The sources of the records in these three volumes are three volumes in which the Late Canon Foster collected and arranged the reports of visitations held by the last two pre-Reformation bishops of Lincoln and their officers. These, including visitations of rural deaneries as well as of monasteries and colleges, cover a wider ground than the three volumes of Visitations of Religious Houses (LRS Volumes 7, 14 & 21), which belong to the first half of the previous century. The records for the whole diocese are incomplete. Out of seventy-one religious houses of any importance visited by either Bishop Atwater or Bishop Longland, records remain for thirty-three which were visited by both. Those of Longland's episcopate refer to only five archdeaconries, omitting those of Lincoln, Stow and Leicester, while from those of Atwater's episcopate returns from the Archdeaconry of Northampton are missing. Nevertheless, it is doubtful whether any English diocese can supply an equally valuable source of information for the state of parochial and religious life at this highly critical period in the history of the Church.The first volume contains the visitations of rural deaneries from the Atwater manuscript.Adapted from the Preface
