Harley MS 3

This manuscript contains the medical work of John Mirfield [Johannes de Mirfeld] (d. 1407), an ecclesiastic and medical writer, and chaplain of the hospital of St Bartholomew, Smithfield, in London. Towards the end of his life he wrote two encyclopedic works in Latin, the so-called Florarium Bartholomei, a religious treatise, and the present medical compilation probably composed between 1380 and 1395, which he entitled Breviarium Bartholomei [see f. 6r, last 2 lines]. Only two manuscripts of the Breviarium Bartholomei are known: the present manuscript and Oxford, Pembroke College, MS 2, ff. 11-342, 353-359, a contemporary illuminated copy, which also contains the only extant copy of Mirfield's glossary of medical terms or Sinonoma Bartholomei. An interpolated extract of the Signis malis febricitantium [Signs of Death], part I, dist. 6, ch. 19, is extant in London, Lambeth Palace Library, MS 444, ff. 180-182. Both the complete copies were produced in or shortly after Mirfield's lifetime. The Harley copy is the most accurate and carefully designed of the two versions, featuring an acrostic of Mirfield's prayer to St Bartholomew that can be found by spelling out the first letter of each new chapter, starting at chapter 2 (the prayer has been written out on f. 302v). The medical compilation is written in Latin, but features various Middle English translations of the Latin names of conditions, plants and animals (e.g. 'elfcake' [f. 91v], 'foxglove' [f. 113v], 'blakeberien' [f. 152v], 'bever' [f. 212r], and 'mulbere' [f. 298v]). It also contains a few English recipes (ff. 302v-303r) added by the mathematician and astrologer John Dee (b. 1527, d. 1609).

Contents:

ff. 6r-301v: John Mirfield, Breviarium Bartholomei, beginning: ‘Incipit Breviarium bartholomei / In principis huius / conpilacionis’; and ending: ‘Hic autem conpilacionis huius facio finem […] qui / est deus benedictus sublimis et gloriosus. viuens et / regnans in secula seculorum Amen / Explicit conpilacio ista que intitulata / Breviarium Bartholomei. / Sit terrae celorum rex gloria culmen honorum / Quod conpletorum; datum hic nostri meta laborum / Iustus vir vividus extat nunc equore lato / Gratia diuinitus, scriptori nomina dato’. The work comprises 15 parts (partes) relating to: [1] fevers (ff. 6v-21v); [2] illnesses of the entire body or its major parts (ff. 21v-45v); [3] head, throat and upper chest infections (ff. 45v-83v); [4] lower and inner chest infections, and arm and hand problems (ff. 83v-96r); [5] illnesses from the bust to the genital organs (ff. 96r-114r); [6] genital organ infections (ff. 114r-131r); [7] diseases from the anus to the feet (ff. 131v-136r); [8] abscesses (ff. 136r-158v); [9] wounds and surgery (ff. 158v-189); [10] bone fractures (ff. 189r-196r); [11] dislocations (ff. 196r-202r); [12] simple drugs (ff. 202r-240v); [13] composite drugs (ff. 240v-282r); [14] laxatives and purgatives (ff. 282r-289v); [15] bloodletting and health regimen (ff. 289v-301v). The partes are divided into distinctiones and subdivided into chapters.

The manuscript contains several additions:

f. 1r: A document relating to a convent at Mount St […], French, 1562.

f. 2r: A document relating to a trade agreement between England and Russia at the time of Elizabeth I, Latin, before 1603.

ff. 3r-3v, 304-304v: the first two leaves of another earlier copy of the Breviarium, bound in reverse order, with the incipit on f. 304r; written about the year 1400.

ff. 4r-5v, 302r-302v, with additions on f. 3v and f. 303r: An alphabetical index of medical subjects with page references; added by a later (15th-century) hand.

f. 302v: John Mirfield, a prayer to St. Bartholomew, beginning: 'Ora pro nobis Sancte bartholomee. ait Johannes de mirfelde ut digni efficiamur promissionibus cristi’; ending: 'per cristum dominum nostrum. Amen. Explicit'; added c. 1400. The prayer can also be recited by reading the decorated chapter initials in sequence from Pars II, dist. 1, chap. 1, to Pars IX, dist. 7, ch. 4 (ff. 21v-184v), as indicated by a note of the scribe in the lower margin of f. 21v 'Ordine prestacto si connumeres capitales. Nomen factoris demonstrabunt tibi tales' (see Hartley and Aldridge, Johannes de Mirfield (1936), pp. 40-41).

ff. 302v-303r, John Dee, recipes against worms in children and for the improvement of eye-sight; 1590, autograph, including a recipe on f. 302v, beginning: 'Against Childrens Worms / in the maue or stomache / Take the shell of a Crab'; and ending: '1590 / July 19 / at Mortlake'; and a recipe on f. 303r, beginning: 'For the Eye sygt clearing / Take Camphor'; and ending: 'and this will clear thy sygt’.

f. 303v: Latin medical terms translated into English, beginning: 'Sternutatio - yesking or Neesing'; added by a later (?) 17th-century hand (perhaps also responsible for some marginal annotations throughout the manuscript).

Decoration :

15 large puzzle initials (4-6 lines; ff. 6r, 21v, 58r distinctio secunda of part 2, 83v, 96r, 114r, 131v, 136r, 158v, 189r, 196r, 202r, 240v, 282r, 289v) in red and blue with red, purple, blue or black pen-flourishing, at the beginning of the different partes. Pars III (f. 45v) and distinctiones (throughout) marked by smaller pen-flourished initials (2-4 lines; letter I descending up to 12 lines in the margins) in blue with red flourishing. Guide-letters to initials throughout. Cadels in the top lines of pages from f. 149 onwards, a few in the shape of fish (ff. 205v-206r, 214v). Paragraph marks in red and minor initials touched in yellow. Headings in red, with guide wording in cursive script in the lower margins; running titles for parts and distinctiones in red.