Forty Centuries of Christian Writing

The Riddles

Enigmata

Aldhelm · c. 639–709

A hundred verse riddles in which ordinary things — a candle, a bookcase, silkworms, a storm — speak in the first person about what they are.

The Penitential of Theodore

Theodore of Tarsus · 602–690

Rulings by a Greek archbishop of Canterbury on penance, marriage, food, and the reconciliation of Irish and Roman practice, collected by a disciple.

On Virginity

De Virginitate

Aldhelm · c. 639–709

A double work in prose and verse for the nuns of Barking, praising virginity through a gallery of biblical and patristic examples, in an extravagantly ornate Latin.

The Canterbury Biblical Commentaries

The school of Theodore and Hadrian

Classroom notes from the school at Canterbury, explaining biblical words with reference to Greek, Syriac usage, and the actual geography of the Near East.

The Life of Wilfrid

Stephen of Ripon · 8th century

The combative career of the bishop who argued the Roman case at Whitby, was repeatedly expelled from his see, and twice appealed to Rome over the head of his king.

Commentary on Luke

The Venerable Bede · c. 673–735

A patient exposition of the third gospel that marks in the margin which father each borrowed passage comes from, so a reader can tell Bede's own words from Ambrose's.

On the Tabernacle

The Venerable Bede · c. 673–735

An allegorical reading of the desert tabernacle in which every measurement, curtain, and vessel figures the church and the Christian life.

Lives of the Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow

The Venerable Bede · c. 673–735

The history of his own monastery through its founders, including the book-buying journeys to Rome that built the library Bede worked in.

Letter to Egbert

The Venerable Bede · c. 673–735

Written months before his death to a former pupil now a bishop, complaining of absentee clergy, fraudulent monasteries founded as tax shelters, and dioceses too large to serve.

Letter on the Death of Bede

Cuthbert of Jarrow · 8th century

A pupil's account of Bede's last days, dictating a translation of John's gospel into English between fits of breathlessness and finishing the final sentence on the day he died.

The Life of Guthlac

Felix · 8th century

A warrior of noble birth becomes a hermit on an island in the fens, where he is tormented by demons who speak British and drag him to the mouth of hell.

The Penitential of Egbert

Egbert of York · d. 766

A northern English tariff of penances covering perjury, theft, violence, sexual sin, and the eating of blood, with reductions for the poor and the ill.

The Ecclesiastical History of the English People

Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum

The Venerable Bede · c. 673–735

The conversion of the English told from Roman Britain to Bede's own day, with named sources, dated events, and a monk's eye for the moment a king's council decides the fate of a people.

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle

Anonymous

Year-by-year annals kept at several monasteries, from Julius Caesar to the twelfth century, terse for most years and vivid in crisis.

The Life of King Alfred

Asser · d. c. 909

A Welsh bishop's account of the king he served, including the illness that plagued him, his late acquisition of Latin, and his reading aloud with his children.

The Monastic Agreement

Regularis Concordia

Æthelwold of Winchester · c. 904–984

A single customary imposed on all English monasteries, including the earliest description of the Easter sepulchre ceremony in which monks act out the visit to the tomb.

The Colloquy

Ælfric of Eynsham · c. 955–c. 1010

A Latin conversation practice in which a teacher questions boys playing a ploughman, a shepherd, a fisherman, a hunter, and a merchant about their work.

The Monastic Constitutions

Lanfranc of Bec · c. 1005–1089

Customs for Canterbury covering the whole year, including the sign language monks used during the hours of silence — signs for bread, for a book, for a psalter.

Deeds of the Kings of the English

William of Malmesbury · c. 1095–c. 1143

English history from the Saxon settlement to his own day, written by a librarian who compared his sources and said so when he doubted them.

The Life of Christina of Markyate

Anonymous

A young Englishwoman refuses the marriage her parents arranged, escapes disguised as a man, and lives hidden in a tiny cell for years before founding her own community.

The Correspondence

Thomas Becket and his circle · c. 1120–1170

Hundreds of letters from the six-year quarrel over whether clergy accused of crimes could be tried in royal courts, preserved by both sides.

On the Sacrament of the Altar

Baldwin of Forde · c. 1125–1190

A meditative rather than argumentative treatment of the eucharist, reading it through the Old Testament sacrifices and the church's unity in one bread.

The Statutes of Salisbury

Richard Poore · d. 1237

Diocesan statutes applying the Fourth Lateran reforms in England: what a parish priest must know, how to hear confessions, and what must be kept in a parish church.

The Greater Chronicle

Chronica Majora

Matthew Paris · c. 1200–1259

A vividly opinionated chronicle of Europe from a St Albans scriptorium, illustrated by its author's own hand, hostile to papal taxation and to almost everyone in authority.

The Fire of Love

Incendium Amoris

Richard Rolle · c. 1300–1349

A hermit's account of the physical warmth, sweetness, and song he experienced in prayer, described with a confidence that irritated more cautious contemporaries.

The Form of Living

Richard Rolle · c. 1300–1349

A guide written in English for a woman becoming a recluse, on temptations, on the degrees of love, and on how to keep the heart occupied.

The Lay Folks' Catechism

John Thoresby · d. 1373

An archbishop's instruction, issued in Latin and English, that every priest teach his people the creed, commandments, sacraments, and works of mercy four times a year.

The Twelve Conclusions of the Lollards

Anonymous

A manifesto nailed to the doors of Westminster Hall condemning clerical wealth, celibacy, transubstantiation, pilgrimages, images, and war.

The Decades

Heinrich Bullinger · 1504–1575

Fifty sermons covering the whole of Christian doctrine, written for clergy who needed a course of instruction they could preach through.

On the Kingdom of Christ

De Regno Christi

Martin Bucer · 1491–1551

A programme for a Christian commonwealth presented to Edward VI — poor relief, education, marriage law, and the reform of worship — written in English exile.

An Admonition to the Parliament

John Field and Thomas Wilcox

A demand that England abolish bishops, the prayer book's ceremonies, and clerical vestments, and adopt a presbyterian discipline instead.

Commonplaces

Peter Martyr Vermigli · 1499–1562

Theological topics extracted from an Italian ex-Augustinian's biblical commentaries, arranged as a system after his death.

Eikon Basilike

Attributed to Charles I and John Gauden

Meditations and prayers presented as the king's own, published within days of his execution and showing him at prayer amid his troubles.

The Law of Freedom in a Platform

Gerrard Winstanley · 1609–1676

A commonwealth without buying or selling, in which the earth is a common treasury and clergy are replaced by weekly public teaching on any useful subject.

The Savoy Declaration

The Congregational churches of England

Westminster doctrine with a congregational polity — each gathered church complete in itself, with no authority above it but Christ.