Probable Truth: Editing Medieval Texts from Britain in the Twenty-First Century

✍ Scribed by Vincent Gillespie, Anne Hudson (eds.)

• Publisher: Brepols
• Year: 2013
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 566
• Series: Texts and Transitions, 5
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Editing as an academic mode of work has had a variable ‘press’ - it is often seen as just plumbing. But without editions no historian of whatever critical persuasion could operate. Texts that are not edited are effectively invisible.

The advent of electronic means of text production has also raised new possibilities and new problems that need to be openly considered rather than ignored. The papers in this volume reflect those concerns, and explore the ways forward. How do the best editorial procedures of the past get transmitted to the future? A distinguished line-up of experienced editors and younger scholars actively grappling with these issues reflect on their engagement with the challenges of textual theory and editorial practice.

No single solution emerges as applicable to all texts and for all editions; the individual characteristics of each text and its transmission, together with the intended audience of each edition, emerge as primary areas for consideration.

✦ Table of Contents

Front Matter ("Editorial Board", "Title Page", "Copyright Page", "Table of Contents", "Illustrations", "Acknowledgements", "Early English Text Society", "Abbreviations"), p. i

Free Access

Introduction, p. 1
Vincent Gillespie, Anne Hudson
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101730

The Early English Text Society 1930 to 1950: Wartime and Reconstruction, p. 15
H. L. Spencer
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101731

Whatever Happened to Electronic Editing?, p. 39
Bella Millett
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101732

Editing Electronic Texts, p. 55
Thorlac Turville-Petre
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101733

The Architecture of Old English Editions, p. 73
Katherine O’Brien O’Keeffe
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101734

Editing Old English Prose and the Challenge of Revision or, Why It Is Not So Easy to Edit Old English Prose, p. 91
Malcolm Godden
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101735

Editing Texts with Extensive Manuscript Traditions, p. 111
Ralph Hanna
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101736

Composite Texts: Some Methodological Considerations, p. 131
William Robins
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101737

Editing Insular Song across the Disciplines: Worldes blis, p. 151
Ardis Butterfield, Helen Deeming
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101738

The Optics of Ps-Grosseteste: Editing Peter of Limoges’s Tractatus moralis de oculo, p. 167
Richard Newhauser
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101739

Variants vs Variance, p. 197
Derek Pearsall
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101740

When Variants Aren’t: Authors as Scribes in Some English Manuscripts, p. 207
Matthew Fisher
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101741

Some Measures of Scribal Accuracy in Late Medieval English Manuscripts, p. 223
Richard Beadle
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101742

Editing and Correcting, p. 241
Daniel Wakelin
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101743

What is Scribal Error, and What Should Editors Do (or Not Do) about It?, p. 261
Stephen Morrison
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101744

In Praise of the Variant: Why Edit Critically? A Pragmatic Viewpoint, p. 275
Susan Powell
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101745

Assessing Sole Attestation in Selected Middle English Textual Traditions, p. 293
Rosamund Allen
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101746

Editing Older Scots Texts, p. 311
Sally Mapstone
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101747

Towards an Edition of the Scottish Troy Book, p. 327
Emily Wingfield
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101748

Textual Criticism and Baile Binnbérlach mac Búain, p. 345
Michelle Doran
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101749

A Medieval Welsh Version of the Troy Story: Editing Ystorya Dared, p. 355
Helen Fulton
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101750

Editing the Editor: Editorial Policy at the Anglo‑Norman Dictionary, p. 373
Heather Pagan, Geert De Wilde
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101751

A Plea for Middle English Botanical Synonyma, p. 387
David Moreno Olalla
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101752

New Software Tools for the Analysis of Computerized Historical Corpora: GUL MSS Hunter 509 and 513 in the Light of TexSEn, p. 405
Laura Esteban-Segura, Teresa Marqués-Aguado
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101753

Editing Alchemical Texts in Middle English: The Final Frontier?, p. 427
Peter J. Grund
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101754

Why Edit the Middle English Prose Brut? What’s (Still) in It for Us?, p. 445
John J. Thompson
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101755

Parallel Texts and a Peculiar Brut: A Case Study, p. 465
Marie Stansfield
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101756

New Challenges to the Editing of Chaucer, p. 481
Orietta Da Rold
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101757

‘Let Copulation Thrive’: Some Varieties of Contamination in the Textual Tradition of Piers Plowman, p. 493
A. V. C. Schmidt
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101758

Editing Walter Hilton’s Scale of Perfection: The Case for a Rhizomorphic Historical Edition, p. 509
Michael G. Sargent
https://doi.org/10.1484/M.TT-EB.1.101759

Back Matter ("Index of Manuscripts", "Index of Names, Places, and Texts", "Titles in Series"), p. 535