Purpose

In the thousands of inventories on decease compiled for the purpose of probate during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in England, books are often among the items listed. They are also recorded in a variety of other documents associated with men and women of this period, including wills, account ledgers, receipts, and inventories of goods distrained. Private Libraries in Renaissance England (PLRE) transcribes and annotates such book-lists produced between the beginning of the sixteenth century and the mid-seventeenth century; it also reconstructs private library holdings of that period based on extant books. The information thus derived is then entered into a uniform database which can be searched and from which material about those books and their owners is retrieved and published.

One of the goals of PLRE is to provide scholars with data to help anchor generalizations about print culture within the history of particular books and readers. Edited book-lists and library catalogues provide evidence for the histories of reading and collecting, for the languages in which that reading was conducted, for changing intellectual, educational, and literary fashions, and for the social roles or aspirations of book owners. A library is in itself a kind of collective text: even in the absence of the books themselves, a book-list offers the chance to see how a given book might have been used by placing it against the backdrop of other books owned by the same reader. These inventories can also provide a great deal of information about the book trade. They reveal not only the extensive presence of continental publications in English inventories, but also, as dated collections, the provable years by which these publications were present in England. They also document changing patterns of probate valuations that provide glimpses into the underdocumented history of the used book trade in the period.

Design

Published Volumes

In the published volumes of PLRE, each entry in the book-lists is reproduced as it appears in the manuscript source and is provided with the following:

1) a reference number (PLRE number);

2) as identifiable, the title, author and other contributors (such as editors, translators, and illustrators);

3) STC status;

4) publication information such as place, stationers, and date;

5) language;

6) cost or appraised value

7) the location of that particular copy if extant.

Additional information is provided in a general annotation section. Each edited book-list is also prefaced with a brief bio-bibliographical introduction. (See Representative Booklist on this website.)

Six fully indexed volumes containing 150 book-lists, dating from 1507 to 1644, with a total of over 9900 books have thus far been published. Book-lists in Volumes II-VI are all drawn from inventories taken under the jurisdiction of the Chancellor of Oxford University and, with a few exceptions, detail libraries of sixteenth-century Oxford University scholars. Volume VII, now in preparation, will complete the editing of the book-lists from the Oxford University Archives.

The Cumulative Catalogue (PLRE database)

The PLRE database is made up of two parts: 1) all the annotated book-lists that appear in the published volumes of PLRE and 2) selected book-lists that have been published elsewhere. This second group of previously published book-lists (appended book-lists) are identified in the database with Ad prefixed to the PLRE number. They are not completely re-edited but are augmented as necessary (e.g., by the provision of uniform titles, PLRE reference numbers, subject categories, and the like) so that they conform to the PLRE format and are subject to retrieval with other entries.

In addition to all the information found in the published volumes of PLRE cited above (with the exception of the bio-bibliographical introductions), the database of the Cumulative Catalogue contains for each book listed: the dates, profession or vocation, and social status of the person associated with the book-list; the purpose of the manuscript containing the book-list (whether, for example, a will, an inventory or a receipt); the location where the manuscript was drafted and its date; the manuscript’s current location; and one or more classifications defining the subject categories of the work.

Thus far, these appended lists add thirty book-lists containing approximately 1000 books to those appearing in the published volumes. As of May, 2008, the PLRE Cumulative Catalogue consists of 180 book-lists containing a total of more than 11,000 books.

* * *

Volumes are published by Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies (Tempe, AZ) and are available in the United Kingdom and Europe from Adam Matthew Publications (Marlborough, Wiltshire).