, all of which are in the database.

Early Manuscripts at Oxford University
This website has high resolution digital facsimiles of over 80 medieval and early modern manuscripts in institutions associated with Oxford University, including the Bodleian Library and Balliol College. 72 medieval manuscripts are in the database.

Electronic Text Center at the University of Virginia
The Electronic Text Center has tens of thousands of texts from many countries and time periods. There are roughly 26 texts in Middle English available to the general public on the website, all of which are in the database.

In Parenthesis
Maintained at the University of York in Toronto, Canada, In Parenthesis makes available PDF documents of out-of-copyright translations and editions of a wide variety of texts and language learning tools. Roughly 40 medieval texts are available, all of which are in the database.

Internet Medieval Sourcebook
Maintained by Paul Halsall at Fordham University. Contains hundreds of online editions of texts, as well as links to other websites of primary sources. Roughly 65 texts are in the database.

Labyrinth Library
Includes texts in original languages and translation. The most useful texts are those in Old English. 8 texts are in the database.

Medieval English Urban History
A website created by Stephen Alsford that illuminates all aspects of life in medieval English towns. Includes dozens of brief documents on a wide range of topics related to urban history.

Leeds Medieval History Texts in Translation
Maintained by Graham Loud at Leeds University, this website contains the first published English translations of texts relating to the Pontificate of Gregory VII, the Crusades, and the Norman Kingdom of Sicily. Roughly 20 texts are available, all of which are in the database.

Monastic Matrix
A scholarly resource for the study of women's religious communities from 400 to 1600. Includes a collection of over 30 primary sources, all of which are in the database.

Ogmios Press
Ogmios Press is an online publishing house offering free access to a catalogue of historical texts. They specialise in Scottish and Celtic subjects, publishing first online editions of significant or otherwise intriguing texts. All of their medieval texts are in the database.

OMACL: Online Medieval and Classical Library
Maintained by the University of California at Berkeley. Contains roughly 40 medieval texts in translation, all of which are in the database.

ORB: Online Reference Book for Medieval Studies
Contains many new transcriptions and translations of important medieval texts that have not been previously accessible in print or electronic format. Roughly 20 texts are in the database.

Project Gutenberg
Begun in 1971 and maintained entirely by volunteers, Project Gutenberg is the oldest collection of digital texts. It contains thousands of full texts of public domain books, produced in simple formats that should outlast major technolgical changes. 63 medieval texts are in the database.

Last Updated: September 10, 2007