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Lollardy: the English heresy?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2016

Anne Hudson
Anne Hudson*
Affiliation:
University of Oxford Lady Margaret Hall
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Extract

Sythen witte stondis not in langage but in groundynge of treuthe, for tho same witte is in Laten that is in Grew or Ebrew, and trouthe schuld be openly knowen to alle manere of folke, trowthe moueth mony men to speke sentencis in Yngelysche that thai han gedired in Latyne, and herfore bene men holden heretikis.

Such is the opening sentence of the tract known in the only surviving manuscript as Tractatus de Regibus. The text owes much of its material to Wyclif’s De Officio Regis, though the prologue does not derive from this source, and is undoubtedly of lollard origin; its date cannot be later than the early fifteenth century. The sentiments of the first part of the sentence are typically Wycliffite, though not exclusively so. The interesting part of it is the last clause, and particularly the word herfore. I want in this paper to investigate the implications and validity of this word. The meaning of the word is superficially clear: ‘for this reason are men considered heretics’—most modern writers would use ‘therefore’.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History , Volume 18: Religion and National Identity , 1982 , pp. 261 - 283
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1982

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References

1 The complete tract is edited, with some unfortunate misinterpretations of the medieval English, in Four English Political Tracts of the Later Middle Ages, ed Genet, J.-P., CSer, 4 series 18 (1977) pp 5–19 Google Scholar. The passage here quoted is also printed in [Hudson, A.,] Selections [from English Wycliffite Writings] (Cambridge 1978) no 2/1–5 Google Scholar. (In ensuing references to texts, line numbers, where given, follow an oblique stroke; unless the extent of the passage is open to doubt, only the opening line number will be given. In quotations from manuscripts, and from older editions, modern punctuation has been introduced; all abbreviations are expanded without notice.)

2 See Selections pp 200-1; the only contemporary allusions point towards the end of the fourteenth century as the date of composition, though the sole surviving manuscript, Oxford Bodleian MS Douce 273, is paleographically of the early fifteenth century.

3 For lollard instances see below; for an apparently orthodox statement compare the English version of Robert of Greatham’s Miroir, Oxford Bodleian MS Holkham Misc. 40 fol 1v ‘and so hit is ful gret foli to speke Latyn to lewd folk, and he entermeteth hym of a fol mister that telleth to hym Latyne. For eche man schal be undurnome and aresound aftur the langage that he hath lered.’

4 The Complete Works of John Gower, ed Macaulay, G. C., 4 vols (Oxford 1899-1902)Google Scholar, Confessio Amantis, Prol. 346 seq, bk 5.1803 seq; Carmen super multiplia viciorum pestilencia, 13 seq.

5 Lincoln register Chedworth fol 62v, concerning John Baron of Amersham in 1464. The group of lollards in the Chilterns investigated by Chedworth seems to have been well provided with books (see Cross, C., Church and People 1450-1660 (Edinburgh 1976) pp 32-5Google Scholar for a brief account of the group), and the authorities particularly undiscriminating in their suspicion. As well as the Chaucer volume, a second containing ‘a play of seint Dionise’ and a third containing the ‘Myrrour of Synners’—for the usual tract that went under this name see Horstman, C., Yorkshire Writers, 2 vols (London 1895-6) 2, pp 436-40Google Scholar, manuscripts listed by Jolliffe, P. S., A Check-List of Middle English Prose Writings of Spiritual Guidance (Toronto 1974) p 81 Google Scholar—the ‘Myrrour of Matrimony’, the ‘lyff of oure Lady, Adam and Eve’ and ‘other sermones’ were confiscated from Baron. The group owned several copies of biblical translations and other religious works.

6 For instance Thomson, J. A. F., The Later Lollards 1414-1520 (Oxford 2nd ed 1967) p 243 Google Scholar.

7 See, for example, Leff, G., Heresy in the Later Middle Ages, 2 vols (Manchester/New York 1967) 2, pp 494–558 Google Scholar; Robson, J. A., Wyclif and the Oxford Schools (Cambridge 1966)Google Scholar; Wilks, M. J., ‘The Apostolicus and the Bishop of Rome’, JTS ns 14 (1963) pp 338-54Google Scholar. For Wyclifs own references to Berengar see my note appended to ‘The Expurgation of a Lollard Sermon-Cycle’, JTS ns 22 (1971) pp 464-5.

