Publication of Europa Triumphans: Court and Civic Festivals in Early Modern Europe General Editors J.R. Mulryne, Helen Watanabe-O’Kelly and Margaret Shewring, Associate General Editors Elizabeth Goldring and Sarah Knight (Aldershot and Burlington VT: Ashgate 2004).

The two-volume collection of Festival Texts, a major objective of the Europa Triumphans project, was published in December 2004 by Ashgate, meeting the schedule set by the AHRB Centre for the Study of Renaissance Elites and Court Cultures.

The volumes comprise 1135 pages, with 145 black and white and 23 colour illustrations. 44 texts of differing lengths in 9 languages are included. All are given in their original languages, with an en face translation into English. Each of the eight groups of texts is introduced by scholarly essays, and each is provided with a detailed commentary, including both textual and explanatory notes. The volumes are prefaced by a series of six Introductory essays by leading scholars: Helen Watanabe-O’Kelly (Oxford), R.J. Knecht (Birmingham), Ute Daniel (Braunschweig), Iain Fenlon (Cambridge), Roger Savage (Edinburgh) and Henri Zerner (Harvard).

The volumes’ eight sections present festival texts associated with Henri III, Genoa, Poland-Lithuania, the Netherlands, the Protestant Union, La Rochelle, Scandinavia and the New World.

In addition to the General Editors and Associate General Editors there are 33 further principal contributors from universities across Europe and the USA, and more than 20 other contributors, including translators.

The volumes were launched at the end of November 2004 at Mecklenburgh House, the London headquarters of Ashgate publishing, with Sir Brian Follett, former Vice-Chancellor of Warwick and current Chairman of the AHRB, and Mr Nigel Farrow, Chairman of Ashgate as guest speakers. Also present was Professor David Wells, Treasurer of the Modern Humanities Research Association, the source of a subvention which made publication possible.

The volumes can be ordered here.

Also completed: a large-scale digitisation project undertaken by the Centre in partnership with the British Library.

274 Festival Books in the collections of the British Library, comprising more than 17,000 pages, have been photographed and is freely accessible and searchable on the British Library web-site http://www.bl.uk/treasures/festivalbooks/homepage.html The project was led by Professor Mulryne and Dr Shewring of the Renaissance Centre, with Dr Kristian Jensen and Mr Colin Wight leading British Library staff. Selection, cataloguing and coding of the books was undertaken by Dr Sarah Cusk and Dr Alexander Samson, research fellows of the Centre. Dr Thomas Stäcker of the Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel, a major repository of festival books, provided valuable liaison and advice. About 17,000 words of introductory and explanatory material were written for the ‘front end’ of the site. The site will offer both a ‘gateway’ and an important scholarly resource.