Liber Eliensis

"This is the first ever translation from Latin into English of the Liber Eliensis, an account of the history of the Isle of Ely compiled by a monk of Ely in the later twelfth century. He uses evidence from his monastery's Latin and Old English archives, combined with data from chronicles, to tell the story of Ely in three parts." "The first book, devoted to the period from the earliest days of East Anglican Christianity to the reign of King Edgar, tells how Saint AEthelthryth and three of her holy kinswomen ruled as abbesses over a double house at Ely; how their house was sacked by the Danes in 870 and partially reoccupied by a community of canons in the mid-tenth century. The second book covers 970-1109, when the Benedictine monastery was ruled by abbots, and includes an account of Hereward's resistance to William the Conqueror. The third book begins at the point when Ely first became the seat of a bishop, and extends to the compiler's own times, ending with the martyrdom of Archbishop Becket." "The translation does full justice to the compiler's wide range of source material; it gives priority to the readings of the oldest manuscript of the Liber Eliensis, but covers everything included in the later but fuller recension of the Latin text presented in E.O. Blake's 1962 edition. There are notes on the text and sources, an introductory essay, appendices and indices."--Jacket.