A Sixteenth-Century Library in Eighteenth-Century Cambridge

The Library of Archbishop Matthew Parker (1504–75) was bequeathed to Corpus Christi College Cambridge, where it still remains. Parker imposed strict conditions on the use of the books, and it has often been assumed as a consequence the collection was not well used. In this paper, the authors explore the evidence from eighteenth-century borrowing registers and show that the Parker Library did continue to be used and made a significant contribution to scholarly endeavours in Cambridge and beyond.