The English Apocalypse: A Fourteenth-Century Translation of the Book of Revelation from Columbia University, MS Plimpton Add. 03

Before translators at the University of Oxford began producing the first Wycliffite Bibles in the 1380s, few complete books of the Bible had ever been translated into Middle English. One notable exception is the English Apocalypse, a Middle English version of the Book of Revelation translated between 1340 and 1360 from an Anglo-Norman Apocalypse dated to the early fourteenth century. The English Apocalypse survives in eighteen extant manuscripts and often appears alongside Wycliffite material, attesting to its popularity with Wycliffite translators. In the case of this edition’s chosen base manuscript, it almost completely replaces the Middle English translation of the Book of Revelation from the Latin Vulgate Bible, the source text for most Wycliffite Bibles of the period. Expanding upon earlier work on this important textual tradition, this edition of the English Apocalypse offers a unique glimpse into English Bible translation and production at a historic moment of transition.