Online Medieval Sources Bibliography

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

Source Details

Dimock, James F, ed., Magna vita S. Hugonis episcopi Lincolniensis : from manuscripts in the Bodleian Library (London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts and Green (Rolls Series, No. 37),1864). Read this source online

Magna Vita S. Hugonis Episcopi Lincolniensis; Life of St. Hugh

378

  • Adam of Eynsham

1135 - 1220

Bodleian Library, Oxford (Digby 165); Imperial Library, Paris (Latin No. 5,575)

  • Latin

  • Original language included

  • England

Lincoln

  • Hagiography

  • Clergy - Priests, Bishops, Canons
  • Monasticism
  • Royalty / Monarchs
  • Saints
  • Saints - Cults / Relics

  • Index
  • Glossary
  • Introduction

This volume contains the Life of St. Hugh (c. 1135-1200), a Carthusian monk from Burgundy who became the bishop of Lincoln in 1186 because of pressure exerted by king Henry II (1154-1189). The Magna Vita was written by a Benedictine monk named Adam who later became the abbot of Eynsham. The author had been a member of Hugh’s household for three years prior to the saint’s death during which time he served as his private chaplain (priest). This relationship gave him access to vast stores of information about Hugh’s life but may have also predisposed him to writing about the bishop in a favorable light. The full text is available through the Medieval and Modern Thought Text Digitization Project. Although Dimock’s edition is a good one, the newer edition of the Magna Vita by Douie and Farmer is of superior quality, see: Decima Douie and David H. Farmer “Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis: The life of St. Hugh of Lincoln” (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985).

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