reflects the changing position of slaves after the Conquest or whether it is just correcting the term, since slaves were chattels. Overall, the Roffensis scribe treated his sources with respect. He did not, for example, make erroneous 'corrections' to the Old English law texts, unlike the "incompetent translations of Quadripartitus's author". History The two manuscripts were bound together in around 1300.The first part is a collection of documents which includes the Law of Æthelberht, attributed to Æthelberht of Kent (c. 560–616), and the 1100 coronation charter of Henry I of England. The Law of Æthelberht is the oldest surviving English law code and the oldest Anglo-Saxon text in existence. The second part of the Textus Roffensis is the oldest of the Rochester Cathedral registers. The entire volume consists of 235 vellum leaves. Over the centuries, the Textus Roffensis has been loaned, lost and recovered on several occasions and has been in the custody of a variety of different people and places: was once held at the Medway Archives Office in Strood under reference number DRc/R1 and has since been withdrawn. It is currently held in the in an airtight case in the Cathedral’s Crypt. Sometime between 1708 and 1718 the book was immersed for several hours in either the River Thames or the River Medway when the ship transporting it overturned; water damage is apparent on a number of pages. The book was named 'Britain's Hidden Treasure' by the British Library, and was the subject of a conference at the University of Kent in 2010. It has been digitised and published on line by The University of Manchester's Centre for Heritage Imaging and Collection Care. The full digital facsimile is available through Rochester Cathedral's website. A short film was also produced about the book by Rochester Cathedral about its history and digitization process. Notes Citations Sources (online facsimile) Further reading External links John Rylands Library "The Textus Roffensis" - scanned images of each of the pages of the Textus Roffensis. Medieval documents of England 1120s books English manuscripts 12th-century manuscripts Legal manuscripts Medieval English law Anglo-Saxon law 12th-century Latin books