Author Description

Product Description This catalogue, the first in 150 years, describes 112 manuscript books and over 200 fragments, including about 95 books that have been at All Souls since the fifteenth century. They and later acquisitions contain material that will interest historians, literary, linguistic, liturgical students, and historians of science, medicine and law. Review in the last decade or so, a wealth of detailed descriptions has been published, treating libraries from Hereford Cathedral to the Pepys collection at Magdalene. Andrew G. Watson's homage to All Souls' library holdings is a distinguished and welcome addition to this recent upsurge./ What most sets Watson's contribution apart is precisely Watson himself and the engaging style of presentation he brings to the task... Watson writes real and informative prose; he thus communicates the obvious zest and affection he feels for the books... And he does so impressively, without compromising any of the cataloguer's 'technical' responsibilities./... an excellent performance: anyone interested in medieval manuscript books will learn a very great deal about book production and how to think about it from reading Watson's catalogue. / Ralph Hanna III, Oxford, Medium Aevum, Vol 68, no 1, 1999 `Andrew G. Watson's A Descriptive Catalogue of the Medieval Manuscripts of All Souls College, Oxford... includes all the survivors of this unusually well documented library in his meticulous analysis of the 112 medieval books and more than 200 manuscript fragments now in the college's possession... The unrivalled breadth and accuracy of the author's scholarship ensure that this volume will prove a valuable resource to scholars working in almost every branch of medieval studies.' Simon Walker, University of Sheffield, EHR, June 1999 `Andrew G. Watson's A Descriptive Catalogue of the Medieval Manuscripts of All Souls College, Oxford... includes all the survivors of this unusually well documented library in his meticulous analysis of the 112 medieval books and more than 200 manuscript fragments now in the college's possession... The unrivalled breadth and accuracy of the author's scholarship ensure that this volume will prove a valuable resource to scholars working in almost every branch of medieval studies' English Historical Review About the Author Lecturer, Reader and Professor of Manuscript Studies, University College, University of London, until 1990