Medieval Studies

Collection overview

Material related to the medieval period can be found across the Library’s collections.

It is important that you use the catalogue, as many early works are held in Special Collections or other closed stacks, and so will not be apparent from shelf browsing. If you cannot find a book published before 1980, please check the online card catalogue.

Collection strengths include:

Modern editions of medieval texts in all major European languages, including Latin
Major documents series, including: Patrologia Cursus Completus, Corpus Christianorum, the National Archives Lists and Indexes, and Publications of the Record Commissioners
Secondary literature in all fields, especially art, history, literature and manuscript studies
Range of periodicals dealing with the period: from specialist titles such as Yearbook of Langland Studies to more general titles, eg Speculum, many of which are available in print and electronic formats, eg via JSTOR
Facsimiles of important manuscripts, often illustrated
Online access to major bibliographic databases

Other libraries of particular interest in this area within the University of London Research Library Services (ULRLS) include the Warburg Institute and the Institute of Historical Research, which share a catalogue: http://catalogue.ulrls.lon.ac.uk/search~S24

Special Collections

Manuscripts:

Manuscripts can be located on Senate House Library’s Archive & Manuscript Catalogue: http://archives.ulrls.lon.ac.uk; or via AIM25 (Archives in London and the M25 Area): www.aim25.ac.uk.

The Library holds over 100 medieval manuscripts, many in fragment form. There are Books of Hours, a fifteenth-century bible, and two manuscripts of the C text of Piers Plowman. The complete list of the Library’s medieval manuscripts can be found at: www.shl.lon.ac.uk/subjects/guides/medievalmss/index.shtml

The Fuller Collection contains many medieval seals and a variety of documents.

Texts to assist with reading medieval handwriting can be found in the Palaeography collection, Sterling Library Reading Room, 4th floor South Block, eg M.P. Brown (1990), Guide to Western Historical Scripts from Antiquity to 1600 and J. Roberts (2005), Guide to Scripts used in English Writings up to 1500.

Early Printed Books

The Library holds incunabula (books printed before 1501). These include early copies of Augustine of Hippo, Euclid, and Geoffrey Chaucer.

Reference sources for incunabula include:
IISTC (llustrated Incunabula Short Title Catalogue) and EEBO (Early English Books Online, 1473-1700)

Palaeography

The Palaeography collection, Special Collections, holds material relating to Western palaeography and manuscript studies. The collection is strongest in Latin and vernacular manuscripts, with some holdings in Greek and Hebrew.

Of particular interest to medievalists are:

a complete set of Early English Manuscripts in Facsimile
fascimiles of notable manuscripts such as the Lindisfarne Gospels, the Book of Kells and the Ellesmere Chaucer
standard reference tools including Lowe’s Codices Latini Antiquiores, Migne’s Patrologia Cursus Completus (Series Latina and Graeca only) and the ongoing series Corpus Christianorum

The Palaeography collection also holds manuscript catalogues for major repositories and a near-complete set of Roxburghe Club publications.

There are eighty documents written between the twelfth to seventeenth centuries, mostly property deeds, which were collected by Prof Francis Wormald (1904-1972) to show the development of English documentary hands.

For further information on the Palaeography collection, see the Palaeography & Manuscript Studies web pages.