The Chaucer Review: An Indexed Bibliography (Vols. 1-30)

Wright, Constance S. "The Printed Editions of Chaucer's Legend of Good Women: 1532-1889." 24 (1990): 312-19.
Of the editions published between 1532 and 1889, John Urry's 1721 edition is the best, because it uses a variety of manuscripts to restore readings removed by previous editors. Other editions such as Thynne's (1532), Stowe's (1561), and Speght's (1598, 1602, 1687) repeated the previous editor's errors and therefore cannot be so highly regarded as they have been. Eighteenth-century editors follow Urry's text. Nineteenth-century editors follow either Thynne, Stowe, or Speght though editors sometimes alter the text in light of different manuscripts. Urry's edition is, however, the best edition of all of these because of the effort he expended to recover manuscript readings.