Methuen & Co., Ltd. (London, UK)
Series dates: 1933-1977
Size: 5″ x 7.5″
Appleton-Century-Crofts (New York, US)
Series dates: 1960-1969
Methuen’s Old English Library series began in 1933 and consisted of literature, criticism and reference titles related to the early English language. The last new title, the 24th in the series, was published in 1977. Reprints by Methuen appear through 1991. Appleton-Century Crofts published a dozen or so of the titles in the 1960s, and a few specific titles were published in the US by Holt, Barnes & Noble, and Harper & Row.
This copy of R.M. Wilson’s Early Middle English Literature was first published in 1939, and this is the 2nd edition printing of 1951. Jackets are stern and plain, common to the series. The series name and price (8s. 6d.) are on the jacket spine and front. The series editors, A.H. Smith and F. Norman, are noted below the series name on the jacket front. The price is also included on the front of the jacket. The front jacket flap is blank, except for “Catalogue No. 7715U.”
The rear of the jacket contains only Methuen’s colophon. The rear flap is blank.
Solid cloth bindings in orange with the title, author, and publisher printed on the spine.
The half title page includes the series name, general editors, and book title.
A list of titles in the series faces the title page. As of the printing of this book (1951), ten titles are listed. One more (Beowulf and the Seventh Century, by Ritchie Girvan) was published in 1935, but apparently no longer available in the series. Dates for books in the three sections (below) are the first year of publication. Additional titles published from 1935 to 1977 follow. By this accounting, the series had a total of 24 titles published from 1933 to 1977.
A – Poetic Texts
1. Three Northumberland Poems, edited by A.H. Smith (1933)
2. Deor, edited by Kemp Malone (1933)
3. Waldere, edited by F. Norman (1933)
4. The Dream of the Rood, edited by Bruce Dickins & A.S.C. Ross (1934)
5. Widsith, edited by Kemp Malone (1936)
6. The Battle of Maldon, edited by E.V. Gordon (1937)
B – Prose Selections
1. The Parker Chronicle: 832-900, edited by A.H. Smith (1935)
2. Aelfric’s Colloquy, edited by G.N. Garmonsway (1939)
3. Sermo Lupi Ad Anglos, edited by Dorothy Whitlock (1939)
C – Studies
1. Early Middle English Literature, by R.M. Wilson (1939)
Additional titles not in the list above, include:
1935: Beowulf and the Seventh Century, by Ritchie Girvan.
1951: Middle English Literature, by George Kane
1951: The Lost Literature of Medieval England, by Richard Middlewood Wilson
1952: Judith, edited by Benno Johan Timmer
1955: Juliana, by Juliana, Saint of Nicomedia & Cynewulf; edited by Rosemary Woolf
*1955: An Old English Grammar, by Randolph Quirk and C.L. Wrenn (1955)
1958: Cynewulf’s Elene, edited by Pamela Gradon
1960: The Seafarer, edited by Ida Lilian Gordon
1966: Lives of Three English Saints, by Aelfric, Abbot of Eynsham; edited by Geoffrey Ivor Needham
**1969: The Wanderer, edited by Thomas Dunning and Alan Bliss
***1970: Middle English Literature, by George Kane
****1974: Finnsburh: Fragment and Episode, edited by Donald K. Fry
****1974: Daniel and Azarias, edited by Robert T. Farrell
1977: Exodus, edited by Peter J. Lucas
*Copublished by Holt, New York
**Copublished by Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York
***Copublished by Barnes & Noble, New York
****Copublished by Harper & Row, New York
The copyright page and dedication:
The book was “Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner, Ltd., Frome and London.
