PREFACE
The title of this volume—a translation of the Latin words "Legenda Aurea"—recalls the custom in medieval churches and monasteries of gathering into a large volume records of the lives and deaths of saintly personages, and reading them aloud according as the ecclesiastical year brought round their memorial days. The reading due on a particular day would be the "legenda" (scilicet "lectio"); and from it the whole volume would be entitled the "legendarium" or (more simply) the "legenda." From the narrative character of these readings, which naturally made a considerable impression on the popular mind, the modern word "legend" gained its circulation and meaning; that its meaning has somewhat deteriorated, implying fiction rather than fact, is not surprising; a similar fate befell our word "story" and the French "histoire."
The "legendae" of particular churches or monasteries would naturally be of local and limited scope. The thirteenth century-an age of mental awakening-demanded something of wider range. There was a public eager for an encyclopedic volume which should deal in attractive style with the saints of all times and places-their deeds, sufferings, and miracles. The production of such a work required a mind and pen of no common enterprise and ability: these, however, were ready for the work; and the
