University of Virginia Library

Note on this e-text edition.

This etext edition of The Shepheardes Calender derives from the John C. Nimmo facsimile (London, 1895) of the British Museum copy of the first edition of 1579. It has been carefully compared with the Variorum edition (Baltimore: 1943) and the Oxford edition (Smith and De Selincourt) of 1935. Long "s" has been modernized, "vv" has been replaced by "w", and catchwords have been omitted. Capital vowel-ligatures and ornamental initial letters are indicated by capitalization of the first two characters (e.g. "AEgloga"). Sixteenth century usage of "i" for "j" and of "u" and "v" has been retained, along with the original spelling. Text found in the original in Greek has been transliterated within brackets. A few printer's errors have been emended, also within brackets. Some, though not all, italics are indicated within slashes; many italics, such as those which were used for proper names, have been omitted. (In the original, the "argument" for each month is in italics, the poem is in black letter, and the gloss by E.K. is in roman type.) Pagination is in the form of folio numbers in the upper right corner of right hand pages; these are here indicated within the text within angle brackets. The Shepheardes Calender is a carefully planned visual experience which cannot be fully represented by this text-only edition; The twelve woodcuts are here described within boxes in their proper locations within the text, but readers not familiar with them are urged to see them in a paper edition. Anyone desiring to create a "second" edition containing graphic files, should certainly feel free to do so. Please send the editor of the current edition a copy of any modified version. The copyright for this etext (1993) is owned by the University of Oregon; it is distributed for scholarly and teaching purposes only. It is anticipated that linguistic or statistical studies of the text may require removal of leading spaces, letterspacing, folios, and matter enclosed within brackets and boxes. For such purposes, you may make alterations in the text in copies which are for your own use only; those which you distribute (as master copies) must retain their original form* and include this paragraph. This text has been proofread, but will probably contain errors and misreadings. The editor gratefully acknowledges the helpful comments of Dr. G. William Rockett, who read the Introduction. Send corrections and comments to Richard Bear, rbear@oregon.uoregon.edu, or in care of the Department of English, University of Oregon, Eugene OR USA 97403.

*exceptions: You may make and distribute graphic (as described above) or SGML or TeX or other marked-up versions. Attribution for the original transcription must be retained.