 Bede sometimes included in his theological books an acknowledgement of the predecessors on whose works he drew . In two cases he left instructions that his marginal notes , which gave the details of his sources , should be preserved by the copyist , and he may have originally added marginal comments about his sources to others of his works . Where he does not specify , it is still possible to identify books to which he must have had access by quotations that he uses . A full catalogue of the library available to Bede in the monastery cannot be reconstructed , but it is possible to tell , for example , that Bede was very familiar with the works of Virgil . There is little evidence that he had access to any other of the pagan Latin writers — he quotes many of these writers but the quotes are almost all to be found in the Latin grammars that were common in his day , one or more of which would certainly have been at the monastery . Another difficulty is that manuscripts of early writers were often incomplete : it is apparent that Bede had access to Pliny 's Encyclopedia , for example , but it seems that the version he had was missing book xviii , as he would almost certainly have quoted from it in his De temporum ratione . 
