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The importance of the Legenda aurea for the Late Middle Ages can hardly be overestimated, as witness the impressive manuscript tradition of the original Latin text as well the different vernacular versions. This huge hagiographic collection, organised per circulum anni, can be considered as a compendium of the medieval religious worldview: it offers insights into the (deuterocanonic) tradition of the New Testament, the lives and deaths of the most important saints, the history of the church of Rome, and it can be read as a catechism in narrative form. But the Legenda aurea is also a treasure-trove of stories, motifs and themes splendidly reflecting medieval mentality in its entirety. The influence of the Legenda aurea on literature and iconography is so far-reaching, that the book is an indispensable aid for the ?reading? of countless medieval texts, paintings and sculptures.The text was translated several times into Middle Dutch and of the first southern Dutch translation (ca. 1357), made by Petrus Naghel (? 1395) in the Charterhouse of Herne, a modern edition is now available.This is the first volume of a two-volume work (volume II appeared in 2011). The text edition in the present volume begins with Advent and ends with the legend of Saint Pancras, thus comprising the legends pertaining to the three great feasts: Christmas, Easter and Pentecost. The volume further contains a comprehensive introduction, which opens on a succinct presentation of the Latin Legenda aurea, its author and its transmission. The principal focus is on the Middle Dutch text, its translator and his source, and its transmission in manuscript and print. A number of concordances and an index of names offer keys to the text of the legends and facilitate parallel consultation of the Gulden Legende and contemporary editions of the Latin text.