Cross Collection

Rich in early editions and theological scholarship, the Cross Collection comprises more than 6500 books, 160 serial titles and 918 reprints, with a focus on patristic studies, canon law, liturgy and the development of the early Church.

Religion and philosophy

Key items in the collection

The Cross Collection contains about 6500 works, including multi-volume titles, around 160 serial titles and 918 reprints of individual articles. The collection reflects Frank Cross’s expertise in patristic studies and includes works published between the 16th and 20th centuries.

The collection includes thousands of books and multi-volume works in the following subject areas:

patristic studies
liturgy
canon law
Biblical studies
church history
biography
cathedrals
other religions
philosophy and psychology
classics
guide books
reference and general works

Many titles are scholarly editions of the Church Fathers, including:

St Athanasius (d. 373)
St Augustine (d. 430)
St Clement (d. 215)
St Cyril (d. 444)
St Gregory (d. c. 394)
St John Chrysostom (d. 407)
Pope Leo I (d. 461)
Tertullian (d. c. 230)
Theodoret of Cyrrhus (d. c. 457)

There are also significant holdings on the history of the early Church and Church Councils.

The following are examples of rare and substantial works in the collection:

St Robertus Bellarmino, Disputationes Roberti Bellarmini (1608)
St Bernard of Clairvaux, Sancti Bernardi abbatis primi Claraevallensis…opera (2 vols, 1690)
Joseph Bingham, Origines ecclesiasticae or The antiquities of the Christian Church (5 vols, 1834–35)
Alban Butler, The lives of the saints (12 vols, 1926–38)
Robert M Grant(ed.), The Apostolic fathers: a new translation and commentary (6 vols, 1964–68)
Adolf Harnack, History of dogma (7 vols, 1896–99)
Karl Josef von Hefele, Histoire des Conciles d’après les documents originaux (22 vols, 1907–52)
Edmond Martene, De antiquis ecclesiae ritibus libri quatuor (3 vols, 1700–02)
Monumenta eucharistica et liturgica vetustissima (7 vols, 1935-37)
Le Nain de Tillemont, Louis Sebastien, Histoire des empereurs, et des autres princes, qui ont régne durant les six premiers siècles de l’Eglise (6 vols, 1720–38).

Modern theologians

The collection includes works by prominent 19th- and 20th-century theologians and scholars, such as:

Karl Barth
Walter Bauer
CH Dodd
Charles Gore
Leonard Hodgson
Friedrich von Hügel
Edmund Husserl
John Richardson Illingworth
William Ralph Inge
TA Lacey
JB Mozley
John Henry Newman
W Sanday
Darwell Stone
Henry Barclay Swete
William Temple
Ernst Troeltsch
George Tyrrell
Alec Vidler
Clement CJ Webb

Series

Strong holdings are available for major scholarly series, including:

Alcuin Club Collection (1917–68)
Ante-Nicene Christian Library (1867–71)
Sources chrétiennes (1943–68)

Serials and journals

While most journals are represented in short or broken runs, the collection includes strong holdings of:

Laudate (1923–53)
Mélanges de science religieuse (1944–57)
Mind (1944–65)
New Testament studies (1954–69)
Oxford (1950–68)
Oxford diocesan magazine (1944–67)
Philosophy (1947–62)
Sobornost (1951–68)
Theology (1923–69).

About Frank Cross

Education and career

Frank Leslie Cross (1900–1968) was educated at Bournemouth School and the universities of Oxford, London, Marburg and Freiburg. He entered the Church in 1924 and, from 1925 to 1926, was chaplain and tutor at Ripon College, Oxford. In 1927, he was appointed librarian at Pusey House, Oxford, a role he held until 1944. He lectured in the philosophy of religion at Oxford University and was appointed Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity in 1944. He retired in 1968, shortly before his death. He was also a canon of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford.

Publications

Cross wrote, translated and edited many books, including:

Religion and the reign of science (1930)
John Henry Newman (1933)
Early Christian fathers (1960)
The Oxford dictionary of the Christian Church (1957), which he edited

Book collecting

In the 1940s, Cross purchased a number of early works from the library of Christ Church, Oxford. He also inherited books from Darwell Stone, his predecessor at Pusey House.

Background to the collection

The Cross Collection was purchased from Elizabeth Livingstone of Oxford in 1969.

The pre-1800 books in the Cross Collection are housed in the Rare Books collection. They have not been kept together but are dispersed across the Dewey and miscellaneous sequences. All have been catalogued.

The journals have been integrated into the general collection, while the remainder of the books have been kept together as a formed collection. Their call numbers carry the prefix CRO. An author catalogue of the entire collection was produced on cards, with copies bound into three volumes. A fourth volume lists the reprints.

This guide was prepared using these references:

Elizabeth A Livingstone, Frank Leslie Cross, Oxford dictionary of national biography, vol. 14, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2004, pp. 421–2.
Obituary of F.L. Cross, The times (London), 3 December 1968, p. 10.
TM Parker, Frank Leslie Cross 1900–1968, Proceedings of the British Academy, vol. 55, 1969, pp. 369–75.