The first edition of the complete works of Rabanus was produced by G. Colvener (Cologne 1617) and reprinted in PL cvii–cxii. The commentary on Ruth is PL cviii.1199–224. The sole manuscript, the fourteenth-century Madrid, BN 102 (M), is of middling quality.This edition is based primarily upon Colvener's text, with some corrections from M. The commentary is preceded by a list of chapter headings, and the commentary elucidates the entire text of Ruth, phrase by phrase. His biblical text is almost pure Vulgate. The few exceptions include Deuteronomy xxxii.43 (cf. Romans xv.10) [iii.7; identically in Claudius 10]), Isaiah liii.8a (ix.5: first used in this context in Lactantius, Institutes iv.18), Psalm xxiii.8 (vi.6; Claudius 16), Psalm xliv.18a (xv.3: derived from the Alcuin Bible), Psalm cxxix.11 (xiv.2: IW Sixto-Clementine). Chapters 3.7 and 14.2 of Rabanus are taken verbatim from Isidore, In judicum 9.7 (PL lxxxiii.390–2). There are a number of close textual similarities between the commentaries, and it may be that Rabanus and Claudius drew independently upon some unidentified common source, perhaps the lost commentary by Bellator, commissioned by Cassiodore, mentioned in his Institutiones i.2. But this hypothesis cannot be tested, nor can it be definitively demonstrated that either commentator used the other's work. Both drew upon Ambrose, In Lucam, which in turn drew upon Origen for its figurative interpretation of Ruth. Their reading of the Church Fathers was very wide, and their interpretation informed primarily by that tradition. Rabanus' exegesis is very allegorical, Claudius' less so, but coloured with anti-Jewish polemic. The exposition, including that of proper names and numbers, used by both authors ultimately goes back to Rabbinic exegesis, given a Christian interpretation. Ruth is an allegory of God's plan of salvation, a figure of the Gentiles, who left their homeland and entered the land of Israel. Thus Ruth is the Church, spouse to Boaz, a type of Christ, who has accepted his Gentile bride. The interpretation of Hebrew names in both commentaries derives from Jerome, Liber interpretationis hebraicorum nominum, and their allegorical exposition is the foundation of the commentary. Claudius' commentary exists in four manuscripts and is about one quarter the length of Rabanus', omitting commentary upon several verses. The last two chapters of Ruth – the betrothal before witnesses – are given in resumé, and are taken verbatim from Isidore 20–5=Isidore, Judges (Ruth) 3–7. Monat bases his edition on that of Douglas (Sacris Erudiri xxii [1974–5]), who used three manuscripts, with some modifications in orthography and punctuation, and the arrangement of the text into twenty-five paragraphs. The biblical text has traces of Old Latin usage (Ruth i.1: ‘Et factum est’; Ruth ii.3 ‘colligam spicas de post metentes’). For the rest, it is largely Vulgate, with variants caused by citation from memory, or paraphrase. This is an excellent and badly needed edition of two important, parallel medieval commentaries on a little accessed book of the Bible. The introductory matter is succinct, clear and fully accurate.