A Late Fifteenth-Century Dominical Sermon Cycle

A Late Fifteenth-Century Dominical Sermon Cycle is a critical edition, in two volumes, of a previously unpublished sermon series, which was popular among preachers in the late Middle Ages in England. Its content is notably orthodox, perhaps in response to Wycliffite preaching materials then in circulation. The collection has attracted previous attention in print because of the interest of its exemplary stories and illustrations. Seven surviving manuscripts attest to three stages in the development of the text: the edition presents the final and fullest version, extant in four of the seven copies. The relevant versions of the earlier stages, which are sufficiently different to be edited separately, are printed in the Appendices to Volume 2.

The Introduction gives a description of the manuscripts and discusses their relationships, as well as the language, and the context in which these sermons might have been preached. There is a full list of the exempla, and discussion of their sources. There are explanatory notes to the text, a glossary, and indices of biblical and other quotations.