The sources known to me, out of which an account of the Library of Peterborough Abbey can be constructed, are these:

a. Lists of books bequeathed to the Abbey. These are to be found (i) in the list of gifts of bishop Æthelwold (†984) of Winchester, formerly Abbot of Peterborough: printed from the MS. chartulary belonging to the Society of Antiquaries (No. 60) in the Monasticon, i. 382. (ii) In the lives of the successive abbots from Benedict († 1194) to Nicholas Elmstow (†1396) in Whittlesey's History of the Abbey, extracted by Gunton and printed in full by Sparke.

From these we recover the titles of a little over 220 volumes, but many of these are service-books.

b. Ancient catalogues. Of these there are two: (i) in MS. Bodley 163 (Bede's Historia ecclesiastica). It has been printed several times, by Pauli in Neues Archiv ii (1876), 433, and hence in the Serapeum xxxviii (1877), 120, and by Becker in his Catalogi, No. 96: see also Gottlieb, Ueber Mittelalt. Bibliotheken, 515. It is of cent. XII, early, and contains about 70 titles. It is anonymous in the MS., but coincidences with the other documents in the case have made me sure that it must be attributed to Peterborough.

(ii) In a MS. among the Peterborough muniments (now in the Chapter Library). Printed by Gunton in his History, and copied and collated with the original by myself in 1908.