Summary Concentrating on the period of the emergence of the vernaculars in the context of religious text production in Central and Eastern Central Europe from the fourteenth to the sixteenth centuries, the individual studies in this volume present material so far neglected by nationally defined historiographies and literary studies. The process of vernacularization created a new sociolinguistic field for the negotiation of social order through the choice of texts and topics. This volume seeks to answer the questions of whether, why and how distinctive new communicative, literary, and political cultures developed after the vernacular languages had acquired ever higher levels of literacy and education. The volume fills a gap in contemporary scholarship on the role of the vernaculars and vernacular literatures in European medieval societies and with the focus on Eastern European regions it breaks new ground in regard to questions that have so far only been explored on the basis of material from Europe's 'West'. TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction R jane GAY-CANTON (University of Geneva, Department of Medieval German Studies): Ich sey ain laye ploss: Four Laymen Writing on a Theological Controversy (Last Quarter of the Thirteenth Century - Last Third of the Fourteenth Century) So?a ?ERN (Institute for Medieval Research, Austrian Academy of Sciences): The Letters of St Jerome of the Prague Chancellor and Notary John of Neumarkt: A Transmission History Appendix Tam s VISI (Centre for Jewish Studies, University Olomouc): Latin-to-Hebrew Translations in Late Medieval Ashkenaz: Two Different Strategies Pavel BLA?EK (Institute for Philosophy, Academy of Sciences of Czech Republic): Thomas of ?t tn 's On the Householder (O hospod ?ovi) and its Latin Model Appendix Pavl na RYCHTEROV (Institute for Medieval Research, Austrian Academy of Sciences): Thomas of ?t tn (1330-1400) and his Translation of De septem itineribus aeternitatis by Rudolf of Biberach Christine GLA NER (Institute for Medieval Research, Austrian Academy of Sciences): The German Ars moriendi: Texts from the Circle of the so-called Viennese School of Translators and their Circulation in the Fifteenth Century Farkas G bor KISS (Hungarian Academy of Sciences): Reading Nuns at the Insula Leporum (Hungary): Traces of Bilingualism in a Late Medieval Dominican Nunnery Illustrations Rafa? W JCIK (Department of Old and Rare Books, University Pozna?): The Polish Version of the Meditaciones vite Christi by Baltazar Opec Bibliography Manuscript and Archival Sources Primary Sources Secondary Works Websites Index: Authors and Anonymous Texts