This seven-volume collection was published in nine parts between 1864 and 1890. The bulk of the work consists of translated correspondence between the Venetian ambassadors at the English court and the Signory back home, with documents from other northern Italian states also included. The work as a whole forms a detailed chronicle of Italian dealings with the English crown from the year 1202 up to 1580. Volume 6, which deals with the years 1555 to the death of Queen Mary at the end of 1558, is subdivided into three parts. Translator and editor Rawdon Lubbock Brown (1806–83) lived for many years in Venice, had unrivalled access to the Venetian archives and travelled widely across Italy to search for material in libraries and other archives. He had previously published a two-volume edition of Ambassador Sebastian Giustinian's dispatches to Venice from Henry VIII's court (also reissued in this series).