This collection of early common petitions in the English parliament has been some years in the making, and we owe thanks to a number of organizations and individuals who have made it possible to bring it to fruition. The original identification of the relevant body of material in the National Archives was completed for Mark Ormrod by Dr Lisa Haworth Liddy under a small grant from the Department of History, University of York; this work was supplemented by further identifications and the creation of critical editions of documents, undertaken by Mark Ormrod and Helen Killick, and funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation; we are grateful to Professor Alexandra Gillespie and Professor James Ginther, the Principal Investigators on these projects, for their interest, commitment, and support, and to Dr Kitrina Bevan, Dr Gwilym Dodd, Dr Holly James-Maddocks, Professor Linne Mooney, Professor Anthony Musson and Dr Matthew Phillips, who participated in workshops arising from these grants and have given freely of their knowledge in the making of this edition. Phil Bradford joined the editorial team at a later stage to assist particularly with the historical notes.