| Abstract: | This article introduces the Liber exemplorum sub titulis redactorum of Master Wiger, provost of St Peter's Collegiate Church, Utrecht (afterwards, a convert to the Franciscan Order, fl. 1209–38). Wiger's collection, which was compiled at some point between c.1205 and 1228, is one of the earliest surviving representations of the genre of ‘example book’. It stands in a far more direct literary relationship with the encyclopaedic compendia produced after c.1250 than with the works of Wiger's contemporaries – authors such as James of Vitry, Caesarius of Heisterbach, Odo of Cheriton and the compiler of the anonymous Cistercian collection recently edited under the title Collectaneum exemplorum et visionum Clarevallense. This is established by an examination of the principles of structure and design in Master Wiger's text, and a comparison of his approach to the emerging problem of textual ‘searchability’ with systems employed by contemporary authors. |