8 For a reassessment of the evidence that Wyclif initiated the preaching see Wilks, M., ‘“Reformatio Regni”: Wyclif and Hus as leaders of religious protest movements’, SCH 9 (1972) pp 109-30Google Scholar especially pp 119-21.

9 For this aspect of the Hussite movement see especially Šmahel, F., ‘Le mouvement des étudiants à Prague dans les années 1408-1412’, Historica 14 (Prague 1967) pp 33–75 Google Scholar. and the same author’s ‘The Idea of the “Nation” in Hussite Bohemia’, Historica 16 (1969) pp 143-247 and 17 (1969) pp 93-197; a revised form of these last two was published as Idea národa v husitských Cechách (České Budějovice 1971).

10 All quotations from Wyclif are from the editions of the Wyclif Society (1883-1921). See here, for instance, Wyclifs insistence on the various aspects of the ‘dead hand’ of clerical possession on property in England, De Ventate Sacre Scripture, 3 p 20, De Ecclesia p 338, Dialogus p 70/23, De fiindatione sectarum, Polemical Works I p 28/14.

11 See Knowles, RO 2 pp 161-5: more generally compare Rotuli Parliamentorum ([London 1767-77]) 46 Edward III item 27, 47 Edward III item 30, 50 Edward III items 95 and 124.

12 Tatnall, [E. C.], [‘John Wyclif and Ecclesia Anglicana ’], JEH 20 (1969) pp 19–43 Google Scholar; the earlier discussion in Daly, L. J., The Political Theory of John Wyclif (Chicago 1962) pp 132-51Google Scholar hardly tackles the issue. For cases where ‘English’ customs or law are merely ancillary references see, for example, De Civilt Dominio 2 p 134, De Ventate Sacre Scripture I p 354 and 3 pp 18, 55.

13 See Tatnall pp 34-43 where the references to Wyclif’s works are given. For lollard views about Becket see Davis, J. F., ‘Lollards, Reformers and St. Thomas of Canterbury’, University of Birmingham Historical Journal 9 (Birmingham 1963) pp 1–15 Google Scholar.

14 Some of these passages are briefly mentioned in Tatnall pp 24-31. See also Maitland, F. W., ‘Wyclif on English and Roman Law’, Collected Papers, ed Fisher, H. A. L. (Cambridge 1911) 3 pp 50-3Google Scholar. Despite its title, W. Farr’s John Wyclif as Legal Reformer (Leiden 1974) does not fully discuss this question.

15 In Prague University Library MS X.E.9 fols 206-7v, Vienna Nationalbibliothek MS 3928 fols 189-90 and 3932 fols 155v-6; for the distinctive character see Schramm, P. E., trans Legg, L. G. Wickham, A History of the English Coronation (Oxford 1937) p 236 Google Scholar.

16 Wilks, [M.], [‘Misleading manuscripts: Wyclif and the non-wycliffite bible’], SCH 11 (1975) pp 147-61Google Scholar, especially pp 154-5 and notes. I find it hard to accept the main thesis of Wilks’s paper, that there existed a pre- or non-Wycliffite vernacular bible which the lollards took over and modified. My main objection is that when the lollards came to justify their demand for such a bible they cited many precedents, but never alluded to the existence of such a complete translation of scripture; since such a pre-existing, orthodox version would have immensely helped their case, it seems inconceivable that they should have omitted to mention it. This disagreement does not, however, affect the point at issue here.

17 De Veritate Sacre Scripture 2 p 243 urges the necessity of preaching in the vernacular, De Eucharistia p 90/13, whilst it states that it is preferable to use Latin rather than English for the consecration of the mass because of custom, implicitly acknowledges the possibility of using the vernacular even whilst denying the desirability.

18 The constant repetition of the need for preaching to the laity means that Wyclif must have envisaged the use of the vernacular, see Sermones 2 p 448/16; 3 pp 75/20, 341/13.

19 See his paper n 8 above; compare also my paper ‘A Lollard Compilation and the Dissemination of Wycliffite Thought’, JTS ns 23 (1972) pp 65-81.

