A Jesus College researcher has received funding to create a national online resource for discovering manuscripts made across medieval Britain, and the libraries where they are held.

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Dr Andrew Dunning, Hugh Price Fellow in Book History at Jesus College and R.W. Hunt Curator of Medieval Manuscripts at the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford has received a Special Award grant from the British Academy Neil Ker Memorial Fund for a project entitled ‘Medieval Libraries of Great Britain: Securing a future for a key resource in manuscript studies’.

The project is the first stage in the revitalisation of Neil Ker’s book Medieval Libraries of Great Britain (MLGB) as a fully supported digital resource for the Bodleian Libraries. The book, originally published in 1941, provides a list of surviving medieval books by their location, with a list of donors and a glossary, and is an invaluable academic resource for historians.

Building on earlier efforts to transform MLGB into a comprehensive, integrated dataset, this phase will address inconsistencies in the MLGB3 dataset and incorporate data from the printed editions and handwritten index cards, unifying these sources into a single, authoritative resource.

The project team will develop a robust dataset with unique identifiers for manuscripts, works, contributors, and institutions, enabling precise scholarly citation, the reconciliation of provenance data for lost, fragmentary, and reconstructed books, and linking MLGB data to digitised manuscripts and external databases. New research will expand coverage to include rejected manuscripts and books from parish churches that appeared only in the printed edition. The Bodleian will host the resulting open-access resource using its mature catalogue infrastructure, ensuring its sustainability and enduring value.

Andrew said, “MLGB will be the first national online resource for discovering manuscripts made across medieval Britain, and the different libraries where they are held. As well as enhancing academic research, it will also help to reconnect people with the medieval past of the places where they live.”

“The resource will include many manuscripts within the College collection, he added. “For example, we own some great manuscripts from places like Cirencester and Pershore, which we’re in the process of making available via Digital Bodleian. With MLGB, someone from one of those places will be able to find a page about the library of Cirencester Abbey, and get a list of all known surviving books from it, plus images from collections such as ours.”