Collection of medical recipes, in Latin, following the arrangement of chapters in Rhazes, Liber nonus ad Almansorem

A collection of recipes, in Latin, written by one hand, probably in North East Italy, in the late 15th century. The collection follows the arrangement of chapters A capite usque ad calcem (from head to toe) in the Liber nonus ad Almansorem, a treatise on the medical therapy of diseases written by the Persian physician Muhammad ibn Zakariya al-Razi (865-925 or 933), known in the West as Rhazes or Rhasis. However, the contents are not identical to Rhazes's work. The collection is preceded by a chapter index in the same hand, and followed at the end by two recipes relating to urinal and venereal diseases added by two later readers.

Contents

1. ff. 1r-2v: Index of chapters, closely related to the index entries in the edition of the Latin translation of Rhazes, Liber nonus ad Almansorem, attributed to Gerardus of Cremona, produced at Milan by Leonardus Pachel and Uldericus Scinzenzeler and dated 14 February 1481 (ISTC ir00175000).

The index entries are numbered 1-132, but have no corresponding numbers in the text for leaves, pages or entries.

f. 1r: Incipit: De dolore Capitis. sine Soda … 1. 126 / De uertigine et Scotomia … 3 / De Frenesi … 9 / ...

f. 2v: Explicit: Ad Siaticam [paragraph sign] Sedatiuum doloris siatici coiti et stomaci … 130 / Restauratiuum dandum infirmum / Ad morsum Canis … 131.

2. ff. 4r-54v: An anonymous collection of recipes, in Latin, following the head to toe arrangement of the chapters in Rhazes, Liber nonus ad Almansorem, and formerly identified as an abridged copy of the Latin translation of Rhazes's work (Moorat, I, p. 509). The collection is imperfect at the end as it breaks at mid-sentence on the bottom line of f. 54v in the middle of the last gathering, not apparently due to the loss of a middle bifolium.

For another manuscript in the Wellcome Library containing an unidentified collection of medical recipes in Latin similarly following the chapter organisation of Rhazes's Liber nonus ad Almansorem, see MS. 683.

f. 4r: Incipit: [rubric in red] Soda [end of rubric] est lesio in membris capitis. In Soda Sanguine aut ad mixta sanguini primo fiat flobotomia premissa clisteri lenitivo …

f. 54v: Breaking at: ... [paragraph sign in red] Conferens dolori arenali. Recipe riquilitie [sic for 'liquiritie'] optime et bene munde. drama. ii aque communis cyatos tres. fac <…>

3. f. 55v: Recipe against burning pain during urination, in Italian, added by a late 16th- or early 17th-century hand. Title: Medicamentum Eccellentissimi Falopii ad ardorem urine; Incipit: Recipe aque solari, in qua imponatur radices malue et bulliant parum …; Explicit: … intro ponatur ad refrigerandum, quod est maxime iuuamentu.

4. f. 56r-v: Recipe against wart-like lesion on male genital, in Italian, added by a 17th century hand.

f. 56r: Title: Per guarire la carnosita della verga esperimento; Incipit: Recipe Cerussa dramme due / Futia preparata drama 0/2 / Canfora drama 0/2 / Antimonio dramme due / Trociscor albi rasis dramme due / ogni cosa ben poluerizzati et composte nel mortaio …

f. 56v: Explicit: … uuole un mese di tempo nel quale non si deue andare a Cauallo ne usare il coito ne mangiar cose agre ne insalate.

On paper. Watermark: three columns, similar but not identical to Briquet 4452 (Ferrara, 1500).

60 leaves, plus two modern flyleaves (one bifolium) at the beginning; modern foliation '2-60' in pencil; ff. 3, 55r, 57-60 blank. 223 x 161 mm; written space 170 x 115 mm; ruled in single vertical and horizontal bounding lines in metal point for a single column (the horizontal and vertical lines crossing each other in the margins), 29-33 written lines to the column, beginning above the upper horizontal bounding line, but with no other guiding horizontal line; no trace of pricking holes.

Collation: 1-5¹²; catchwords on last verso of quires, descending along and outside the vertical bounder in the lower right corner. The breaking of text at the end of f. 54v may indicate the loss of a central bifolium in last fifth quire.

Secundo folio: De colerica passione.

Written in black ink in a cursive humanistic hand, Italy, late 15th century. Recipes on ff. 55v and 56r-v written by two different hands, the first in dark brown ink by a late 16th- or early 17th-century hand, the second in light brown ink with a pointed quill by a 17th-century hand.

One-line chapter initials, rubrics and paragraph marks in red throughout.

Occasional marginal additions supplied by the scribe.

A note supplied in brown ink in a formal cursive humanistic hand by a late 15th- or early 16th-century reader in the lower margin of f. 13r.

Binding: parchment over pasteboards, late 18th- or early 19th-century, the parchment taken from the tacketed binding of another volume; the first flyleaf shows signs of having been used as pastedown on a previous binding with turn-ins whose outlines do not match those of the present binding.

Bought from the London bookseller and collector Wilfrid Michael Voynich (1865-1930) on 17 August 1910.

The title 'Ricettarum' [sic] lettered in light brown ink on the upper cover by an Italian 16th-century hand.

Conte Colonnello Fabrizio Orsini de Rilli (1742-1826), his ownership note 'Del Colonnello Orsini Rilli. 1806' on the upper turn-in of the upper cover and title 'Ricettario' along the spine, both in black ink. Count Fabrizio Orsini Rilli bequeathed his rich library of 9,000 books and 200 manuscripts to the municipality of Poppi, thus providing the foundation collection of the Biblioteca Comunale Rilliana: see Gli incunaboli della Biblioteca Comunale 'Rilliana' di Poppi e del Monastero di Camaldoli, ed. Piero Scapecchi (Florence: Regione Toscana, 2004), pp. 11, 14-15.

Marked '136. [space] 4.' in light brown ink on lower pastedown, 17th century [?].

Marked '8969 / oz' in pencil on verso of first upper flyleaf, 20th century.

Marked '321', substituted with '241', all in pencil, on verso of first upper flyleaf, 20th century.