The Dominicans in the British Isles and Beyond: A New History of the English Province of the Friars Preachers

The history of the Dominicans in the British Isles is a rich and fascinating one. Eight centuries have passed since the Friars Preachers landed on England's shores. Yet no book charting the history of the English Province has appeared for close on a hundred years. Richard Finn now sets right this neglect. He guides the reader engagingly and authoritatively through the medieval, early modern and contemporary periods: from the arrival of the first Black Friars – and the Province's 1221 foundation by Gilbert de Fresnay – to Dominican missions to the Caribbean and Southern Africa and seismic changes in church and society after Vatican II. He discusses the Province's medieval resilience and sudden Reformation collapse; attempts in the 1650s to restore it; its Babylonian Exile in the Low Countries; its virtual disappearance in the nineteenth century; and its unlikely modern revival. This is an essential work for medievalists, theologians and historians alike.

Table of Contents:
1. The Making of an English Multi-National: 1221–1348; 2. From the Black Death to the Tudor Suppressions: 1348–1559; 3. An Unorganised Mission: 1559–1655; 4. A European Foundation: 1655–1827; 5. Apostolic Missioners: 1655–1850; 6. The Re-makings of an Observant Province: 1850–1913; 7. 'Jarrett's Jam': The Re-Shaping of the Province: 1914–1963; 8. From 'Acute Agony' to 'Rebirth', 1964–2021.

About the Author :
Richard Finn, OP, joined the Dominicans in 1985. He served as Regent of Studies for the English Province from 2008 to 2012, and as Novice Master from 2012 to 2016. Author of Almsgiving in the Later Roman Empire (Oxford University Press, 2006) and Asceticism in the Graeco-Roman World (Cambridge University Press, 2009), he is also the Order's Provincial Archivist in Blackfriars, Oxford.

Review :
'While the Dominicans in medieval England have received various degrees of attention over the past decades, this book does a particular service in attending to the less remembered history of the Order from the Reformation onwards. Notably, it also covers the activities of the Province beyond the geographical boundaries of England proper, which includes not only Scotland, Ireland and Wales but also its “homeless” period in the Netherlands and its emergence within various British colonial territories. The scholarship is of a consistently high quality and the research is impressively comprehensive. There is also a welcome determination to bypass flowery narratives of the Order's past in favour of more complicated and occasionally less-harmonious accounts.' Steven Watts, Crandall University 'The scholarship is of a consistently high quality and the research is impressively comprehensive.' Steven Watts, Crandall University 'This is an accessible account of the history of the Order from 1221 until 2021 and one that should attract a great deal of interest from readers. Richard Finn nimbly makes his way through the early history of the English Province, incorporating many of the sources published in the last seventy years. He then significantly expands knowledge of the Order as it strove to deal with the political constraints of the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and brings the history of the English Dominicans into the new millennium and lifetime of the author. Finn adopts an even-handed approach to the multiple sources, and is content to let the records speak for themselves. His book offers a very worthy commemoration of the eighth centenary of the Friars' arrival in England.' Michael Robson, St Edmund's College, Cambridge 'Finn displays a complete mastery of the relevant primary and secondary sources that is all the more impressive because of the volume's broad chronological and geographical sweep. He writes in a crisp, accessible style, enlivened by occasional flashes of dry wit and provides a reliable and comprehensive introduction to the history of the Friars Preachers in Britain, Ireland, Flanders and further afield.' Colmán Ó Clabaigh, Irish Theological Quarterly 'Finn's book is a rare achievement: it is meticulously researched, but also highly readable … The book fills a gap in scholarship. Throughout his study, Finn uncovers a number of mistaken assumptions made by early modern sources that have been taken at face value and perpetuated in later scholarship for decades.' Cornelia Linde, The Journal of Religious History, Literature & Culture