An article about the Canterbury Tales Project at De Monfort University.

"If the Middle Ages are the basic formative period of modern European history, they are no less the foundation of American history. Yet the increasingly numerous and important contributions being made to medieval historical- studies by American scholars tend to parallel or supplement European research; and there has been relatively little in the way of subject, approach or interpretation in medieval historical studies in this country that might be called distinctively American."

"Fifty years ago, the Polish canonist Adam Vetulani published his ground-breaking study of Roman law in Gratian's Decretum. He showed, convincingly, that most of the excerpts from Roman law sources were added after the completion of Gratian's work, probably by another author. The success of Vetulani's admirable thesis prompted him as well as others, and particularly Jacqueline Rambaud, to explore the possibility that other components of the text of the Decretum also were late ad ditions."