Revised: 6/99

BIBLIOGRAPHY I: General Works on the Medieval Church

1. THE MEDIEVAL CHURCH: SURVEYS

R.W. Southern, Western Society and the Church in the Middle Ages, Pelican History of the Church 2 (New York:

Penguin Books, 1970) paperback, $16. Southern, one of the major medieval historians of this century,
focuses more on emblematic moments and trends than on a straightforward narrative of events. This survey
includes long chapters on the medieval papacy and religious orders. A great synthesis, but sometimes
presupposes a knowledge of the main events and figures.

Peter Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity AD 200-1000 (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell

Publishers, 1996) NEW in paperback, $18. Peter Brown is not only one of the finest historians of late
antiquity and the early medieval world, but is also a gifted writer. Few historians have his ability to bring
alive ancient and foreign worlds. This survey spans much unconventional ground. Brown covers not only
the classic Greek and Latin forms of Christianity, but also explores its more exotic varieties: Coptic and
Syriac, Celtic and Central Asian. Try it for fresh perspectives

Colin Morris, The Papal Monarchy: The Western Church from 1050 to 1250, Oxford History of the Christian

Church (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991) paperback, $30. Not just a book about the papacy, but
a first-rate survey of the crucial period which witnessed the ascendancy not just of the papacy, but of much
else: of the Crusades, of heresy, of the universities, of the mendicants. Worth the price—and then some.
Also a superb bibliography.

Adriaan H. Bredero, Christendom and Christianity in the Middle Ages (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1994)

hardback, $30.

Richard Fletcher, The Barbarian Conversion: From Paganism to Christianity (Henry Holt, 1998) hardcover, $35.

NEW. Due out in paperback in Nov, 1999.

Isnard Wilhelm Frank, A Concise History of the Mediaeval Church (New York: Continuum, 1995) paperback, $18.
Bernard Hamilton, Religion in the Medieval West (London: Edward Arnold, 1986), paperback, $18.
Judith Herrin, The Formation of Christendom (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987) paperback, $10. Superb

treatment focusing on the period from 400-1000.

Joseph H. Lynch, The Medieval Church: a Brief History (London: Longman, 1992), paperback, $20.
John McManners, ed., The Oxford Illustrated History of Christianity (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990).

See the chapters by R.A. Markus, “From Rome to the Barbarian Kingdoms (330-700)” and Colin Morris,
“Christian Civilization (1050-1400).”

Francis Oakley, The Western Church in the Later Middle Ages (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1985)

paperback, $9.

James C. Russell, The Germanization of Early Medieval Christianity: A Sociohistorical Approach to Religious

Transformation (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994) paperback, $14.

Gerd Tellenbach, The Church in Western Europe from the Tenth to the Early Twelfth Century, Cambridge Medieval

Textbooks (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992) paperback, $22.

John A.F. Thomson, The Western Church in the Middle Ages (London: Arnold Publishers / Oxford University Press,

1998) paperback, $25. NEW.

Carl A. Volz, The Medieval Church: From the Dawn of the Middle Ages to the Eve of the Reformation (Nashville:

Abingdon Press, 1997) paperback, $18.

J.M. Wallace-Hadrill, The Frankish Church, Oxford History of the Christian Church (New York: Oxford University

Press, 1983).

Bibliography: General Works on the Medieval Church

2

2. MEDIEVAL CIVILIZATION: SURVEYS

George Holmes, ed., Oxford Illustrated History of Medieval Europe (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988)

paperback, $22. A fine survey of medieval history with chapters by leading scholars. The illustrations are
superb. A good place to start. It covers more than simply the history of the Church.

Jacques LeGoff, Medieval Civilization (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1990) paperback, $18. LeGoff, one of the

leading medieval historians of this century, focuses here not on the course of historical events, but on the
social milieu. Wonderful plates and maps.

Robert Bartlett, The Making of Europe: Conquest, Colonization, and Cultural Change, 950-1350 (Princeton:

Princeton University Press, 1993) paperback, $12.

Marc Bloch, Feudal Society, 2 vol. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961) paperback, $10 per volume. A

classic.

Robert Calkins, Medieval Architecture in Western Europe: From A.D. 300-1500 (New York: Oxford University

Press, 1998) hardcover, $36. NEW.

Norman F. Cantor, The Civilization of the Middle Ages, revised edition (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1993; 1

st

edition, 1963) paperback, $16.

Giles Constable, The Reformation of the Twelfth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998)

paperback, $25. NEW.

Georges Duby, The Three Orders: Feudal Society Imagined (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980)

paperback, $12.

Georges Duby, ed., Revelations of the Medieval World, Volume 2 of A History of Private Life (Cambridge, MA:

Harvard University Press, 1987) paperback, $20.

Georges Duby, Women of the Twelfth Century, 3 vol. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997-1998) paperback,

$15 per volume.

Robert Fossier, ed., The Cambridge Illustrated History of the Middle Ages, 3 vol. (New York: Cambridge, 1986,

1992) hardcover.

Henry Mayr-Harting, The Coming of Christianity to Anglo-Saxon England (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State

University Press, 1991), paperback, $15.

Johann Huizinga, The Waning of the Middle Ages (New York: Doubleday, 1924), paperback, $8. A classic, recently

reprinted.

Christiane Klapisch-Zuber, ed., A History of Women in the West: Vol. 2: Silences of the Middle Ages (Cambridge,

MA: Harvard University Press, 1992), paperback, $16.

Angus Mackay, ed., Atlas of Medieval Europe (London: Routledge, 1998) paperback, $26. NEW.
Rosamund McKitterick, ed., The New Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. 2: 700-900 (Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 1995), hardcover.

