Cookery-Books, Italian: Before 1500

Collection of 395 numbered, and twelve unnumbered cookery receipts in Italian. Written in a neat humanistic hand, 20 lines to a page. Ornamental initials in red with grotesque marginal decoration on ll. 13, 52, 96v, 127, 133v, 146. Other initials in red, a few black: headings in red. Fol. 1 Tabvla De La Prese/Nte Oper/A. 13 (red) Ad fare uno sciugo a una cossa de / castrato o vero spalla. c. 1º. 146 (End of numbered receipts) ... et/unge cum uno poco de zafferame / e olio: e poi lassala cocere. // Finis. 150 (End of 'A fare una substantia a uno infirmo') ... Et poi metterli / tucti queste cose in uno pignatello et / fa bollire a foco lento. The paper has a scissors water-mark, which appears to be Briquet's No. 3688, dated 1496. A name has been struck through in the upper margin of the first leaf; in the lower margin 'Joannes Christophorus Ciccurini', in a 16th cent. hand.

c. 1500

1 volume 150 ll. 8vo. 21 x 13 cm. Original half calf binding over wooden boards, metal and leather clasps repaired. The margins of the last leaf damaged and repaired, first leaf slightly wormed.

Purchased from Hodgson & Co., London, 9 Dec 1931, Lot 786.

Please consult the digitised version as this item needs to be accessed in our conservation studio. Email library@wellcomecollection.org to request an appointment.

Database description transcribed from S.A.J. Moorat, Catalogue of Western Manuscripts on Medicine and Science in the Wellcome Historical Medical Library (London: Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, 1962-1973).

On leaf 13 and on the last leaf is an unidentified armorial library-stamp.