NOTICE OF JOHN DE TREVISA. 151 



Dibclin says, "This opinion" {i.e., that Trevisa translated the 

 Bible) " was first taken up by Bale and Pits, from a loose assertion 

 "of Caxton, in the proheme of the above work" (the Polychronicon) ; 

 " but upon what authority our printer asserted it, or, if he saw 

 " such a translation, why he did not think it at least as deserving 

 " of publication as the Polychronicon, are questions which may 

 " be thought to press hard upon the probability of its existence." * 



Hartwell Home writes on the subject as folloAvs : — " As no part 

 " of this work appears ever to have been printed, the translation 

 " ascribed to him is supposed to have been confined to a few texts, 

 " which are scattered in some parts of his works (several copies of 

 " which are known to exist in MS.), or vfhich were painted on the 

 " walls of his Patron's Chapel, at Berkeley Castle." t 



This was written whilst Hartwell Home was in the Library of 

 the British Museum, and had every facility for full research 

 amongst its treasures; and although it is remarkable that he 

 should make no reference to Fuller's statement — and it is 

 impossible to suppose that he was ignorant of it, — yet the fact of 

 his having devoted the whole of his long life mainly to Biblical 

 study, gives authority to any statement of his upon the subject. 



Mr. Thomas Watts also, the late head of the printed book 

 department in the British Museum, and whose recent death is a 

 great public loss, was not aware of any part of the reputed 

 translation having ever been printed, nor did he know of the ex- 

 istence of the MS.$ ^ 



The most recent authority, who, so far as I am aware, has 

 thrown any light upon the subject, is Mr. Churchill Babington, of 

 St. John's College, Cambridge ; who, in a long note on Trevisa's 

 works, at page liv. of the 1st vol. of the Master of the Eolls' 

 series, Avhich he edited, says : — " Of his other translations, that of 

 " the Bible, said by Caxton, Bale, and others to have been made 

 "by Trevisa, and possibly still extant at Rome, is the most important 

 " on all accounts. It is not, hoAvever, certain, though by no means 

 "improbable, that Trevisa ever translated the Bible at all." 



« Dibdin's Ames. Typogr. Antiq., i, 142 — 3. 



f Eev. H. Home's Biblical Bibliography, 1839, p. 66. 



I Mr. Watts died Sep. 9, 1869, at 58. See a brief bxit interesting notice 

 of his life and services, in the Athenceum of Sep. 18, 1869. 



E 3 



