This part of the subject is so interesting that we feel tempted to linger over it, but it is sufficient for our purpose to observe that minstrelsy, before and after the Conquest--indeed, up to nearly the end of the manuscript period--was the chief and almost the only means of circulating literature among seculars. This fact should be borne in mind when any comparison is made between the number of religious and scholastic books in circulation and the number of books of lighter character. Even books of the scholastic class were read aloud to students in class, and often to small audiences of older people; but this method had obvious disadvantages, and the necessity of studying them personally soon came to be recognised as imperative. Hence such books, and especially those which summarised the subject of study, were greatly multiplied. On the other hand, romances were better heard than read, and only enough copies of them were made to supply wealthy households and the minstrels and jesters whose business it was to learn and recite them. Rarely, therefore, did the ordinary layman of medieval England own many books. The large class to whom romances appealed seldom owned books at all, simply because the people of this class, even if wealthy and of noble rank, could not in ninety cases out of one hundred read at all, or could read so poorly that the pastime was irksome. Among the educated classes, the books needed were those with which a reader had made acquaintance at his university, or which were necessary for his special study and occupation. Yet it is uncommon to find private libraries; and with few exceptions they were ridiculously small. The vast majority of the books were owned in common by monastic or collegiate societies.
Let us bring together the meagre records of three centuries, and some exceptions to the general rule which serve only to show up the general poverty of the land. Henry II, an ardent sportsman, a ruler almost completely immersed in affairs of State, made time for private reading and for working out knotty questions,[443] and very probably he had a library to his hand. King John received from the sacristan of Reading a small collection of books of the Bible and severe theology, perhaps as a diplomatic gift, perhaps as a subtle reminder that a little food for the spirit would improve his morals and ameliorate the lot of his subjects. Edward II borrowed at least two books, the _Miracles of St. Thomas_ and the _Lives of St. Thomas and St. Anselm_, from Christ Church, Canterbury.[444] Great Earl Simon had a _Digestum vetus_ from the same source. Guy de Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick (_d._ 1315), had a little hoard of romances, and some other books. Hugh le Despenser the elder enjoyed a “librarie of bookes” (_c._ 1321), how big or of what character we do not know. Archbishop Meopham (_d._ 1333) gave some books to Christ Church, Canterbury; and his successor, John Stratford, presented a few to the same house. Lady Elizabeth de Clare, foundress of Clare Hall, bequeathed to her foundation a tiny collection of service books and volumes on canon law (1355). William de Feriby, Archdeacon of Cleveland, left a small theological library (1378). One John Percyhay of Swinton in Rydal (1392), Sir Robert de Roos (1392), John de Clifford, treasurer of York Church (1392), Canon Bragge of York (1396), and Eleanor Bohun, Duchess of Gloucester (1399), all left Bibles; and small collections of books, much alike in character, consisting usually of psalters, books of religious offices, legends of the saints, Peter of Blois, Nicholas Trivet, the Brut chronicle, books of Decretals, and the Corpus Juris Civilis,--most of it sorry stuff, the last achievements of dogmatism on threadbare subjects. “Among all the church dignitaries whose wills are recorded in Bishop Stafford’s register at Exeter (1395-1419), the largest library mentioned is only of fourteen volumes. The sixty testators include a dean, two archdeacons, twenty canons or prebendaries, thirteen rectors, six vicars, and eighteen layfolk, mostly rich people. The whole sixty apparently possessed only two Bibles between them, and only one hundred and thirty-eight books altogether: or, omitting church service-books, only sixty; _i.e._ exactly one each on an average. Thirteen of the beneficed clergy were altogether bookless, though several of them possessed the _baselard_ or dagger which church councils had forbidden in vain for centuries past; four more had only their breviary. Of the laity fifteen were bookless, while three had service books, one of these being a knight who simply bequeathed them as part of the furniture of his private chapel.”[445]