Cay’s Edition of the Statutes, published in 1758, in Six Volumes Folio, ending with 30 Geo. II. is very much upon the Plan of Hawkins’s Edition, with the following Additions: In cases where the Statutes are printed from the Statute Rolls in the Tower, the Numbers of the respective Membranes of the Rolls are quoted; and in other Cases the several Manuscript Authorities from which they are printed are distinctly cited. The Latin and French Text respectively of several Statutes prior to Edw. III. and the French Text of the Statutes 23 Hen. VI.; 12, 14, 17, and 22 Edw. IV, which had been omitted by Hawkins, are given from Manuscripts. Several Instruments, not included in the previous Editions by Hawkins, Pulton, and others, are inserted from the early Printed Copies, and some Matters not contained in any former Edition of the Statutes, are printed from the Parliament Rolls. The Translation of the Statutes previous to Hen. VII. is the same as Keble’s and Pulton’s: In his Preface, Cay attributes the whole of that Translation to George Ferrers, in the Time of Hen. VIII. and speaks thus of it: “It is not a good one, and the Mistakes in it are very numerous and considerable: It has often been desired that a new Translation should be made, but as this has been used for some Ages, not only by the Public in general, but even by the Parliament, and many Statutes are recited in subsequent Acts in the Words of this Translation, it seems to be too much authenticated for an Editor to presume to reject it.”
The Editions by Hawkins and Cay were for some time continued by several Volumes containing the Statutes of subsequent Years.
In 1762 was printed the First Volume of an Edition of the Statutes at Large, which was completed in 1765, by Ruffhead, in Nine Volumes Quarto, ending with the Statutes of 4 Geo. III. In this Edition is included all that was comprehended in Cay’s. Several Matters, however, which by Cay were inserted in the Body of his Work, were printed by Ruffhead, in an Appendix subjoined to the Ninth Volume; and in this Appendix are also introduced some Acts of Henry VII. and of subsequent Reigns, taken from former Printed Copies, and also from the Parliament Rolls, and the Inrollments of Acts in Chancery. This Edition was reprinted in 1769, &c. and has been regularly continued from time to time by Volumes containing the Statutes of subsequent Years.
Pickering’s Edition of the Statutes at Large, in Twenty-three Volumes Octavo, ending with the Statutes 1 Geo. III. was printed at Cambridge, and published at various Times between 1762 and 1766. A Twenty-fourth Volume containing the Preface and Index was published in 1769. This Edition contains the same Matters, and for the most part, in the same Order, as Cay’s Edition; with the Addition of the Statutes afterwards passed, and also of some Instruments and Translations from former Printed Copies, and other Sources, which “though deemed antiquated” were added “on account of their Public or Constitutional Importance.” In an Appendix subjoined to the Twenty-third Volume, some of the Matters are inserted which are contained in Ruffhead’s Appendix. This Edition also has been regularly continued by subsequent Volumes published from time to time.
It should be observed, that the Matters for the first time introduced by Hawkins, Cay, Ruffhead, and Pickering respectively, are few in Number; and that some of them are clearly not entitled to the Character of Statutes.[1] It is evident also that Ruffhead and Pickering took, each, Advantage of the Circumstance of their Editions being in the course of Publication during the same Period; and that, in the Insertion of new Matters, they by turns borrowed from each other.
Neither Hawkins, Cay, Ruffhead, nor Pickering take any Notice of the French Text of the Statutes of Richard III. which have been stated by some Writers[2] to have been originally in English; whereas the Editions of the Nova Statuta by Pynson, Rastall’s Collection, and the Sessional Publication of the Statutes of Richard III, prove that the Statutes of that Reign were originally published in French: although, in and after the Reign of Henry VI, many Bills, in the Form of Acts, are entered on the Parliament Roll in English.
