Some Primary Sources in Translation
INDEX
A. On-Line Resources [click
here]
B. Narrative Sources for
England (and Normandy), c. 1066-1270 [click here]
C. Narrative Sources for
France, c. 1000-1280 [click here]
D. Narrative Sources for
Germany [click here]
E. Saints' Lives [click
here]
F. Letters [click
here]
G. Legal and Administrative
Texts [click here]
H. Literature [click
here]
I. Collections of Texts
[click here]
B. Narrative Sources for Anglo-Norman
and Angevin England (1066-1270)
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
Dudo of Saint-Quentin, History of the Normans
Encomia Emmae Reginae (Poem of praise to Queen Emma, wife
of Canute)
Orderic Vitalis, Ecclesiastical History (Historia Ecclesiastica)
William of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum Anglorum (deeds of
the Kings of england)
William of Malmesbury, Historia Novella ("recent" history,
ie., 1130s-1140s)
William of Poitiers, Gesta Guillelmi (deeds of William
the Conqueror)
William of Jumieges, Gesta Normannorum Ducum (deeds of
the Norman Dukes)
John of Worcester, Chronicle
Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum (history of the
English)
Hugh the Chanter, History of the Church of York, 1066-1127
Eadmer, Historia Novorum (history of recent events)
Anonymous, Gesta Stephani (deeds of King Stephen)
Guy of Amiens, Carmen de Hastingae Proelio (Song of the
Battle of Hastings)
The Waltham Chronicle
Chronicle of Battle Abbey
Roger of Hoveden, Chronicle
Gerald of Wales, the Topography of Ireland
Gerald of Wales, De expugnatio Hiberniae (The Conquest
of Ireland)
Gerald of Wales, De instructione principis (on the Instruction
of princes)
Richard of Devizes, Chronicle
Jordan of Fantosmes, Chronicle [poem on civil war between Henry
II and his sons]
John of Salisbury, Historia Pontificalis (Pontifical History)
Ralph de Diceto, [chronicle]
William de Newburg (Neuberg), [chronicle]
Roger of Wendover (or Roger Wendover), Flowers of History
Matthew Paris, Flowers of History [chronicle]
Jocelin of Brakelond, Chronicle of the Abbey of St Edmund's
Ambroise, the Crusade of Richard Lion-Heart
C. Narrative Sources for France,
c.1000-1275
Ralph Glaber, History, in Ralph Glaber, Opera, ed. John
France
Suger, Deeds of Louis the Fat
Jean de Joinville, Life of St Louis
Galbert of Bruges, The Murder of Charles the Good
Hugh of Poitiers, the Vezelay Chronicle
Odo de Deuil, De profectione Ludovici VII in orientem
[Louis VII's expedition to the Holy Land in 1147]
The Book of St Foy (miracle stories)
Guibert of Nogent, Autobiography (edited under the titles Self
and Society in Medieval France and A Monk's Confession)
Deeds of the Counts of Anjou (at the Internet
Medieval Sourcebook, and from Dr. Barton)
Deeds of the Bishops of Le Mans (from Dr. Barton)
Geoffrey de Villehardouin, Chronicle of the Fourth Crusade
Robert de Clari, The Conquest of Constantinople (4th crusade)
William of Tyre, A History of Deeds Done Beyond the Sea (crusades)
D. Narrative Sources for Germany
Otto of Freising, the Deeds of Frederick Barbarossa
Imperial Lives and Letters of the Eleventh Century
Regino of Prum
Adam von Bremen, History of the Archbishops of Hamburg-Bremen
Philippe of Novara, The Wars of Frederick II Against the Ibelins
in Syria
E. Saints' Lives
St Odo of Cluny, "The Life of St. Gerald of Aurillac," ed. Gerard
Sitwell, in the book St Odo of Cluny (New York,
1958). [Gerald was a 10th century nobleman]
Eadmer, Life of St Anselm
Life of St Hugh of Lincoln
Wulfstan of Winchester, Life of St Aethelwold