20 See Registrum Johannis Trefnant, ed Capes, W. W., CYS (1916) pp 278–365 Google Scholar. The learning of Brut is evident from the length of his written replies to the charges made against him; since there is no indication to the contrary, and elsewhere Trefnant’s register records in English replies given in that language, the Latin in which these replies are couched must be Brut’s own. For the taunt of Hoccleve see Hoccleve’s Works: The Minor Poems, ed F. J. Furnivall and I. Gollancz, revised J. Mitchell and A. I. Doyle, EETS extra series 61 and 73 (1970) no II/194, with which compare II/137-60.

21 History 62 (1977) pp 347-71.

22 I have used the text in Wilkins 3 pp 314-19; Arundel appears to have drafted the Constitutions in 1407 and issued them in 1409 (see Jacob, E. F., The Register of Henry Chichele, archbishop of Canterbury 1414-1441, 4 vols (Oxford 1938-47) I pp cxxx–cxxxi)Google Scholar. For lollard references to the Constitutions see The Lantern of Lizt, ed Swinburn, L. M., EETS 151 (1917) pp 17/17Google Scholar, 100/1; BL MS Egerton 2820 fols 48v-9, BL MS Cotton Titus D V fols 46, 57.

23 Wilkins III p 316 ‘Praedicator . . . in praedicando clero sive populo, secundum materiam subjectam se honeste habeat, spargendo semen secundum convenientiam subjecti auditorii; clero praesertim praedicans de vitiis pullulantibus inter eos, et laicis de peccatis inter eos communiter usitatis, et non e contra’.

24 For the earlier stages see McFarlane, K. B., John Wycliffe and the Beginnings of English Nonconformity (London 1952) pp 108-16Google Scholar, 156-7; also Aston, M., Thomas Arundel (Oxford 1967) pp 329-34Google Scholar.

25 Wilkins 3 p 317 ‘nisi per universitatem Oxonii aut Cantabrigiae, seu saltem duodecim personas ex eisdem, quas eaedem universitates aut altera earundem, sub nostra, successorumve nostrorum discretione laudabili duxerint eligendas, primitus examinetur, et examinatus unanimiter per eosdem, deinde per nos seu successores nostros expresse approbetur, et universitatis nomine ac auctoritate stationariis tradatur, ut copietur; et facta collatione fideli, petentibus vendatur justo pretio sive detur, originali in cista aliqua universitatis extunc perpetuo remanente’.

26 Oxford Bodleian MS Fairfax 2 fol 385; see Hargreaves, H. in CHB 2 p 394 Google Scholar.

27 I have used the 1968 Gregg reprint of the Provinciale (Oxford 1679) p 286; see Cheney, C. R., ‘William Lyndwood’s Provinciale ’, reprinted in Medieval Texts and Studies (Oxford 1973) pp 158-84Google Scholar. I have checked the gloss in the following manuscripts: Oxford Bodleian MSS Bodley 248 fol 278v, Laud Mise 608 fol 176, Oxford Corpus Christi College MS B.71 fol 240, BL MS Royal 11 C. viii fol 200, BL MS Royal 11 E.i fol 229v, Cambridge Peterhouse MS 53 quire 28 leaf 8, Cambridge Peterhouse MS 54 fol 166v, in all of which the gloss appears as printed; the gloss is abridged in Oxford Magdalen College MS 143 fol 217v and Cambridge Pembroke College MS 309 fol 316, and does not appear at all in the more heavily abridged glosses in BL MS Royal 9 A.v, BL MS Royal 9 A.xiii and Cambridge University Library MS Ee.6.32.

28 For the first see my paper ‘A Neglected Wycliffite Text’, JEH 29 (1978) pp 257-79, for the second most recently The Middle English Translation of the ‘Rosarium Theologie’, ed von Noleken, C., Middle English Texts 10 (Heidelberg 1979)Google Scholar; for the vernacular texts compare the footnote biblical references to texts nos 20-6 in Selections.

29 Annales Monasterii S. Albani a Johanne Amundesham, ed Riley, H.T., 2 vols, RS (London 1870-1) I pp 222-8Google Scholar.

30 [The Debate on Bible Translation, Oxford 1401’,] EHR (1975) pp 1-18.

