NOTICE OF JOHN DE TREVI3A. 149 



whilst among his translations we find a treatise " De re Militari," 

 and the once famous periodical, " Ranulphi Polychronicon," which 

 he translated in the year 1387, appending to it a treatise in Latin 

 on the special value of translations."" He also translated the work 

 which has been called "The G-reat Cyclopsedia of the Middle 

 Ages," viz., " Bartholomseus de Glanvilla de proprietatibus rerum." t 



But the work which will probably be deemed by his country- 

 men in the present clay to be the most important and interesting, 

 as connected with Trevisa's name, is his reputed translation of the 

 Bible into English. .If he did really execute this important work, 

 it was one of the first translations into English, and preceded only 

 by that of Wyckliff"; but authorities are by no means agreed that 

 Trevisa ever did translate the whole Bible, and the better opinion 

 seems now to be, that he did not carry his translation beyond 

 selected texts or other portions of the Holy Scriptures, which 

 were used for the embellishment of the Chapel of Berkeley Castle, 

 or of his own parish Church, near it. 



It is perhaps worth while to examine the principal authorities 

 upon this very interesting question. 



Both Fabricius | and Bishop Tanner, || who wrote before Fuller, 

 speak of an undoubted translation of the whole Bible : whilst 

 Fuller writes as if he had seen the translation itself, and compared 

 it with Wyckliff 's. His language deserves to be quoted. 



After saying that Trevisa was Chaplain to Thomas Lord 

 Berkeley, he proceeds : — " at whose instance ... he translated the 

 " Bible into English : a daring work for a private person in that 

 " age, without particular command from Pope or publique council 

 " Some much admire he would enter on this work, so lately 

 " performed (about fifty years before) by John AVicklife ; what was 

 " this but ' actum agere,' to do what was done before 1 Besides, 



* This work has been re-edited by Mr. Churchill Babington, in vol. i of 

 the Master of the EoUs' series of Chronicles of the Middle Ages. 



f The Early English Text Society have recently announced their inten- 

 tion of re-editing this CycloiDasdia from the MS. The task is committed to 

 the care of Mr. Edwajd B. Peacock, who proposes to devote two or three 

 years to the work, and to follow out the quaint notions contained in the book 

 to their original sources. — Athenceum, Oct. 2, 1869. 



I Bibliotheca Medice et Infimo} Latinitatis, vol. ii, p. 154. 



II Bibliotheca Brit. Hib. (folio), London, 1748, p. 720. 



E 2 



