A Catalogue of the ‘Unlawful’ Books found in John Stow’s Study on 21 February 1568/9

Abstract

The raid of Bishop Grindal’s commissioners on the study of John Stow, the eminent antiquary, which occasioned this catalogue of forty proscribed works, was indication of the growing hostility towards Catholics after the Northern Rebellion and a foreshadowing of their open persecution in the years to come. Similar searches became commonplace in the 1570s and 1580s but the Stow catalogue, reflecting his historical and antiquarian interests, is one of the most comprehensive which survive. Although it includes manuscripts of chronicles, suggesting that Stow’s historical interests were not immune from the imputation of religious bias, the large group of Catholic and Recusant works indicates one direction in which these interests might have developed further had he not become the subject of official investigation.