A bibliography of some of the most important sources for the history of the monastic life is prefixed to abbot Gasquet's _English Monastic Life_, 1904, a valuable account of the constitution and customs of religious houses, followed by an appendix containing the most complete list which has yet appeared of English monastic foundations. An annotated list (_The English Student's Monasticon_) forms vol. II of Mackenzie E. C. Walcott's _English Minsters_, 1879.
A large number of monastic chronicles have been printed in the Rolls series. The period before the Norman conquest is represented by the _Chronicon Monasterii de Abingdon_, Thomas of Elmham's _Historia Monasterii S. Augustini Cantuariensis_, the _Liber Monasterii de Hyda_, the _Chronicle of the Abbey of Ramsey_, and the _Vita S. Oswaldi_ (in _Historians of the Church of York_, vol. I). Later history is contained in the _Annales Monastici_, 5 vols. (Annals of Bermondsey, Burton, Margam, Oseney, Tewkesbury and Waverley abbeys, and of Dunstable, Winchester and Worcester priories), the _Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham_, _Historia et Cartularium Monasterii S. Petri Gloucestriae_, 3 vols., _Chronicon Monasterii de Melsa_ (Meaux), 3 vols., Walsingham's _Gesta Abbatum Monasterii S. Albani_, 3 vols., _Registra quorundam abbatum S. Albani_ (15 cent.), 2 vols., and _Memorials of St Edmund's Abbey_, 3 vols. Jocelyn of Brakelond's and other chronicles were printed by the Camden Society among their publications: there is a translation of Jocelyn in the 'King's Classics.'
For custom-books, monastic account-books, etc., reference may be made to abbot Gasquet's bibliography, ut sup., where also there are notes of printed editions of monastic visitations and episcopal registers. The registers of archbishops Giffard and Wickwane of York (ed. W. Brown for the Surtees Soc.) and that of archbishop Romeyn, about to appear under the same editorship, contain many valuable documents relating to visitations of monasteries. The present writer is engaged upon an edition of similar documents from the Lincoln episcopal registers for the Lincoln Record Soc., of which vol. I (1420-36) is now in the press.
Three books of recent times are of the highest importance to students of monastic history, viz. (1) J. W. Clark's _Observances of Barnwell_, already mentioned; (2) _Inventories of Christ Church, Canterbury_, ed. W. H. St John Hope and J. Wickham Legg, 1902; (3) _The Rites of Durham_, ed. J. T. Fowler, 1903 (Surt. Soc.), the notes to which are a mine of information as to monastic customs, ritual, etc.