Description

Bury St Edmunds possessed one of the wealthiest abbeys in England. This three-volume collection of Latin documents relating to the abbey was edited by Thomas Arnold (1823-1900) and published between 1890 and 1896. Volume 3 contains a variety of records. The Cronica Buriensis covers the years 1020-1346 in a manuscript of c.1400, and the Brevis Cronica, possibly by Thomas Croftis, c.1479, covers 1020-1471. There is also a collection of fifteenth-century letters, excerpts from Cambridge manuscripts relating to Bury St Edmunds, an account of the fourteenth-century dispute between the abbey and Bishop Bateman of Norwich, and a description of the fire of 1465 that completely gutted the church. The appendices include by-laws of 1477 concerning the town weavers, a charter of privileges of 1447, and another life of St Edmund. A glossary and index to all three volumes are also provided, along with English side-notes throughout.