n PIRENNE'S _Bibliographie de l'Histoire de
Belgique_ (1895). Of special importance is JAN VAN KLERK'S _Van den
Derden Edewaert Rym Kronyk_. (1840), useful for 1337-1341, and written
with an English bias.

The unofficial legal literature of the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries is of exceptional variety and value. Many lawyers' treatises
throw light on matters far beyond legal technicalities. HENRY OF
BRACTON or BRATTON'S _De Legibus et Consuetudinibus Angliae_
illustrates the union of English and Roman juridical ideas
characteristic of the age of Henry III. It has been edited badly by Sir
T. Twiss in six volumes (Rolls Series), and some portions well by
Professor Maitland in his _Select passages from Bracton and Azo_
(Selden Soc.). Maitland's _Bracton's Note Book_ includes extracts from
plea rolls seemingly made by Bracton. Bracton's book on the laws was
translated, condensed, and rearranged by a writer of the next
generation called Britton. It may be studied in a modern edition in
NICHOLLS'S _Britton on the laws of England_, while _Fleta_, an almost
contemporary Latin law book, must be read in Selden's seventeenth
century edition. Another thirteenth century law-book, _Le Mirroir des
Justices_, has been edited by Maitland and W.J. Whittaker for the
Selden Society. From Edward I.'s time onwards unofficial reports of
trials called YEAR BOOKS, written in French, become valuable for their
vividness and detail, and for the light which they throw on the more
technical records of the plea rolls. Many of them are printed in
unsatisfactory seventeenth century editions, but the Year Books of five
of Edward I.'s regnal years, between 1292 to 1307, together with the
Year Book of 11-12 Edward III., are accessible in A.J. Horwood's
editions in the Rolls Series. L.O. Pike has also edited in the Rolls
Series the _Year books of Edward III._ from 1338 to 1345, and
Maitland's _Year books of Edward II._ for the Selden Society are the
first two instalments of a scheme for publishing the Year Books of the
reign. Besides their legal value, the Year Books are an almost unworked
mine for social and economic, and often even political and
ecclesiastical, history.

Of literary aids to history T. WRIGHT'S _Political Songs_ (Camden Soc.)
illustrate this period to the reign of Edward II. One of Wright's
pieces has been more elaborately edited in C.L. KINGSFORD'S Song of
_Lewes_ (1890), and C. Hardwick published a _Poem on the Times OF
Edward II