Life of King Edward Who Rests at Westminster (Life of King Edward
the Pious)
Three Eleventh-Century Anglo-Latin Saints' Lives
the Book of St Gilbert
Walter Daniel, the Life of Ailred of Rievaulx
Ralph Glaber, "The Life of Saint William," in the book Ralph
Glaber, Opera, ed. John France
F. Letters
Letters of John of Salisbury
Letters of Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury
Letters of Gilbert Foliot
Letters of Ivo of Chartres
Letters and Poems of Fulbert of Chartres
Letters of St Anselm
Letters of Pope Gregory VII
Letters of Peter of Blois
G. Legal and Administrative Texts
the Internet Medieval Sourcebook has a very good legal history
page: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/sbook-law.html
1. English sources
Richard fitzNigel, Dialogus de Scaccario (Course of the Exchequer)
Glanvill (Legal text from England in the 1180s)
Leges Henrici Primi (laws of Henry I [d. 1135])
the Laws of William the Conqueror, found on-line at the Online Medieval
Sourcebook
English Lawsuits from William I to Richard I, 2 vols., Selden
Society nos. 106-107, ed. R.C. Van Caenegem [at Duke]
Documents of the Baronial Movement of Reform and Rebellion, 1258-1267
The Court Baron [various texts, including Manorial Court records],
edited by F.W. Maitland and published by the Selden
Society
Magna Carta
The Pipe Rolls, edited by the Pipe Roll Society. In Latin, but
with 30 minutes training from me, you could be reading and
using the Pipe Rolls. A short translated excerpt is found in Patrick
Geary, Readings in Medieval History, 2nd
edition. UNCC-Chapel-Hill has most of the 88-volumes; they list it as a
periodical under the title "Publications
of the Pipe Roll Society".
Select Canterbury Cases, 1200-1301, published by the Selden
Society [law cases brought before the ecclesiastical court of
Canterbury]
The Huntingdonshire Eyre of 1286, excerpts published by Patrick Geary,
Readings in Medieval History
Bracton, On the Laws and Customs of England
Select Pleas of the Crown: Volume 1--A.D. 1200-1225, ed. F.W.
Maitland (London: Bernard Quartich, 1888).
Several of these have been placed on-line at the Internet
Medieval Sourcebook Legal Page
Select Pleas in Manorial and Other Seignorial Courts: Volume 1--Reigns
of Henry III and Edward I, ed. F.W.
Maitland (London: Bernard Quaritch, 1889). Several accounts have been placed
on-line.
2. French sources
Philippe de Beaumanoir, Coutumes de Beauvasis (Customs of the
Beauvais Region)
The Etablissements of St Louis [customs for the region of Orleans,
Tours, and Angers]
Documents on the Peace of God Movement, as an appendix to Head and
Landes, The Peace of God (1992?)
Enquetes of Saint Louis [legal records from France in the 13th century],
excerpts have been edited and published by Patrick
Geary in Readings in Medieval History.
Odo Rigaldus (Eudes, Archbishop of Rouen), The Register of Eudes of
Rouen
3. Other Regions
The Ustages of Barcelona [customs for Barcelona, in Spain]
H. Literature
the Ruodlieb (german, 11th century)
the Song of Roland
Chretien de Troyes, Arthurian Romances (Yvain, Erec and Enide, Lancelot,
Perceval, Cliges)
Raoul of Cambrai
the Poem of the Cid
Lancelot of the Lake
Eneas, a 12th century French Romance
Guillaume d'Orange (William of Orange), Four French Epics
Many more ....
I. Collections of texts
David Herlihy, The History of Feudalism
English Historical Documents, vols. 1-2, series edited by David
Douglas
Stephenson and Marcham, Sources of English Constitutional History
Patrick Geary, Readings in Medieval History