A Handlist of Manuscripts Containing Gregory\u27s Regula Pastoralis

Pope Gregory the Great\u27s Liber Regulae Pastoralis has often been called one of the most influential books of the Middle Ages. While the modern tase may find little that is attractive in the work, the survival of nearly 500 MSS in eighteen European countries attests to its Medieval popularity, and the existence of 89 printed Latin editions (1470-1953), and the existence of numerous modern translations in Armenian, Czech, English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish attest to the work\u27s continued popularity.1 The Regula is a handbook for bishops in which Gregory sets out at a great length the manner in which a bishop ought to conduct himself. The major portion of the text (Bk. III) is devoted to a series of admonitions concerning many specific types of sinners and the differing methods of dealing with each. The work, for all its elaborate Gregorian allegorical interpretation, is really nevertheless a very practical book which was and still is put to good use by churchmen. Yet the Regula has been used in other ways than simply as an exemplum for episcopal conduct: it has been applied to temporal conduct, it has been used as a rhetorical handbook- an early type of the ars praedicandin, and it has been used as a sourcebook for exegitical experts.