Thomas Wright (1810–77), antiquarian, archaeologist and historian, wrote many works on all his areas of interest, including several reissued in the Cambridge Library Collection. He was the first excavator of the Roman city of Wroxeter, wrote on the history of Ludlow and of Cambridge, and was interested in ethnology, folklore, Old English, and etymology. This two-volume collection of his essays was published in 1861: he selected them 'to embrace in some manner the whole field of our own primeval history and that of the Middle Ages'. The subjects range from the excavation of tumuli in Yorkshire to the history of drama in the Middle Ages. Wright draws on sources ranging from medieval charters to modern linguistic studies, as well as the remains and artefacts uncovered by his own and others' excavations. Volume 1 considers prehistoric finds, aspects of Roman Britain, and the Anglo-Saxon and late medieval period.