The Golden Legend, by Blessed Jacobus de Voragine

Dec 042010
 

Thus endeth the legend named in Latin Legenda Aurea, that is to say in English, the Golden Legend. For like as gold passeth in value all other metals, so this legend exceedeth all other books, wherein be contained all the high and great feasts of our Lord, the feasts of our Blessed Lady, the lives, passions, and miracles of many other saints, and other histories and acts, as all along here afore is made mention. Which work I hare accomplished at the commandment and request of the noble and puissant earl, and my special good lord, William, earl of Arundel, and have finished it at Westminster the twentieth day of November, the year of our Lord fourteen hundred and eighty-three, and the first year of the reign of King Richard III. By me, William Caxton.

The Golden Legend or Lives of the Saints. Compiled by Jacobus de Voragine, Archbishop of Genoa, 1275. First edition published 1470. Englished by William Caxton, first edition 1483. Temple Classics edited by F S Ellis, first issue of this Edition, 1900. Printed in Great Britain by T. and A. Constable LTD. at the University Press, Edinburgh. Reprinted 1922, 1931. Scanned by Robert Blackmon, bob_blackmon@mindspring.com. Part of the Internet Medieval Source Book by Paul Halsall, halsall@fordham.edu.