Report of the Editor

Volume 103 of the journal consisted of 846 pages of articles, addresses, essays, book reviews, brief notices, and the quarterly sections Notes and Comments, Periodical Literature, and Other Books Received, with an additional twenty pages of preliminary material and forty-six pages of the general index. In all, Volume 103 contained 912 pages. Subsidies from authors and contributions from others made directly to the journal allowed for the addition of pages above those budgeted. Dr. Paul F. Grendler of Chapel Hill, NC (emeritus of the University of Toronto) and the Reverend Robert C. Ayres of Cazenovia, N.Y., have made generous contributions.

Of the eighteen regular articles and two addresses published, three treated a medieval topic, six early modern European, three late modern European, seven American, and one a modern ecumenical theme. Fourteen of their authors came from American institutions, the others from Canadian, German, Italian, Maltese, Polish, and Portuguese universities. In addition, there was a Forum Essay dealing with a book on the early modern period that had contributions by scholars from Canadian, Italian, and American institutions.

In 2017, the journal published 150 book reviews and one brief notice. The book reviews can be subdivided into the following categories: general and miscellaneous (14), ancient (11), medieval (34), early modern (44), late modern (20), American (21), Latin American (5), and Canadian (2). In addition, there was a review of a film treating an early modern missions theme (1). Their authors came mostly from institutions in the United States (93 or 62%), but those in other countries were also represented: in the United Kingdom (25 or 16%), Canada (10 or 7%), Italy (8 or 5%), Germany (3 or 2%), two each from Australia and France, and one each from Austria, Belgium, Chile, Croatia, Cyprus, Greece, Ireland, Spain, and Sweden. One brief notice and the review of the film were by authors at institutions in the United States. Please see Table 1.

The editors received thirty-four new submissions of articles in 2017. They came primarily from the United States, but also from Australia, Canada, Chile, Croatia, the Czeck Republic, Korea/Japan, Russia, Tanzania, and the United Kingdom. Table 2 shows the current disposition of these submissions. During the year 2017, seventeen articles earlier accepted were published.

Two articles received awards during 2017. The Peter Guilday Prize for the best article that was the first scholarly article published by an author went to Ms. Kathleen Walkowiak for her study "Public Authority and Private Constraints: Eugenius III and the Council of Reims" (pp. 409–36). A new prize, anonymously donated recently and entitled the Nelson H. Minnich Award was granted to Dr. Carolyn Salmons for her article "A Church United in Itself: Hernando de Talavera and the Religious Culture of Fifteenth-Century Castile" (pp. 639–62), deemed by the prize committee to be the best article to appear in the journal in 2017.

Table 1.

Book Reviews, Film Review, and Brief Notice Published in 2017

Table 2.

Manuscripts Submitted in 2017

During 2017 the journal experienced staffing problems. With the departure in November of Ms. Elizabeth Foxwell as staff editor, a search for her replacement took four months to find an appropriate candidate. Ms. Mary Tonkinson filled in for a couple months but then also left. Mr. Richard Lender subsequently helped out. We appreciate everyone's patience and understanding during this period of transition. The editor is most appreciative of their services and those provided by the associate editors Msgr. Robert Trisco and Dr. Jennifer Paxton, by the graduate assistant Ms. Katya Mouris, and by the Board of Advisory Editors. The journal could not function without their continued dedicated services.