Presents a facsimile of the version of William Langland's poem, "Piers Plowman" held by the Bodleian Library. Included are 72 marginal illustrations which provide a record of the response to the poem by an early 15th-century reader.

For the art-historian, the pictures are interesting as an exercise in the eclectic adaptation of pictorial traditions to a special interpretative purpose. For the literary scholar, the manuscript is an opportunity to examine an authentic early and near-contemporary response to a great poem of the English Middle Ages.

The illustrations of MS Douce 104, Kathleen Scott
Appendices: The manuscripts of "Piers Plowman", Derek Pearsall
MS Douce 104 - decorative analysis, Kathleen Scott
a preliminary list of late 14th and 15th century English manuscripts with marginal illustrations, Kathleen Scott.