Corpus Christi College : Ranulf Higden, Polychronicon (English translation by John Trevisa)

Corpus Christi College

<p style='text-align: justify;'>The <i>Polychronicon</i> was the last universal chronicle to be produced by a monk in England. Its author – or, to use his own preferred title, its compiler – was Ranulf Higden, a Benedictine monk at the Abbey of St Werburgh in Chester. He coined the title for his work, he explained, 'from the plurality of eras that it encompasses'. Drawing from a wide variety of medieval and classical authorities, whom he listed in his prologue and cited in the text, Higden described the geography of the world in the first book, and its history from Creation through to his own time in the following six books. On occasion, he added his own observations, marking them with his initial 'R'. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>Details of Ranulf's life are sparse. His knowledge of and evident pride in Chester and its environs, as well as his fore-name (which was common in those parts), suggest that he was born locally. He probably entered the monastery at an early age and seems to have spent his entire life there. A later inscription in a copy of the <i>Polychronicon</i> records that he died around 12 March 1363/64. The only evidence that Higden ever left the abbey precincts is a royal summons of 8 August 1352, which instructed Brother Ranulf to bring himself and 'all of [his] chronicles and those which are in his keeping' to a meeting of the king's council at Westminster, on business to be explained to him there. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>Regardless of the purpose of this summons, it shows the nationwide renown as a historian that Higden achieved within his own lifetime. Indeed, we know from surviving manuscripts and from contemporary records that copies of the <i>Polychronicon</i> were in circulation at Oxford, Exeter and elsewhere before his death. This widespread dissemination was no doubt aided by the traffic of monks between their native houses and the universities, where increasing numbers of them studied, and the development therein of commercial book trades that could readily supply new copies of in-demand texts. The extent of the demand for the <i>Polychronicon</i> through to the end of the 15th century is shown by the survival today of nearly 150 complete or partial copies of the text, as well as a number of fragments. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>A further indicator of the <i>Polychronicon</i>'s appeal is that it was chosen for translation into Middle English by the Oxford cleric John Trevisa (d. 1402). Supported by his patron, Thomas (IV), fifth Baron Berkeley, whom he also served as family chaplain, Trevisa had begun the work by at least 1385 and completed it on 18 April 1387. Like Higden, Trevisa too made his own interpolations – adding to, querying or even disagreeing outright with his source text – and marked these with his name. He extended the text with a continuation to 1360, and also supplemented it with further prefaces to Higden's own: the <i>Dialogue between a Lord and a Clerk</i>, a fictionalised conversation about translation between his patron and himself, and a dedicatory <i>Epistle</i>.</p><p style='text-align: justify;'>Neither of these are found in this copy, however, and the loss of leaves means that the text of the translation begins and ends imperfectly. The manuscript is moreover very plain, with the text written on paper in long and densely packed lines of cursive script, and without even simple coloured initials to mark the beginnings of each book or chapter. Some copies of Trevisa's translation, however, were every bit as ornate as copies of the Latin text: those in <a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://www.joh.cam.ac.uk/library/special_collections/manuscripts/medieval_manuscripts/medman/H_1.htm'>Cambridge, St John's College, MS H.1</a> and Tokyo, Senshu University Library, MS 1 are particularly fine productions. That patrons were prepared to commission such lavish ornamentation suggests the esteem in which they held Trevisa's text and the pride they felt in owning a copy (as well as, no doubt, a desire to show off their personal wealth through conspicuous consumption). </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>Altogether sixteen manuscripts of Trevisa's translation are known, including this one. The vagaries of manuscript survival mean that we cannot necessarily infer that the Latin <i>Polychronicon</i> was more popular than the Middle English rendering: it may indeed be that its circulation was rather limited or, alternatively, that it was primarily among owners whose books were more vulnerable to subsequent loss or destruction. Either way, who these owners were is consequently less well-known than for the Latin <i>Polychronicon</i>. No evidence of medieval provenance survives in this manuscript (though the presence of marginal annotations and content markers confirm that it was read). Copies of the <i>Polychronicon</i> are recorded in contemporary documents, but unless they explicitly state the language in which the text was written we can only speculate as to whether these were copies of the Latin or the vernacular version. Examples might include a 'Ponecronykyll' in the will of John Hamondson (d. 1472), master of St Peter's grammar school in York; another in the will of Robert Scrayningham (d. 1467), mercer of London; and 'a book called Pollicronikon' that was bequeathed to the clerk John Pechell by William de Thorp (d. 1391) of Maxey Castle in Cambridgeshire. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>There was, however, no simple division in spoken language or in literature between a Latinate clergy and vernacular laity in late medieval England (although this is often assumed). There are examples of laymen bequeathing copies of the Latin <i>Polychronicon</i> that one may assume in at least some of these instances they had read themselves. For example, John Yorke of Twickenham lent his Latin <i>Polychronicon</i> (now <a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://medieval.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/catalog/manuscript_6045'>Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Hatton 14</a>) to the Carthusian William Mede of Sheen 'for the duration of his life'; his son, William Yorke, inherited the book and in turn bequeathed it to Sheen forever. Sir John Morton of York (d. 1431) left 'unum librum de Latino, vocatum Policronica, ex compilatione Fratris Ranulphi Monachi Cestriae' to Robert Semer, rector of St Michael le Belfrey in that city. Notably, Sir Thomas Chaworth (d. 1458) of Wiverton, Nottinghamshire, had copies of both versions: he willed that 'Maister Gull have a boke writen in Latyn called Policonicron' (William Gull was master of Clare Hall in Cambridge, 1440-1446), while also bequeathing a copy of an English translation – presumably Trevisa's – to his son, William. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>Limited though the manuscript dissemination of Trevisa's text may have been, it gained a further lease of life in 1482, when it was printed by William Caxton. He reworded and emended Trevisa's text, and further extended it to 1460 with his own 'Liber ultimus'. This formed the basis for further printings by Wynkyn de Worde in 1495 and Peter Treveris in 1527. Evidently, commercial demand for the vernacular text at least must have remained sufficiently buoyant to support these ventures, with readers continuing to consume Higden's text – albeit in mediated form, at a couple of removes from the original – two centuries after his life. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>Dr James Freeman<br />Medieval Manuscripts Specialist<br />Cambridge University Library</p><p style='text-align: justify;'><b>Bibliography</b><ul><li>James Freeman, <i>The manuscript dissemination and readership of the 'Polychronicon' of Ranulph Higden, c. 1330-c. 1500</i> (unpublished PhD dissertation, University of Cambridge, 2013)</li></ul></p>