An important new contribution to the emerging field of late medieval supplicatory cultures. Late medieval petitions, providing unique insights into medieval social and legal history, have attracted increasing scholarly attention in recent years. This wide-ranging collection brings two approaches into dialogue with each other: the study of royal justice and secular petitions presented to the English crown, and the study of papal justice, canon law and ecclesiastical petitions (emphasising the international dimension of petitioning as a legal device exercising authority across Latin Christendom). In so doing, it crosses the traditional demarcation lines between secular and ecclesiastical systems of justice, of particular importance, given the participation by many litigantsand legislators in both of those legal spheres. A major focus is the mechanics of petitioning - who were the intermediaries in this process, and what were the "strategies of persuasion" they employed? The essays also re-examine the relationship between petitioners and their advisors, and the specific legal, rhetorical and linguistic choices they made in the composition of these texts. In so doing, the volume makes an important new contribution to theemerging field of late medieval supplicatory cultures. THOMAS W. SMITH is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at the University of Leeds; HELEN KILLICK is a post-doctoral researcher at the ICMA Centre, University of Reading.

Contributions on fundamental aspects of medieval ecclesiastical history, demonstrating the importance of primary documents. The work of historians in providing new editions of primary documents, and other aids to research, has tended to go largely unsung, yet is crucial to scholarship, as providing the very foundations on which further enquiry can be based. The essays in this volume, conversely, celebrate the achievements in this field by a whole generation of medievalists, of whom the honoree, David Smith, is one of the most distinguished. They demonstrate the importance of such editions to a proper understanding and elucidation of a number of problems in medieval ecclesiastical history, ranging from thirteenth-century forgery to diocesan administration, from the church courts to the cloisters, and from the English parish clergy to the papacy. Contributors: CHRISTOPHER BROOKE, C.C. WEBB, JULIA BARROW, NICHOLAS BENNETT, JANET BURTON, CHARLES FONGE, CHRISTOPHER HARPER-BILL, R.H. HELMHOLZ, PHILIPPA HOSKIN, BRIAN KEMP, F. DONALD LOGAN, ALISON MCHARDY

First modern edition of medieval ecclesiastical documents illuminates the career of a senior prelate. Robert Grosseteste, teacher, scholar and pastor, remains one of the dominant figures of the medieval English church. A major influence on the early history of Oxford University, his writings on a wide range of theological and scientific subjects have been widely studied. His concern for pastoral care is also well attested; as bishop of Lincoln from 1235 until his death in 1253, he had the opportunity to exercise the pastoral office in the largest diocesein western Europe. But how did Grosseteste's theories of pastoral care work out in practice? The study of Grosseteste's career as a diocesan bishop has been hampered by the relative inaccessibility of the records of his episcopate, published in an unsatisfactory edition in 1911 and long out of print. This completely new edition of Grosseteste's episcopal rolls makes it possible to take a fresh look at how he tackled the vexed issues of clerical ignorance, pluralism and non-residence in the aftermath of the reforms of the Lateran Council of 1215. They are presented here with an introductory study and elucidatory notes. Dr Philippa M. Hoskin is Reader in medieval history at the University of Lincoln