Francis Oakley, The Medieval Experience, Medieval Academy Reprints for Teaching 23 (Toronto: University of

Toronto, 1974; reprint, 1988) paperback, $10.

Edward Peters, Europe and the Middle Ages, 3

rd

edition (New York: Prentice-Hall, 1997), hardcover.

J.R.S. Phillips, The Medieval Expansion of Europe, 2

nd

ed., (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998) paperback,

$25.

R.W. Southern, The Making of the Middle Ages (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967) paperback, $10. A

masterpiece of historical scholarship.

Brian Tierney, Western Europe in the Middle Ages, 300-1475, 6

th

ed. (New York: McGraw Hill, 1998) paperback,

$52.

J.M. Wallace-Hadrill, The Barbarian West, 400-1000 (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1962) paperback, $20.

Bibliography: General Works on the Medieval Church

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3. MEDIEVAL THOUGHT: SURVEYS

Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: a History of the Development of Doctrine, 5 vol. (Chicago: University of

Chicago Press, 1974, 1978, 1984) paperback, $16 per volume. One of the finest studies of the evolution of
Christian thought. One problem: Pelikan presumes you know really your history—and the procession of
names he mentions. Three volumes are relevant to medieval theology:

•

Volume 2: The Spirit of Eastern Christendom (600-1700).

•

Volume 3: The Growth of Medieval Theology (600-1300).

•

Volume 4: Reformation of Church and Dogma (1300-1700).

A.H. Armstrong, ed., Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval Philosophy (London: Cambridge

University Press, 1967) paperback.

Joseph Canning, A History of Medieval Political Thought, 300-1450 (New York: Routledge, 1997) paperback, $27.
M.D. Chenu, Nature, Man, and Society in the Twelfth Century: Essays on New Theological Perspectives in the Latin

West (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968). A selection of path-breaking essays by one of the
architects of Vatican II. Originally published as La théologie au douzième siècle (Paris: Vrin, 1957).

Marcia L. Colish, The Medieval Foundations of the Western Intellectual Tradition, 400-1400, The Yale Intellectual

History of the West (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997) NEW in paperback, $18.

Henri de Lubac, Medieval Exegesis, Vol. 1:The Four Senses of Scripture, trans. Mark Sebanc, Ressourcement Series

(Grand Rapids, MI: Wm B. Eerdmans, 1998) hardcover, $45. NEW. An older, classic study now available
in English.

G.R. Evans, Philosophy and Theology in the Middle Ages (New York: Routledge, 1993), paperback, $12.
G.R. Evans, The Language and Logic of the Bible: the Earlier Middle Ages (New York: Cambridge University

Press, 1984), paperback, $12.

Margaret T. Gibson, The Bible in the Latin West (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame, 1993).
Michael Haren, Medieval Thought: The Western Intellectual Tradition from Antiquity to the Thirteenth Century ,

2

nd

edition (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1992).

David Knowles, The Evolution of Medieval Thought (New York: Doubleday, 1962) paperback, $8. An older survey

of medieval theology, recently reprinted.

Norman Kretzman, Anthony Kenny, Jan Pinbourg, eds., Cambridge History of Later Medieval Philosophy: from the

Rediscovery of Aristotle to the Disintegration of Scholasticism, 1100-1600 (New York: Cambridge
University Press, 1982), hardcover.

G.W.H. Lampe, ed., Cambridge History of the Bible, Vol. 2: The West from the Fathers to the Reformation

(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970) paperback.

Gordon Leff, Medieval Thought: St. Augustine to Ockham (Baltimore: Penguin Book, 1962).
John Marebon, Early Medieval Philosophy (480-1150) (Cambridge, MA: Routledge, 1983), paperback, $18.
John Marebon, Later Medieval Philosophy (1150-1350) (Cambridge, MA: Routledge, 198_) paperback, $17.
Steven Ozment, The Age of Reform, 1250-1550 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980) paperback, $16. It is

widely praised, but I must confess that I find myself quibbling with some of his interpretations.

B.B. Price, Medieval Thought: an Introduction (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1992) paperback, $20. A good place

to start for a beginner.

R.W. Southern, Scholastic Humanism and the Unification of Europe, vol. 1: Foundations (New York: Blackwell,

1995), NEW in paperback, $27.

4. ANTHOLOGIES OF CLASSIC TEXTS

Norman F. Cantor, ed., The Medieval Reader (New York: HarperCollins, 1994) paperback.
Patrick J. Geary, ed., Readings in Medieval History (Peterborough, Ont: Broadview Press, 1989), paperback.
Brian Tierney, ed., The Middle Ages: Sources of Medieval History, 5

th

ed. (New York: McGraw Hill, 1992)

paperback, $32.

Bibliography: General Works on the Medieval Church

4

5. GENERAL REFERENCE WORKS.

James S. Bradley and Richard A. Muller, Church History: An Introduction to Research, Reference Works and

Methods (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995) paperback, $19.

Henry Chadwick and Gillian R. Evans, ed., Atlas of the Christian Church (New York: Facts on File, Inc., 1987).
David Farmer, The Oxford Dictionary of Saints, 4

th

ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), paperback, $16.

New edition.

J.N.D. Kelly, Oxford Dictionary of Popes (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986), paperback, $12.
Anthony Kenny, ed., The Oxford History of Western Philosophy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994)

hardcover, $45.

Elizabeth Livingstone, The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 3

rd

ed. (New York: Oxford University Press,

1997), hardcover, $125.