An edition of the letters (1621-1625) of the Reverend Joseph Mead to Sir Martin Stuteville of Suffolk in BL MS Harleian 389.

Joseph Mead, a theological scholar and tutor at Christ's College, Cambridge, wrote weekly newsletters to his friend and cousin at Dalham in Suffolk for eleven years from 1621 to 1631. The manuscripts are in the British Library Harleian collection in volumes 389 and 390. The 154 letters in this edition, from BL MS Harleian 389, cover the years 1621 to the end of 1625. All other contents of BL MS Harleian 389, such as copies in Mead's handwriting of letters received from London, Germany and elsewhere, are described in Calendars in Appendix 7. Mead's letters are transcribed in chronological order. The transcriptions retain seventeenth-century spelling; standard abbreviations are extended; non-standard abbreviations are retained. Omissions and illegibilities, often due to wear and tear of the manuscripts, are noted in textual notes at the end of each letter. The textual notes also include comment on Mead's deletions, insertions and corrections. The letters are concerned with current events in Europe and England, in particular with the early stages of the war in the German Empire (the Thirty Years' War) and English reaction to it. Mead's foreign news, which he gathered from many sources, supplements contemporary weekly printed newsbooks, many of which are no longer extant. Home news, in spite of a royal prohibition on discussion of affairs of state, includes references to the political repercussions in England of the European conflict, parliamentary business, the Court of James I, Church business and the Clergy. The content of the newsletters is editorially annotated using contemporary references where possible to confirm or refute Mead's news. The historical background, assxamed by Mead to be 'understood', is briefly described in the Appendices. In this edition of Mead's letters thorough annotation has been attempted in the hope that the sometimes confused reports in England, about the early stages of the Thirty Years' War, will be followed without confusion and with enjoyment by the reader.