On early Christianity itself, there are now two very useful
encyclopaedic collections: E. Ferguson (ed.), Encyclopedia of
Early Christianity(Chicago and London: St James Press, 1992);
and (translated from an Italian original) A. Di Berardino (ed.),
Encyclopaedia of the Early Church, 2 vols (Cambridge: James
Clarke and Co., 1992). Another useful resource is the English
version of G. Kittel (ed.) Theological Dictionary of the New
Testament, 10 vols (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1964–76): a
mine of information on a range of subjects (classical and Jewish
as well as early Christian); note, however, that the headwords for
articles are in Greek.
Anyone whose linguistic ability ranges beyond English
might find much that is useful in a number of European ency-
clopaedias. For those who can read French, the fifteen volumes
of the Dictionnaire d’archéologie chrétienne et de liturgie(Dic-
tionary of Christian Archaeology and Liturgy) (Paris: Letouzey
et Ané, 1907–53), commonly abbreviated as DACL, is a fasci-
nating repository of information on a wide range of topics. Its
scope ranges beyond antiquity to the middle ages, and is consid-
erably broader than its title might suggest. Useful discussions of
material will be found on particular places and on motifs used
in Christian art; much of it is illustrated with beautiful engrav-
ings, which make leafing through it one of the great pleasures
of studying early Christianity. Its age, however, means that
several recent and important excavations are not mentioned. A
comparable encyclopaedia, but covering more than just early
Christianity, is the Dictionnaire d’histoire et de géographie
ecclésiastiques (Paris: Letouzey et Ané: 1912– ), abbreviated
asDHGE: entries in the more recent volumes are well-worth
reading. The Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum(Specialist
Dictionary for Antiquity and Christianity) (Stuttgart: Hieresmann,
1950– ), usually abbreviated as RAC, contains articles in German;
but illustrations are often included, and each article is accompa-
nied by a very thorough bibliography. However, the length of time
it has taken to produce RACmeans that some of the material in
the earlier volumes is now out of date. Other encyclopaedias
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