Serial Bibliographies for Medieval Studies

Richard H. Rouse's Serial Bibliographies for Medieval Studies is a comprehensive annotated guide to bibliographic tools essential for medievalists, addressing the challenge of inaccessibility due to the proliferation of specialized bibliographies. It provides detailed annotations on coverage, organization, and distinctive features of nearly three hundred serial bibliographies across the full range of medieval studies, organized into eleven major divisions. The guide includes conventional lists of publications, bibliographic essays, and accessions lists, broadening the definition of bibliography. It serves as a practical and indispensable reference tool for beginning graduate students and established scholars, improving bibliographic control in the humanities.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 164 pages
Publication date: 13 May 2022
Publisher: University of California Press

Serial Bibliographies for Medieval Studies by Richard H. Rouse is a comprehensive annotated guide to the vast range of bibliographic tools essential for medievalists. As Rouse makes clear in his introduction, the challenge facing scholars is not so much the absence of information as its inaccessibility: the proliferation of specialized bibliographies across languages and disciplines often leaves even experienced researchers unsure of what exists and where to find it. Unlike classical studies, which benefit from a unifying resource like Lannée philologique, medieval studies are served by a multitude of narrower bibliographies with little coordination among them. Some fields, such as art and ecclesiastical history, are richly covered though frequently duplicated, while areas like economic history, English studies, or medieval technology remain thinly represented. Rouse's guide addresses this unevenness by identifying, describing, and contextualizing nearly three hundred serial bibliographies across the full range of medieval studies. Organized into eleven major divisions—from general, national, and regional bibliographies to specialized listings in art, music, intellectual history, linguistics, law, science, and medicine—the guide provides detailed annotations on coverage, organization, and distinctive features of each resource. The work deliberately avoids evaluation in favor of accurate description, though bibliographies offering particularly thorough coverage are marked with an asterisk as obvious starting points for research. By including not only conventional lists of publications but also bibliographic essays and accessions lists, Rouse broadens the definition of bibliography to encompass all systematic attempts to organize knowledge. The result is a practical and indispensable resource for medievalists of all levels.

Weight: 227g
Dimension: 216 x 140 x 10 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780520308664