Opening the Textus 900 celebrations at Rochester Cathedral, three remarkable British Library manuscripts are now on display in the Cathedral Crypt exhibition Beauty and the Beasts.

Artists from Kent Association for the Blind Art Groups, Peer Arts and Deaf Peer Arts are delighted to share their exhibition inspired by Beauty and the Beasts in partnership with Dr Diane Heath and Martin Crowther from the NLHF Medieval Animals Heritage project at Canterbury Christ Church University.

In 2022 the collection of early English law codes preserved in Textus Roffensis was added to the UNESCO Memory of the World UK Register, joining documentary heritage of national significance including the Death Warrant of King Charles I, Magna Carta and the Churchill Archives.

Textus Roffensis featured as part of the ‘once-in-a-generation’ 2018-2019 exhibition Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms at the British Library.

The Hidden Treasures, Fresh Expressions Project 2012-2016 engaged the University of Manchester in the production of a high-quality digital facsimile of Textus, a bespoke exhibition area in the Cathedral crypt, and study and handling copies for the refurbished Chapter Library.

Textus featured in an exhibition of the Faversham Magna Carta in 2015, highlighting the significance of these foundational documents of English Law.

Elizabeth Elstob made a facsimile of Textus Roffensis (c.1123), in two parts. Here, Dr Christopher Monk explores her handwritten copies of the three Old English Kentish law codes, unique to Textus, and her copy of the foundation charter of Rochester Cathedral with its marvellous decorated initial.

Perhaps second only to Gundulf in shaping the medieval Cathedral and St Andrew’s Priory, there is some evidence to suggest it may be down to Hamo and the turbulent times in which he lived that resulted in the two halves of Textus being bound together in the mid-fourteenth century.

Dr Christopher Monk explores the origins of Ethelbert’s law-code, foundational document of the Early English Laws portion of the ‘Rochester Book’.

Bishop’s Chaplain Lindsay Llewellyn-MacDuff discusses the centrality of Elizabeth Elstob to our understanding of and access to Anglo-Saxon history.

In 1573, the scholar William Lambarde came to Rochester Cathedral to examine Textus Roffensis. He was amazed to find that its opening document, Æthelberht’s law-code, was one he thought no longer survived. Moved by the importance of his discovery, he added a comment in the right margin, urging others to take note.