The three interludes in this volume come from the press of John Rastell, barrister, printer, adventurer, member of parliament, brother-in-law of Thomas More, and one of the first men in England to have a stage built at his own house. The Four Elements is unique in its genre of scientific morality play. Rastell composed it himself to expound the rudiments of natural science and to air his own frustrating experience of venturing to the New World, in 1517. The anonymous Calisto and Melebea is based on the beginning of the notorious Spanish novel, La Celestina, and has an elegance and subtlety in...

Last and best edition of the first English law dictionary. Corrected and greatly enlarged, English and Law French in parallel columns. First published in 1527, this pioneering dictionary was originally written in Law French with the Latin title Expositiones Terminorum Legum Anglorumae. Quite popular with students and lawyers due to its clarity and concision, it went through at least twenty-nine editions, the last appearing in 1721(with reissues in 1742 and 1819). The 1721 edition was translated by his son, William Rastell, who is often listed as its author. "Rastell's Termes de la Ley is a...