Libro de los medicamentos simples
By: Mateo Plateario
Publisher: M. Moleiro Editor, S.A.
Published: 2000
Place of publication: Barcelona
Language: fre
Translated from: lat
Number of pages: 340
ISBN-13: 9788488526670; 9788488526687; 9788488526694
Subjects: Herbals; Early works to 1800; Medical Botany; Medicinal plants; Vegetable Materia medica; Materia medica; Medieval Medicine; French Illumination of books and manuscripts; Medieval Illumination of books and manuscripts; French Manuscripts; Facsimiles; Medicinal Plants; Herbal Medicine; Manuscrits; Fac-similés; Phytothérapie; Plantes médicinales; Médecine médiévale; Rossiĭskai︠a︡ nat︠s︡ionalʹnai︠a︡ biblioteka
Other titles: Livre des simples médecines; Book of simple medicines
Work titles: De simplici medicina
Description: "Livre des simples médecines (The book of simple medicines) of the Russian National Library, St Petersburg, is a remarkable codex not only because of its outstandingly beautiful illustrations but also because it is the culmination of European medieval knowledge of the animal, vegetable and mineral substances used to cure or relieve disease. This knowledge originated in classical antiquity. The books on medicine in Greek of that period were recuperated in Europe by means of indirect Latin translations from Arabic with the addition of remedies from the Islamic world. These translations were begun in the 11th century, initially in the city of Salerno. Working on such translations in the mid 12th century was Matthaeus Platearius, the physician to whom De medicinis simplicibus (“On simple medicines”), the most important and influential Salernitan compendium on this subject, was attributed. The codex housed in St Petersburg was produced in France in the late 15th century for Count Charles of Angoulême and his wife Louise of Savoy. It consists of 220 pages divided into five parts: herbs and flowers, trees and their gums and resins, metals and minerals, animal products and other matters. It is followed by a splendid, 116-page atlas with 386 figures. The core of the text is the French translation of the compendium attributed to Matthaeus Platearius, with the addition of chapters from works of the following three centuries, a period when the knowledge of medicinal substances increased, based on the translations produced mainly in Toledo

The atlas is similar in certain respects for its author – in all likelihood the great artist Robinet Testard – gathered together medieval illustrations of a diagrammatic nature or bearing no resemblance to reality with other realistic illustrations belonging to the Renaissance “back to nature” movement. Most of them depict medicinal plants and, to a lesser extent, curative animal or mineral products, although some scenes portray people gathering them. Examples of such scenes are found in the figure entitled “Aloe”, which does not refer to the aloes that bitter aloes are obtained from but to lignaloes, i.e. wood saturated in agalloch resin, often substituted in that period by aloe resin. The other three depict gold, alum and antimonite being collected (antimonite was used at that time as a desiccative medicine). Another interesting feature of this codex is the annotations, like those to be seen on these two pages, by two physicians who handled the codex in the 16th century. They were both of a clearly Renaissance outlook and had editions in Greek and direct Latin translations of books on medicine from classical antiquity. They consequently deemed the original terms of the codex to be "barbaric" and added others in Greek and Latin, sometimes together with comments."--
Notes: Full-color facsimile of an unfinished French manuscript, produced between 1487 and 1496 for Charles of Angoulême, with illuminations by Robinet Testard. Manuscript is preserved at the Russian National Library in St. Petersburg under the shelfmark Fr. F. VI,1.

Issued with commentary: Le livre des simples médecines.

Full-color commentary volume (432 p.), by José María López Piñero (†) (López Piñero Institute for the History of Medicine and Science, Universidad de Valencia – Spanish National Research Council), Natacha Elaguina (Head curator of the western manuscripts of the National Library of Russia) and Carlos Miranda (Doctor in History).

Facsimile has illuminated initials in red and blue; text in 2 columns per leaf; bound in leather covered boards with gilt decoration; gilt page edges.

Facsimile text in 2 columns per page; every other page numbered.

Title from sheet pasted on p. [3] of facsimile cover.

Author's name appears only on spine of case.

Facsimile edition limited to 987 copies--Cf. p. [3] of facsimile volume cover.

Facsimle issued in case.

Includes bibliographical references (Commentary volume, p. 418-427).

Manuscript in French; commentary in Spanish and English, with Spanish transciption of manuscript text.

Lib. facsimile copy is number 342 of 987.
Table of contents: title: Commentary volume contents. El códice Le livre des simples médecines, de la Biblioteca Nacional de Rusia = Le livre des simples médecines, codex of the National Library of Russia / José María López Piñero; title: Estudio codicológico = Codicological study / Natacha Elaguina; title: Las ilustraciones del Livre des simples médecines de la Biblioteca Nacional de Rusia = The illustrations in the Livre des simples médecines of the National Library of Russia / Carlos Miranda García; title: Le livre des simples médecines, traduccción anotada / María Luz López Terrada.