31 For the stages of early legislation see Richardson, H. G., ‘Heresy and the Lay Power under Richard II’, EHR 51 (1936) pp 1–28 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The edicts in Calendar of Patent Rolls 1181-1385 (London 1897) pp 150, 487 do not mention any heretic by name; Courtenay’s letter used by various bishops in 1387 (see Wilkins 3 pp 202-3 for the copy in Wakefield’s Worcester register) mentions various heretics by name but not books. Compare McHardy, A. K., ‘Bishop Buckingham and the Lollards of Lincoln Diocese’, SCH 9 (1972) pp 131-5Google Scholar.

32 Calendar of Patent Rolls 1381-1389 (London 1900) pp 448, 468, 536; Calendar of Close Rolls 1385-1389 (London 1921) p 519. [Henry], Knighton, [Chronicon], ed Lumby, J.R., 2 vols, RS (London 1889-95) 2 pp 260-5Google Scholar gives an account of new measures taken in 1388, mentioning (p 263) ‘librosque eorum Anglicos plenius examinarent’, and giving a specimen royal commission which orders the inspection and confiscation of books ‘tam in Anglico quam in Latino’ (pp 264-5). Compare the later material exemplified in Hudson, A., ‘The Examination of Lollards’, BIHR 46 (1973) p 156 Google Scholar.

33 Winchester, reg. Wykeham, ed Kirby, T. F., Hampshire Record Society (1896-9) 2 pp 337-8Google Scholar.

34 [Thomas, Walsingham,] Historia Anglicana, ed Riley, H.T., 2 vols, RS (London 1863-4) II p 51 Google Scholar and I p 363; compare Chronicon Angliœ, ed Thompson, E. M., RS (London 1874) p 335 Google Scholar.

35 Knighton II pp 151-2; p 176 Aston, p 179 Purvey, p 174 unnamed Wycliffite.

36 Continuatio Eulogii Historiarum, ed Haydon, F. S., RS (London 1863) pp 351-5Google Scholar.

37 For the sermon see Oxford Bodleian MS Bodley 240, p 848; for the assumption see Fasciculi Zizaniorum, ed Shirley, W. W., RS (London 1858) pp 298-9Google Scholar.

38 There is apparently little in the Latin tracts written against Wyclif by men such as Woodford, Rymington or Netter.

39 Polemical Works I p 116/5 for the date see Wilks p 155. Compare Arnold, [T.], [Select English Works of John Wyclif], 3 vols (Oxford 1860-71) 3 p 100/20Google Scholar; Matthew, [F. D.], [The English Works of Wyclif hitherto unprinted], EETS 74 (1880) p 429/11Google Scholar.

40 Printed in [The Holy Bible . . . made from the Latin Vulgate by John Wycliffe and his Followers], ed Forshall, [J.] and Madden, [F.], 4 vols (Oxford 1850) 4 p 685bGoogle Scholar.

41 Brno University Library MS Mk 28 fob 136v-7; for the text see my paper ‘A Neglected Wycliffite Text’, JEH 29 (1978) pp 257-79.

42 Polemical Works 2 p 700/27; compare De Amore, (Opera Minora) p 9/20, Speculum Secularium Dominorum (Opera Minora) p 74/6, Opus Evangelicum 2 p 115/4. With Arnold 3 p 98/4 ‘the treuthe of God stondeth nou3t in one langage more than in another’ compare the Waldensian text cited by [Gonnet, J. and Molnar, A.,] Les Vaudois [au moyen âge] (Turin 1974) p 394 Google Scholar note 120’sacra scriptura eundem effectum habet in vulgari, quem habet in Latino’.

43 Quoted from Oxford Bodleian MS Laud Misc 200 fol 201; the other two manuscripts do not extend so far. I owe knowledge of this group to Dr Christina von Noleken, who is investigating the material.

44 Vienna Nationalbibliothek MS 4133, fols 195v, 202.

45 Palmer’s determination was printed from the sole manuscript, Trinity College Cambridge MS B.15. 11 fols 42v-7v, by Deanesly, [M.] in [The Lollard Bible] (Cambridge 1920) pp 418-37Google Scholar, but Deanesly’s views about the nature and position of the determination need modification; see here pp 421-2, 425-8, 436-7. The form of Palmer’s text is, as it stands, a muddle; it would seem that it may be notes taken from a whole series of debates.

