My PhD offers a reassessment of the place of the Regimens anitatis( Regimeno f health) in medieval English life, arguing that such a powerful combination of physical and spiritual therapeutics not only informed the language of Church and State, but also found practical expression in the urban environment. It also contends that the Regimen was widely known and understood in England after 1348,a nd that successive outbreaks of plague encouraged the production of health manuals which in turn disseminated medical knowledge to a wider population. It was against this background that the Regimens anitatis and associated texts, such as the Secretas ecretorum(S ecreto f Secrets) and its close relation, the Regimen sanitatis Salerni (Salernitan Regimen of Health), achievedt heir influencea nd popularity. The thesis demonstrates that the appeal of these manuals, particularly among members of what might, anachronistically, be termed the `non-professional' classes, lay in their capacity to offer simple advice, which could be tailored to suit all pockets, and which manifestly accorded with the teachings of the Church, as well as of the leading European faculties of medicine. It also shows that, by teaching people how to safeguard their own precarious mental and physical well being, the Regimen was effectively promoting a culture of medical self-sufficiency. In short, it argues that in the aftermath of plague and epidemics concern for health crossed both the class and gender divide and that the demand for accessible information was met by the Regimen