John Leland (antiquary) - The "New Year's Gift", 1544

The "New Year's Gift", 1544

In the mid-1540s, Leland wrote a letter to Henry VIII in which he outlined his achievements so far, and his future plans. It was subsequently published by John Bale in 1549 (with Bale's own additional commentary) under the title The laboryouse journey & serche of Johan Leylande for Englandes antiquitees. The letter has traditionally (following Bale) been regarded as a "New Year's gift" to the King for January 1546, but James Carley has shown that it must have been composed in late 1543 or early 1544 (so that if it was presented at the new year, which is not certain, it would have been in 1544).

In the letter, Leland reported on his endeavours to preserve books, and the extent and thoroughness of his travels through England and Wales:

"I have so travelid yn yowr dominions booth by the se costes and the midle partes, sparing nother labor nor costes, by the space of these vi. yeres paste, that there is almoste nother cape, nor bay, haven, creke or peere, river or confluence of rivers, breches, waschis, lakes, meres, fenny waters, montaynes, valleis, mores, hethes, forestes, wooddes, cities, burges, castelles, principale manor placis, monasteries, and colleges, but I have seene them; and notid yn so doing a hole worlde of thinges very memorable."

He also described what use he intended to make of the information he had accumulated. He noted four projects:

• De uiris illustribus, a biographical encyclopedia of British writers in four books, arranged chronologically.
• A detailed map of the realm engraved on a silver table, to be presented to the King (inspired by a set of table-maps once possessed by the Emperor Charlemagne), accompanied by a written description, the Liber de topographia Britanniae, and a key to identifying the British place-names given in ancient texts.
• A history of England and Wales, entitled De Antiquitate Britannica, or Civilis Historia. This work was to be divided into "so many bookes as there be shires yn England, and sheres and greate dominions yn Wales", i.e. about fifty: a further six books would deal with Britain's offshore islands.
• De nobilitate Britannica, a catalogue of royalty, nobility, and "capitaines and rulers", divided chronologically into three books.

Of these projects, De uiris illustribus was already largely complete (it was written in two phases, in ca. 1535-6 and ca. 1543-6), but the others would never come to fruition. Polydore Vergil appears to have suggested that Leland had been unrealistically over-ambitious: he was "a vaynegloryouse persone, whyche woulde promyse more, than ever he was able or intended to perfourme".