46 Vienna Nationalbibliothek MS 4133 fol 198r/v; Palmer, ed Deanesly p 435. For other lollard instances see Matthew p 429/22, Forshall and Madden 1 p 59, and the so-called ‘Lollard Chronicle of the Papacy’, ed Talbert, E. W., Journal of English and Germanic Philology41 (Urbana 1942) pp 163-93Google Scholar, lines 99 seq, 136 seq.

47 Polemical Works I p 168/9; the English text printed by Deanesly p 445 (the conjecture about authorship is unwarranted), where the vernacular in which Anne’s books were written has become English; Opus Arduum, Brno University Library Mk 28 fol 174v; Palmer, ed Deanesly pp 419-20.

48 Cambridge University Library MS Ii.6.26 fols 5v-6; compare fol 11 where the story of the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8:26-38 is told in favour of even partial understanding since this will incite the ignorant to search for more.

49 Brno University Library MS Mk 28, fol 137; compare Oxford Bodleian MS Bodley 288 fol 133v (one of the lollard versions of Rolle’s Psalter commentary), Cambridge University Library MS Ii.6.26 fol 42, Arnold 3 p 98/10.

50 See for instance More’s Dialogue concerning Tyndale, ed Campbell, W. C. (London/New York 1931) bk I caps 22-3Google Scholar, bk II caps 14-16, and compare the account in The Confutation of Tyndale’s Answer, ed Schuster, L.A. et al., 3 vols (New Haven/London 1973) 3 p 1155 Google Scholar, and the text Rede me and be nott wrothe (STC 21427, [1528]) sig. c ii, where the anonymous reforming author narrates how Tunstall ‘at Poulis crosse ernestly

Denounced it to be heresy
That the gospell shuld come to lyght,
Callynge theym heretikes excecrable
Whiche caused the gospell venerable
To come vnto laye mens syght!

51 For the text see The Mirrour of the Blessed Lyf of Jesu Christ A Translation . . . by Nicholas Love, ed Powell, L.F. (London 1908) pp 7–13 Google Scholar, 300-1; but the manuscript that Powell printed, Oxford Brasenose College MS e.9 does not contain the whole Latin preface, for which see Salter, E., ‘Nicholas Love’s “Mirrour of the Blessed Lyf of Jesu Christ”’, Analecta Cartusiana 10 (Salzburg 1974) pp 1–2 Google Scholar.

52 Butler’s determination, found in Oxford Merton College MS 68 fols 202-4v, was also printed by Deanesly pp 401-18, here pp 405-7. The text is dated 1401, but, whilst it uses some of the same points as Ullerston’s of the same year, neither can be taken as a direct answer to the other. Butler was a Franciscan friar.

53 Cambridge University Library MS Ii.6.26 fol 3; compare also fols 6v, 7-8v, 21, and Oxford Bodleian MS Laud misc.200 fols 32, 128, 146v, 147v, 198v, Bodley 288 fol 96, BL MS Additional 41321 fols 14v, 30, Arnold 3 p 184/22, Matthew p 159/4.

54 Vienna Nationalbibliothek MS 4133 fols 202v-3.

55 The case is printed from the Arundel register in Wilkins 3 pp 282-4.

56 ‘“wittes and wilfulnes”: John Swetstock’s attack on those “poyswunmongeres” the Lollards’, SCH 8 (1972) pp 143-53, and ‘Church, society and politics in the early fifteenth century as viewed from an English pulpit’, SCH 12 (1975) pp 143-57; the attribution to Swetstock is unlikely, see the latter n 95. I have worked from the manuscripts, here Oxford Bodleian MS Laud Mise 706 fol 160v, Bodley 649 fol 14v, and compare the latter fols 38v, 70v, 80, 98, 125v and the charge repeated in Matthew p 159/1 and in the citation from Cambridge University Library MS Ii.3.8 fol 149 quoted in Owst, [G. R.], Preaching [in Medieval England] (Cambridge 1926) p 135 Google Scholar.

57 See respectively Arnold 3 p 114/10, Cambridge University Library MS Ii.6.26 fol 13 and BL MS Additional 41321 fol 38v; compare Arnold 3 p 393/22, 405/37 and Matthew p 428/14 and the anti-fraternal poem printed by Robbins, R. H., Historical Poems of the XIVth and XV Centuries (New York 1959) no 69 Google Scholar especially lines 1-12.

