MEDICA
Vellum, 9.5 x 5.75, ff. 181, three volumes. 13th-15th cent., 11th-12th cent.
Donor, T. C. S.
Collation: 112 - 812 98 | 108 118 1210 138 1412 (4, 5 canc.) | 154 | 164 1712 18 (two) 1912 (1 canc.).
On the margin of f. 1 (xv, xvi) in large black letters is:
Autores huius libri Alexander de Hales, Petrus de Salerno, Platearius, Muscio, Theodorus Priscianus.
Contents:
I. 13th-14th cent. , double columns of 40 lines, narrow delicate hand.
1. Antidotarius glosatus . . . . . . . . f. 1
Beginning in Pomum Ambre.
Ending 2: pectoralibus inuiscatam. Expl. glose super anti-
dotarium
2. Phisica Urbani, in verse . . . . . . . 82
Sit porcina recens caro prestita flegbotomato
…
Viuere morose studeas fugias uiciosa. Expl. phisica urbani.
3. Inc. liber magri Petri de Salerno transpositus a latino in
romanam ad instanciam Margarete fregille regine Yspanie
de omnibus opi(ni)onibus uniuersorum magistrorum tunc
Salerine (sic) commorancium . . . . . . . 83
Prol. in prose: Humaine cors est ke ist de quatre humors-
deit user. chaude freid et sec.
Text in verse: Home ki veot asescriz entender | Bele resun
ipoet aprender . . . . . . . . . 83
Ends f. 99. (Pur eschaufisun)
Par tut gardez ski seit ouel
Od ewe teue. le deit temprer.
Continues in prose :
Pur la dolur de la teste . . . . . . . . 99
Peliol (?) quit en aisis destempre mettez as nairis.
Ends 100b:
Al meneisun senglante
…si le beiuez ·iii· jors al matin e al seir.
Explicit expliciat nobilis autor erat.
Miscellaneous receipts follow.
Contra paralisim (?) et obtusionem membrorum, etc. . . . 100b
Ending on 104b. Then follows one in French in a similar hand.
Pur la tousse pernez cicore, etc.
In a later hand: Oleum benedictum sic fit.
This is continued on lower margin of 105 showing that the
two volumes have been long bound together.
II. 12th cent., fine Italian (?) hand, red and yellow initials, mostly
double columns of 40 lines.
4. Inc. herbolarius secundum mag. Platearium . . . . . 105
Circa instans negotium
Ends with Zuccarum (147a) nisi propter diuturnam decoctionem.
Deo gratias.
Receipts in a similar hand follow . . . . . . . 147
De azur quomodo fiat.
Aquam ardentem sic facies, etc.
Two lines in yellow, in a frame:
Pro uanis uerbis montanis utimur herbis.
Pro certis rebus pigmentis et speciebus.
A tract on Stones . . . . . . . . . 147b
(L)apis magnes gignitur atque inuenitur circa litus occeani
apud rogoditas.
The sections are on Gagatis, Chelidonius, Electorio, Grisso-
litus, Exebonos, Saphyrus, Epistiten, Galactites, Berillus,
Smaracdus, Corallius, Cristallus.
This end unfinished
Lapis cristallus uires habet stipticas.
148b is blank.
III. 11th-12th cent. in a beautiful round minuscule, probably Italian,
preceded by a table of contents in English hand (14th-15th cent.).
Inc. capitula tractatus libri primi Muscionis de mulierum
membris et earum causis obstetricalibus de greco in latinum
translatus . . . . . . . . . . . 149
Expl. liber quintus genecie theodori preciani de mulierum cura.
Lib. I has 128 chapters. Lib. II, 33. Lib. III in Curaciones
mulierum et de uiciis que mulieribus accidere solent ad
instanciam genecie cleopatre regine de greco in latinum
translatus: 34 chapters.
Lib. IV, 74 chapters, de passionibus mulierum.
Lib. V, genecie theodori preciani de mulierum cura: 43 chapters.
Text. Inc. Prol. Muscionis . . . . . . . . 153
Cum frequentius nobis in mulie(b)ribus causis obstetrix fuisset
necessaria.
Prol. ends: rationem facile intelligere possent. Ed. Val. Rose,
Soranus, p. 3.
Cap. I: Quali positione figurata est matrix, etc.
Que singule partes ut cognoscantur, etc.
Lib. II, f. 157b; III, f. 171; IV, f. 173; V, f. 177b.
Inc. genecia Theodori Presciani . . . . . . . . 177b
Intellexisse te non minus arbitror.
Ends f. 181b: fateretur se uidisse.
Noticed in Diels, Die Handschriften der Antiken Ärzte, p. 66.
Negative microfilm in St John's College Library.
A. M. Bouly de Lesdian, 'Les manuscrits didactiques anterieurs au 14e siecle, essai d'inventaire', Institut de Recherche et d'Histoire des Textes 13 (1964-5), 57-79.
S. de Renzi, Storia documentata della scuola medica di Salerno, 2nd edition, (Naples, 1857), p. 166, and also the appendix of Documenti, p. xxx refer to section 3.
C. Anne Wilson, 'Philosopher's, Iósis and water of life', Proceedings of the Leeds Philosophical and Literary Society 19:5 (1984), 101-219.
D. V. Thompson Jr, 'Trial index for Medieval craftsmanship', Speculum 10 (1935), 410-31.
D. V. Thompson Jr, 'Medieval-color making: tractatus qualiter quilibet artificialis color fieri possit from Paris, B.N., MS, Latin 6749b ', Isis 22:64 (1935), 456-68.
With regard to Soranus of Ephesus, this MS was used in Valentino Rose (ed.), Sorani Gynaeciorum vetus translatio latina… Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana (Lipsiae, 1882).
Monica H. Green, The Transmission of ancient theories of female physiology and disease through the Early Middle Ages (University of Princeton PhD thesis, 1985), pp. 226-34. St John's College Library W.48.
Monica H. Green, 'The De Genecia attributed to Constantine the African', Speculum 62 (April, 1987), 299-323.
The text on f. 181r-v, De matrice, is an excerpt from Book III, cap. 34 of the first part (the Theorica) of Constantine the African's Pantegni; compare the version of the Pantegni published in the Opera Isaaci (Lyons 1515), in the Theorica, Book III, cap. xxxix, ff. 13vb-14va, inc.: Matrix in forma sua est sicut vesica … expl.: fateretur se vidisse.
This MS. is cited in A. Beccaria, I Codici di medicina presalernitano (secoli IX, X, e XI) (Rome 1956), 239-41. Beccaria dated D.4, James 79, as late 11th/early 12th century; however, Consuelo Dutschke feels quite certain that the section in question, ie. the third part of this composite volume, is of the first half of the 12th century, and is of Italian origin.