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Johannes de Rupescissa, <i>De consideratione quintae essentiae</i>, with a glossary of medicinal herbs in Latin and German. Public Domain Mark. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Johannes de Rupescissa, De consideratione quintae essentiae , in Latin>, with a glossary of medicinal herbs in Latin and German, on paper, dated '1443 Ratisponae', i.e. Regensburg (Bavaria), Germany.
Contents
1. ff. 1r-42v: Johannes de Rupescissa (Jean de Roquetaillade), De consideratione quintae essentiae, in Latin.
The treatise, probably written by Rupescissa about 1351-1352, describes the alchemical processes for the extraction by distillation of the essence of wine, plants and minerals for medicinal purposes. The distillation of the aqua ardens (ethyl alcohol) extracted from wine is at the basis of all extractions. The author believes the alcohol to be an element similar to the so-called quinta essentia, the incorruptible fifth element that according to Aristotle forms the essence of heavenly bodies, and is therefore capable of preserving the human body from corruption and illnesses. The text is divided into two books, the first dedicated to the distillation processes with subdivisions called canones, the second to the medical applications of the essences described in chapters called remedia.
The text is listed in eTK, A digital resource based on Lynn Thorndike and Pearl Kibre, A Catalogue of Incipits of Medieval Scientific Writings in Latin (Cambridge, MA: Mediaeval Academy, 1963; with supplements in 1965 and 1968; online at https://medievalacademy.site-ym.com/?page=Books#etk), no. 458A.
Printed for the first time as Ioannis de Rupescissa qui ante CCCXX annos vixit de consideratione quintae essentiae rerum omnium, opus sane egregium (Basel: s.n.t., [1561]) by Guillaume Gratarolo, with his dedicatory letter dated 1561. The publication also included Arnaldus de Villanova, Epistola de sanguine humano distillato, Raymundus Lullus, Ars operativa et alia quaedam and Michael Savonarola, Libellus optimus de aqua vitae.
For other manuscript copies of the treatise in the Wellcome Library, see MSS 117, 186, 384, 513, 520, 709, 710 and 712; imperfect copies in MSS 502, 523 and 711; excerpts in MSS 452, 526 (partly fragmentary), 598, 388 (in English translation); a summary in MS. 517.
f. 1r: Book 1: Incipit: [D]Ixit salomon Sapiencie .7. capitulo / Deus dedit michi horum que sunt scientiam veram ut sciam dispositiones orbis terrarum et virtutes elementorum ...
f. 27v: Book 1: Explicit: ... ad consolationem euangelicorum virorum et honorem ecclesie sancte dei Amen / Explicit primus liber qui est de consideratione quinte essentie.
f. 27v: Book 2: Incipit: Jn nomine domini nostri Jhesu Christi secundus liber qui de generalibus remedys appellatur / [L]Jcet primus liber qui est de consideratione quinte essentie tante virtutis in rei veritate existat ut per eum possit curare omnis morbis curabilis ....
f. 42v: Book 2: Explicit: ... vel in eius absentia aqua ardens. Deo / omnipotenti patrique filio et spiritui sancto sit laus / per infinita secula seculorum Amen. finis. 1443o.
2. ff. 42v-58r: Vocabularius herbarum, Glossary for medicinal herbs in Latin and German.
f. 42v: Incipit: In nomine domini Amen / Vocabularius herbarum / [A]Brotanum Ebirtyss gertwurtz scabwurtz / Absinthium wermuct ....
f. 58r: Explicit: … Zima in fermentum Vihesel. / Et sic est finis. 1443o ratisponae. / Sancte francisce ora pro me [followed by an addition in a different hand] et pro omnibus confidelibus defunctis.
3. f. 58v: An invocation of a spirit [Igael?] and a recipe for a purgative using an essence, added by two cursive hands, the first in dark brown ink, the second in black ink.
Invocation: Igael [in upper margin] / + coniuro te per deum sanctum per deum qui me creauit et per illi quatuor antiquiores patriarchas et prophetas et seniores et per quatuor euangelistas ut mei mansores N et non ualwe [?] me decipere sed verum mihi revelas et absterges ...
Recipe: adprocurandj solutionem essentie / Recipe Aleopaticum Kisserling et mel quod sufficit et fiet emplastrum et si nisi operatur ponatur infirmum in balneum [?] procuretur sudorem etc.
On paper. Watermarks: 1. Blackamoor head, with headband with two ends of noose (height c. 46 mm, width 30 mm, distance between chainlines 40 mm), unidentified; 2. Triple mount, in a circle, with a cross above made of one line (height c. 66 mm, width 31 mm, distance between chainlines 58 mm), similar to Piccard 153320 (Salzburg, 1434).
58 leaves, plus one modern flyleaf at the beginning and the end; old foliation '1-42' in black ink in upper right corner of rectos, continued by a modern foliation '43-58', followed here; ff. 34v-35r blank. 211 x 148 mm, written space 162-218 x 143 mm; ruled in plummet in single lines for the horizontal bounding lines and for the vertical in the inner margin, and in double lines for the vertical bounding lines in the external margin of pages, 32-39 written lines (with no ruling, but below upper horizontal bounding line) to the page; no trace of pricking holes.
Collation: 1-212-1 (both wanting i), 3-412, 512-1 (wanting xii); with catchwords in the lower edge of the last versos in the quires.
Secundo folio: Secretum primum est quod.
Copied in a round and fluid cursive German Gothic hand, about 1443.
Large (11-line high) initial D in red, outlined in black, set against a square ground with foliate decoration in black and red, extending briefly into the inner margin, on f. 1r; red woven pattern possibly added to the letter at a later date [19th century?]; two- to four-line initials, paragraph marks and underlining in red on ff. 1r-20r, 30v-42r.
Tinted drawing in red and green of an alchemical vessel for the conservation of the aqua ardens in the margin of f. 5v; one other small drawing of a compass in red and green in the lower left corner of f. 4v.
Binding of marbled paper (brown and black) over pasteboards, 18th century.
Purchased from H. Tidemann of Berlin on 23 August 1934 for £ 10.
Doctor Simon von Haeberl (1772-1831) of Munich, Germany, his ownership stamp 'Ex libris doctoris S. Haeberl' in red on upper flyleaf. For Simon von Haeberl, see August Hirsch, 'Haeberl, Simon von' in: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie, 10 (1879), p. 269, and online at https://www.deutsche-biographie.de/gnd116358335.html#adbcontent; CERL Provenance database at https://thesaurus.cerl.org/cgi-bin/record.pl?rid=cnp00590296
Marked '2462' in pencil on upper pastedown, 20th century.
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), vol.1, p. 522. Description enhanced by Laura Nuvoloni in Spring 2017 based on the compiler's own research.
P. R. Robinson in Catalogue of Dated and Datable Manuscripts, c. 888-1600, in London Libraries (London: The British Library, 2003), p. 92, no. 269, pl. 121.
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