The original text labeled the recto (odd) pages of the first three leaves of each 12-page signature. These will appear in the margin as a i, a ii, a iii...
A few typographical errors have been corrected. They have been marked in the text with popups.
A
ryght profytable treatyse
compendiously drawen out of many
and dyvers wrytynges
of holy men
by
Thomas Betson
Printed in Caxton's house
by Wynkyn de Worde
about 1500
Cambridge
at the University Press
1905
The tract here reprinted is one of twenty-six formerly bound together in a remarkable volume (AB. 4. 58) which was presented to the University in 1715 by King George the First together with the rest of the Library of John Moore, Bishop of Ely.
The name of the author is only known from the colophon. It will be seen from the facsimile that the fourth letter of the name is not certainly an s. Herbert (p. 204) on the information of W. Cole gives the name as Betton: but it seems probable that we are right in reading it as Betson. Mr Bernard W. Henderson, who has very kindly examined the copy in the Library of Exeter College, Oxford, and Mr F. Madan, to whom he has shown it, are decidedly of opinion that the letter is a blurred s.
The date of printing is fixed by competent authorities as 1500, on the evidence of the states of the printer's mark and of the cut of the Crucifixion.
FRANCIS JENKINSON
This facsimile has been taken from the original in the Library of the University of Cambridge.