Gonville and Caius College : Johannes de Sancto Paulo, Liber virtutem medicinarum simplicium and other medical texts
Gonville and Caius College
<p style='text-align: justify;'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius MS 379/599 is a composite medical volume comprised of several roughly coeval parts copied by different scribes. The volume contains several medical treatises popular in western Europe in the 12th-14th centuries including the text known as the <i>Compendium Salerni</i>, works by Johannes de Sancto Paulo and Matthaeus Platearius on the healing properties of simples (i.e., remedies prepared with a single primary healing ingredient), and a text attributed to Petrus Hispanus on conditions affecting the eyes. There are also lesser-known texts in the manuscript, such as a compilation of medicines ascribed in the rubric to 'Magister Pontius de Sancto Egido', and a wide variety of other shorter, anonymous texts and remedies or charms to treat such ailments as leprosy, sores, or constipation. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>The composite parts were probably all copied in England during the 13th century (although dates in the late 12th century or the early 14th century are possible). The date when all of the composite parts were united is unknown, but the composite parts have coexisted in this form since the late-15th or early-16th century as the volume still retains its late-15th or early-16th century binding, and there is a list of the contents of the volume on the <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(2);return false;'>front pastedown</a> in a late-15th or early-16th century hand which refers to texts which appear across the composite sections of the volume. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>Although not entirely intact as it has been <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(395);return false;'>rebacked</a> in more recent times, the binding is an excellent example of late-15th or early-16th century decorative binding work. The binder used small tools and a panel stamp to impress floral, foliate, and animal motifs within geometric frames in a style particularly popular in Flanders and then England in the late-15th and early-16th centuries. On the <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(394);return false;'>rear cover</a> of the volume there is a medieval label known as a 'fenestra' (Latin for 'window'); fenestras were made from a strip of parchment with a title written in ink (in this case "Cure magistri poncii"), protected by a layer of animal horn shaved thin enough to be transparent (the glazing in the window), and then held in place on a cover with small metal tacks hammered into the board. Complete medieval fenestras are relatively rare as they often had slightly rough or raised edges that would catch on things and tear away leaving only the holes for the tacks behind as evidence of their former presence on a binding. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'>This manuscript, like many others included in the Curious Cures in Cambridge Libraries project was once owned or used by Roger Marchall (c. 1417-1477), a doctor and physician to Edward IV. Marchall may have added the draft table of contents at the beginning of the manuscript on the <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(2);return false;'>front pastedown</a>, which has now largely been cropped away. Marchall is certainly responsible for the gloss to the <i>Curae Magistri Poncii de S. Egidio</i> on ff. <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(229);return false;'>114r-140r</a> and he also added a title 'Gerardi' in the upper margin of the opening leaf of the <i>Modus medendi Gerardi</i> on f. <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(335);return false;'>167r</a>. Marchall may also have written the label in the fenestra on the <a href='' onclick='store.loadPage(394);return false;'>rear cover</a>; he was certainly particularly interested in the text as it is the only one in the volume to which he added substantial annotations, but as the binding probsbly post-dates Marchall's lifetime on stylistic grounds, if the fenestra-label is indeed in Marchall's hand, then it was presumably transferred from an earlier binding. Marchall's ownership or use of manuscripts is very well-attested, with forty-five surviving books (including this one) bearing evidence to connect him to them in some way; six others may have been his or accessed by him, and a further twelve are recorded but not traced. Marchall is known to have gathered together and (re-)arranged manuscripts and the 4-part composite construction of this manuscript (not including the pastedown fragments), suggests that this may be another manuscript that Marchall curated into its current form. </p><p style='text-align: justify;'> As described by Linda Voigts, the present manuscript is one of eighteen (possibly nineteen) manuscripts at Gonville and Caius College that may be linked to Marchall, and which were probably donated by him to Gonville Hall (as Gonville and Caius then was); King's College and Peterhouse, where the study of medicine was also supported, received gifts of books from him too. Thirteen manuscripts owned or used by Marchall (and another with possible Marchall connections) have been digitised, catalogued and conserved as part of the <a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/collections/medievalmedicalrecipes'><i>Curious Cures in Cambridge Libraries</i></a> project: <ul><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-GONVILLE-AND-CAIUS-00059-00153/1'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College, MS 59/153</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 2) </li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-GONVILLE-AND-CAIUS-00098-00050/1'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College, MS 98/50</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 4) </li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-GONVILLE-AND-CAIUS-00105-00057/1'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College, MS 105/57</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 5)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-GONVILLE-AND-CAIUS-00159-00209/1'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College, MS 159/209</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 9)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-GONVILLE-AND-CAIUS-00178-00211/1'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College, MS 178/211</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 10)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-GONVILLE-AND-CAIUS-00181-00214/1'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College, MS 181/214</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 11)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-GONVILLE-AND-CAIUS-00345-00620/1'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College, MS 345/620</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 12)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-GONVILLE-AND-CAIUS-00373-00593/1'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College, MS 373/593</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 13)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-GONVILLE-AND-CAIUS-00379-00599/1'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College, MS 379/599</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 14)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-GONVILLE-AND-CAIUS-00401-00623/1'>Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College, MS 401/623</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 16)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-PETERHOUSE-00095/1'>Cambridge, Peterhouse, MS 95</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 24)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-PETERHOUSE-00222/1'>Cambridge, Peterhouse, MS 222</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 28)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://mss-cat.trin.cam.ac.uk/Manuscript/O.8.31'>Cambridge, Trinity College, MS O.8.31</a> (Voigts 1995, no. 29)</li><li><a target='_blank' class='externalLink' href='https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-ADD-09213/1'>Cambridge, University Library, MS Add. 9213</a> (possible Marchall connections) (Voigts 1995, no. 48)</li></ul></p><p style='text-align: justify;'>Dr Sarah Gilbert<br /> Project Cataloguer, Curious Cures in Cambridge Libraries<br /> Cambridge University Library</p><p style='text-align: justify;'>Dr James Freeman<br /> Medieval Manuscripts Specialist<br /> Cambridge University Library</p><p style='text-align: justify;'><b>References</b>: <div style='list-style-type: disc;'><div style='display: list-item; margin-left: 20px;'>See L. Voigts, 'A doctor and his books: the manuscripts of Roger Marchall (d. 1477)', in R. Beadle and A. J. Piper (eds.), <i>New science out of old books: studies in manuscripts and early printed books in honour of A.I. Doyle</i> (Aldershot, 1995) pp. 249-314</div></div><br /></p>
