The Library
1780 works catalogued century by century, from the literature the Bible was written among to the present — each with a note on what it is, why it lasted, and where to read it.
601–700
1 work
c. 620–636; unfinished at his death
Latin
Etymologiae
Isidore of Seville · c. 560–636
Twenty books explaining the whole of knowledge by way of the origins of words — grammar, medicine, law, God, animals, ships, farming, furniture.
901–1000
1 work
c. 970–1000
Greek
Anonymous
Thirty thousand alphabetical entries on words, authors, and events, compiled from earlier lexica and scholia by editors who often did not understand their sources.
1101–1200
1 work
c. 1167–1185
Latin
Hortus Deliciarum
Herrad of Landsberg · c. 1130–1195
An illustrated compendium of theology, history, and natural science compiled by an abbess for the education of her nuns, with over three hundred miniatures.
1201–1300
2 works
c. 1240
Latin
De Proprietatibus Rerum
Bartholomaeus Anglicus · c. 1203–1272
Nineteen books on God, angels, the human body, illness, air, birds, stones, colours, and smells, compiled by a friar teaching in Germany.
c. 1235–1264
Latin
Speculum Maius
Vincent of Beauvais · c. 1190–c. 1264
Around eighty books in three parts — nature, doctrine, history — assembled by a team at a royal abbey and running to some four million words.
1301–1400
1 work
c. 1300–1324
Arabic
Misbah al-Zulma
Abu al-Barakat ibn Kabar · d. 1324
An encyclopaedia of Coptic Christianity — doctrine, canon law, liturgy, the calendar, and a catalogue of the church's Arabic and Coptic books.
6 of 1780 works