Writing was encouraged by directions of chapters
in 1343, 1388, and 1444.[1] The early part of the fifteenth
century was an age of library building, in the monasteries,
as at the Universities. Special rooms for books were put
up at Gloucester, Christ Church (Canterbury), Durham,
Bury St. Edmunds, and other houses. Large and growing
monastic libraries were in existence--at St. Albans and
Peterborough, two at Canterbury of nearly two thousand
volumes each, two thousand volumes at Bury, a thousand
and more at Durham, six hundred at Ramsey, three hundred
and fifty at Meaux. When John Leland crossed the threshold
of the library at Glastonbury he stood stock still for a
moment, awestruck and bewildered at the sight of books of
the greatest antiquity. In 1482, the abbess of Syon
monastery, Isleworth, entered into a regular contract for
writing and binding books.[2] Some forty years later this
abbey had at least fourteen hundred and twenty-one
printed and manuscript volumes in its library.[3] More
facts of similar character will be noted in the next
chapter. Here we will content ourselves with noting a
few of the most conspicuous instances of monkish
scholarship in these later days.
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