Literary Echoes of the Fourth Lateran Council in England and France, 1215–1405, ed. Maureen B. M. Boulton. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2019, 332 pp.

What a pleasure to review this collection of essays edited by Maureen Boulton on such a rich topic as the consequences and influence of the Fourth Lateran Council! This was an historic and pivotal meeting for the Church, but as these articles demonstrate, the importance and authority of this Council also reverberated in secular literature as well. And while many of the issues treated in the Fourth Lateran Council reflect the cumulation of long-standing ecclesiastical discussions, the 1215 declarations nonetheless made official many practices already in effect.