Scribal Networks and Sustainers in Protestant Martyrology

Abstract

This essay examines the culture and power of epistolarity among the Protestant communities ‘under the Cross’ in France from 1547 to 1559, and in England from 1553 to 1558. It is based on research undertaken in the British Academy John Foxe Project. In the case of the English martyrologist, John Foxe, we have surviving manuscript materials and scribal copies from the print-shop of John Day, which enable us to reconstruct the epistolary culture and circulatory practices from which the letters of the martyrs were derived. A comparison of these extant manuscript materials with what was published reveals how Foxe and his collaborator, John Bull, edited and altered the texts for publication and the article suggests reasons for these alterations. For his French counterpart, Jean Crespin, no such evidence now survives, although it is clear from the published editions of his martyrology that such communities and networks also existed, and probably such editorial practices too. The ‘letters of the martyrs’ published by Crespin and Foxe give us a correspondence corpus that reveals the significance of the letter as a way of creating a vicarious faith-community. They reveal how letters cemented relationships and communities in the face of persecution by the authorities, even when their authors were in prison. Although their impact on the formation of a distinctive Protestant epistolary culture cannot be determined, it may have helped to put in place some tonalities and points of reference.