Textus Roffensis

[2] It is thought that the main text of both manuscripts was written by a single scribe, although the English glosses to the two Latin entries (items 23 and 24 in table below) were made by a second hand.

[5] The first part is a collection of laws and other, primarily secular documents, whilst the second is the cartulary of the Cathedral priory.

However, its final entry (222r–v) is in English, listing the number of masses to be recited for those institutions in England and Normandy which were in confraternity with Rochester.

[16] The unknown scribe was remarkable for his knowledge of old forms of English, and was able to transcribe accurately from a range of original manuscripts written in Anglo-Saxon dialects, including the local Kentish used for the laws of the kings of Kent.

[17] Few of his records were contemporary and, to read the Laws of Aethelberht, he was looking back at an obsolete dialect of early Anglo-Saxon English, some 500 years old.

This was standard practice in the years around 1000, but proficiency in writing Insular Minuscule was in terminal decline by the time of the Textus Roffensis.

ond becƿæl in English and the right-hand page the start of Henry I's Coronation Charter, in Latin.

[22] In clause 2, this has Cild binnan ðritegum nihta sie gefulwad ('a child shall be baptised within thirty days').

[16][25] Over the centuries, the Textus Roffensis has been loaned, lost and recovered on several occasions and has been in the custody of a variety of different people and places: was once held at the Medway Archives Office in Strood under reference number DRc/R1 and has since been withdrawn.

[16] The book was named 'Britain's Hidden Treasure' by the British Library, and was the subject of a conference at the University of Kent in 2010.

[25] It has been digitised and published on line by The University of Manchester's Centre for Heritage Imaging and Collection Care.