In 2019, Edwards and Fraas announced that eleven leaves from a previously unknown manuscript, written by an unknown scribe, of Thomas More’s English writings had been sold at various auction houses in England and North America. Edwards and Fraas detail a number of puzzling points about these sales, including the anonymity of the vendor, the failure to identify More as the author of the text in several of the sale listings, and the nature of the source manuscript. Three of the eleven sales were consecutive leaves from Dialogue Concerning Heresies, sold individually at three separate auctions (2015-2018).[1] The recto contents of the first (Chiswick Auctions, 2015) are unknown, but the verso comprised Yale 327/35-328/36. The second (Addison & Sarova, 2017, now at Kislak Special Collections, University of Pennsylvania) comprised Yale 328/36-331/6. This leaf, the third in the series, takes up at 331/6 and runs to 333/11.

The manuscript includes several corrections and inserts reflecting scribal error. The most obvious appears on line 2 of the verso side. The correct word, as printed in the 1529 edition is “ordeyned”; however, the scribe appears to have struggled with the word, suggesting that he might have been copying from the 1557 Workes, in which “ordeyned” is split between lines and difficult to read. Either further thought or, perhaps, consultation with the 1529 edition, led the scribe to cross out his original attempt and write “ordeyned” more clearly above. There are multiple instances at which the scribe has used an abbreviation when the full word was used in the printed text, or vice versa (see esp. line 8v, “damned”, “dāned” in 1557, “dampned” in 1529). There are also several points at which the scribe’s spelling matches neither printed edition exactly but inclines toward the 1529 version:

                                                MSr line 24 nothinge] nothynge 1529; nothing 1557

                                                MSr line 30 muche] moche 1529; much 1557

                                                MSr line 31 finde] fynde 1529; finde 1557

 As to content, in this section of Book 3, Chapter 16, the Messenger questions why the clergy oppose letting laymen have Bibles in English translation. More responds that only “wicked” translations, such as Wyclif’s and Tyndale’s, are prohibited; older translations are still permitted. He blames the caution of printers, who fear being punished for printing translations that are ultimately condemned, and bishops, who fear it would do more harm than good. More and the Messenger agree that having an English translation of the Bible would be to the general good. The Messenger complains that the clergy think the people “infantes” who can only eat either “milk and pappe” or meat that has first been “chammed” (chewed) by the nurse, meaning that scripture, the “foode of the soule” must be pre-digested by the clergy before it reaches the people, rather than accessed directly through a vernacular translation.   

 Dr. Molly G. Yarn

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Edwards, A.S.G., and Mitch Fraas, ‘A New English Manuscript of More’s English Works’, The Library, 20.1, 89–93

[1] Of the eight other single leaves from this manuscript that have been sold individually, six were from the Confutation of Tyndale’s Answer; they consist of three pairs of consecutive leaves, taken from different sections. The other two leaves, from Answer to a Poisoned Book, are not consecutive.