58 See EHR 90 (1975) p 16; Palmer, ed Deanesly p 425 ‘Quomodo igitur non errarent simplices, idiote circa scripturam, si earn haberent in vulgari idiomate modo, propter malum intellectum Lollardorum et simplicium grammaticam solum intelligentes.’

59 Brno University Library MS Mk 28 fol 161v.

60 Vienna Nationalbibliothek MS 4133 fols 195v, 196, 199 ‘nam si propterea non permitteretur ewangelium scribi in Anglico, quia sunt multi tractatus Anglicani continentes hereses et errores, a pari siue a fortiori prohiberent scripturam in Latino que per totam Christianitatem posset disseminari’, and fol 205 urges care over Latin ‘ex vi lingue incomparabiliter lacius diffundi posset quam in nostro Anglico exaratus qui ultra términos maris Britannici non posset facilius se diffondere’.

61 Cambridge University Library MS Ii.6.26 fol 4v; compare Forshall and Madden I pp 57-8 ‘no doute he shal fynde ful manye biblis in Latyn ful false if he loke manie, nameli newe; and the comune Latyn biblis han more nede to be correctid . . . than hath the English bible late translatid.’

62 Historia Anglicana 2 pp 32-3, Fasciculus Zizaniorum pp 273-4; compare also Knighton 2 p 170.

63 See the discussion by Dobson, R. B., The Peasants’ Revolt of 1381 (London 1970) pp 5 Google Scholar, 373, and Aston, M., ‘Lollardy and Sedition’, PP 17 (1960) pp 1–44 Google Scholar, expecially PP 3-5; for another view see Dahmus, J. H., The Prosecution of John Wyclyf (New Haven/London 1952) pp 82-5Google Scholar.

64 Cambridge University Library MS Ii.6.26 fol 19v.

65 Repressor [of Overmuch Blaming of the Clergy], ed Babington, C., 2 vols RS (London 1860) I pp 1–2 Google Scholar; The Folewer to the Donet, ed Hitchcock, E. V., EETS 164 (1924) pp 7/1-8/21Google Scholar; The Reule ofCrysten Religioun, ed Greet, W. C., EETS 171 (1927) pp 21 Google Scholar, 93-4; The Book of Faith, ed Morison, J. L. (Glasgow 1909) p 116 Google Scholar.

66 Green, [V. H. H.], [Bishop Reginald Pecock] (Cambridge 1945) p 188 Google Scholar. In addition see Jacob, [E. F.], [‘Reynold Pecock, bishop of Chichester’], PBA 37 (1951) pp 121-53Google Scholar, especially here pp 141-3.

67 See Registrum Abbatiœ Johannis Whethamstede, ed Riley, H.T., 2 vols RS (London 1872-3) I p 280 Google Scholar; Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers relating to Great Britain and Ireland: Papal Letters II 1455-64, ed Twemlow, J.A. (London 1921) pp 77 Google Scholar, 529; An English Chronicle of the Reigns of Richard II, Henry IV, Henry V and Henry VI, ed Davies, J. S., CSer 64 (1856) p 75 Google Scholar states that Pecock ‘had labored meny yeres for to translate holy scripture into Englysshe’. The abjuration recorded in Oxford Bodleian MS Ashmole 789 fols 303v-4 is in English but the list of articles abjured is in Latin; the same manuscript, fol 324, has a copy of a letter objecting to the graduation of J. Harlowe because of his favour for, and ownership of books by, Pecock.

68 According to Jacob p 138 n4, the most authentic version of the abjuration is that in Oxford Bodleian MS Ashmole 789 fols 303v-4.

69 Thomas, Gascoigne, Loci e Libro Veritatum, ed Rogers, J.E. Thorold (Oxford 1881) pp 15 Google Scholar, 26-7, 35, 40, 44.

70 pp 208-18.

71 See Jacob pp 130-2, Green pp 28-30, 39-40, 46.

72 p 213 ‘una fuit, quia scripsit tales profundas materias in Anglicis, quæ magis aptæ erant lædere legentes et audientes quam illis proficere . . . et ideo novum cimbolum magnum et longum in Anglicis verbis composuit’; p 214 ‘et magnæ causæ movebant clericos et dominos temporales multum contra eum, scilicet quod scripsit altas materias id est profundas in Anglicis, quæ pocius abducerunt laicos a bono quam ex vero simili plures ducerent ad bonum.’

