Oldest English law collection now available online

“If a mouth or an eye becomes damaged, one is to compensate with 12 shillings,” exhorts the Textus Roffensis, a 12th century manuscript containing the only surviving copy of the oldest law in English. The four front teeth, meanwhile, are worth six shillings apiece, while “if one strikes off a thumb, 20 shillings”. 

The centuries-old legal encyclopedia, which is dated to the 1120s and runs to 476 pages, with 484 images, has just been digitised by the University of Manchester and made available online today. Described as “Britain’s Hidden Treasure” by the British Library, the manuscript was written in 1123-24 by a single scribe at Rochester Cathedral in Kent, which partnered with the university on the project. It has never been seen in its entirety by the public before. 

“The Textus Roffensis is truly a unique manuscript: it predates the Magna Carta by almost 100 years, contains the only copy of the oldest set of laws in English, and was penned by an English scribe within 60 years of the Norman conquest. That it is being made accessible to the public is worth shouting about, and is a tribute to all those involved with the project,” said Dr Chris Monk, a specialist at the university who worked with Rochester Cathedral on the project.

For the digitized version of this remarkable work, here's the link to the John Rylands Library.