The college of the Boni Homines at Ashridge has received little attention compared with other late medieval English monasteries. This may have to do with the fact that it was not an exceptionally large foundation, among the few wealthiest; or that the buildings of the college were pulled down in 1800, denying us their physical evidence; or that it was a unique order, without powerful mother houses or networks enjoyed by other monasteries. Nonetheless, the clues left for us in the historical documents suggest that this modest establishment wielded influence in Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire, where its land holdings were, and that it had the ear—and the sympathy—not only of their diocesan, the Bishop of Lincoln, but of the King himself.

N. R. Ker has traced twelve surviving books to the Ashridge library. This number, however, is no more representative of the library's size or importance than the half dozen books that remain from the Syon library, which contained over 1,420 books.

From the physical evidence left behind in the wake of the dissolutions and the Protestant reformation, and from the fifteenth and sixteenth century histories that refer to the college, this dissertation recovers a convincing picture of the library at Ashridge, and provides a greater understanding of the religious order of the Boni Homines and their monastic vocation. In particular, the dissertation demonstrates that Ashridge, while in no way neglecting its spiritual duties, particularly saw its vocation as a center of learning—a collegium, indeed, in the peculiarly academic sense of the word.

The textual, theological and material analyses of the manuscripts show an influential house that played a dynamic role in the material and spiritual lives of the people connected to it, but that also saw itself as a place of isolation and learning, distancing itself from the world and even from the ecclesiastical structure. The books themselves and the orthodoxy that they affirm provide clues that allow us some understanding about what it might mean to align oneself with a virtually unknown monastic order called the Good Men.