73 For Bury see Emden (O) I p 323; extracts from the Gladius Salomoms are printed at the end of Repressor 2 pp 567-613.

74 Repressor 2 pp 600, 602; Oxford Bodleian MS Bodley 108 fols 51, 53v. The entire section covers fols 53v-7v, but the extracts given pp 600-7 give a reasonable idea of Bury’s argument. For a lollard interpretation of the same passage of Malachi see BL MS Egerton 2820, fols 5r/v.

75 Roberti Grosseteste . . . Epistolœ, ed Luard, H.R. RS (London 1861) pp 155-7Google Scholar; compare Srawley, J.H., ‘Grosseteste’s Administration of the Diocese of Lincoln’, Robert Grosseteste Scholar and Bishop, ed Callus, D.A. (Oxford 1955) pp 168-9Google Scholar.

76 See Arnould, E. J., Le Manuel des Péchés (Paris 1940) pp 1–59 Google Scholar.

77 See HL V.ii (1913) p 1339; Corpus luris Canonici, ed Friedberg, E. 2 vols (Leipzig 1879-81) 2 Google Scholar Decretals lib. i tit. xxxi cap. xiv.

78 Wilkins 2 p 54.

79 Lichfield reg Hales fol 166v; compare the much earlier text described in Selections pp 185-6, BL MS Egerton 2820 fol 52 ‘thei grucchen if ony nedi man haue so moche of this breed that he undirstonde his pater noster in his modir tunge’.

80 Heresy Trials in the Diocese of Norwich, 1428-31, ed Tanner, N.P. CSer, 4 series 20 (1977) p 73 Google Scholar; compare p 69 where John Baker of Tunstall ‘recognovit iudicialiter se habuisse unum librum de Johanne Burge de Beghton dicte diócesis, qui quidem liber continebat in se Pater Noster et Ave Maria et Credo in lingua Anglicana scripta’.

81 Salisbury reg Langton 2 fol 35; the version printed in Arnold 3 pp 82-92 is not outspoken, but more distinctively lollard are those found in BL MS Harley 2398, Trinity College Dublin MS 245, York Minster Library MS XVI.L. 12 and Harvard University MS Eng.738. Miss Rachel Pyper is at present engaged in sorting out the various versions of the Decalogue commentaries, an enterprise that will correct and enlarge the scope of Kellogg, A. L. and Talbert, E. W., ‘The Wycliffite Pater Noster and Ten Commandments . . .’, BJRL 42 (1960) pp 345-77Google Scholar. Compare Matthew p 429/30 ‘and herfore freris han tau3t in Englond the paternoster in Engli3ch tunge, as men seyen in the pley of 3ork, and in many othere cuntreys’, though Cambridge University Library MS Ii.6.26 fol 13 notes the efforts of clerks to prevent people knowing this in English.

82 See Arnold 3 pp 98-110 and its version in Selections no 20, also Matthew pp 198-202. Compare the reason assigned to Arundel for his refusal to return Thorpe’s psalter in Thorpe’s own account of his trial, Oxford Bodleian MS Rawlinson c. 208 fol 38 ‘forthi that thou woldist gadere out thereof and recorde scharpe verses a3ens vs’: such, according to this account, ‘is the bisinesse and the maner of this losel and siche other, to pike out scharpe sentencis of holy writ and of doctours, for to maynteyne her sect and her loore a3ens the ordenaunce of holi chirche’.

83 The investigations are summarized by Foxe in his Actes and Monuments, ed Cattley, S.R., 8 vols (London 1837-41) 4 pp 221-41Google Scholar; compare the comments of Aston, M., History 62 (1977) p 355 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

84 Foxe 4 p 225, 227-8, and for James Morden p 225.

85 See, for instance, the material cited by Owst, Preaching pp 13 5-40 and in Literature and Pulpit in Medieval England (2 ed Oxford 1966) p 374, to which may be added Mirk’s Festial, ed Erbe, T., EETS extra series 96 (1905) p 171/18Google Scholar, Jacob’s Well, ed Brandeis, A., EETS 115 (1900) pp 19/1Google Scholar, 59/26, Durham University Library MS Cosin V.iv.2 fol 130v, Lincoln Cathedral MS 66 fols 25r/v.

86 See Les Vaudois pp 319-404.