His Chronicle of England was completed in 1338. It falls into two parts, distinguished by a change of metre and source. The first, edited by Furnivall in the Rolls Series (2 vols. 1887), extends from the Flood to a.d. 689, and is based on Wace's Brut, the French source of Layamon's Brut. The second part, edited by Hearne, 2 vols., Oxford 1725, extendes from a.d. 689 to the death of Edward I, and is based on the French Chronicle of a comtemporary, who is sometimes called Pierre de Langtoft, sometimes Piers of Bridlington, because he was a native of Langtoft in Yorkshire, and a canon of the Austin priory at Bridlington in the same county. Mannyng's Chronicle has no great historical value, and its chief literary interest lies in the references to current traditions and popular stories.
Handlyng Synne is a much more valuable work. It was begun in 1303:
Þat y began þys Englyssh ryme;
Þe ȝeres of grace fyl þan to be
A þousynd and þre hundred and þre.
In þat tyme turnede y þys
On Englyssh tunge out of Frankys
Of a boke as y fonde ynne,
Men clepyn þe boke 'Handlyng Synne'.
