Royal MS 16 F VIII

1. 'LE REGIME DE SANTÉ': a treatise on health, in French, in four parts. The first part treats of 'fisique', the second 'de garder chascun membre du corps par soy', the third 'de toutes choses qui conuient vser a lomme pour soy tenir en bonne sante', and the fourth 'de fisonomie'. With introductions and tables of chapters to Parts i-iii. Prologue beg. 'Dieu qui par sa grant puissance tout le monde crea'; introduction to Part i, 'Et pour ce que nous auons dit cydessus que nous voullons aucune chose traictier de fisique'. Colophon (f. 175), 'Cy fine ce present liure nomme le regime de sante, extrait des liures de souueraine phisique par les souuerains docteurs medecins et philosophes pour entretenir lomme en naturelle prosperite'. Other copies of French treatises with this title are in 19 B. X, 20 B. IX, Sloane MSS. 2401, 2435, 2806, 2986, 3525, and Add. MS. 8863. Of these Sloane MS. 2435 (13th cent.) has the incipit 'Chi comence li liures pour la sante garder . . . ke maistre Aldebrandius de Scienne fist por Benoit de Florenche', while other MSS. say that Alebrans de Florence made it for Beatrice of Savoy in 1256, or that it was translated from the Latin for Blanche, mother of S. Louis, or that it was translated from the Greek into Latin and thence into French in 1223 by Halebrandis de Seenne for the Emperor Frederic II. The author of the original work has sometimes been assumed to be Richard de Fournival, Chancellor of Amiens (d. circ. 1260), from the incipit to Sloane MS. 2806 (late 14th cent.), which runs: '[Ci] comence la medicine Maistre Richart de Forniual, qui aprent et renseigne a chascun comment on doit le cors maintenir en sante', &c.; but the attribution is rejected by Paul Meyer in Atti del Congresso Internazionale di Scienze Storiche (Roma, 1903), iv, p. 80, cf. Bulletin de la Soc. des Anciens Textes français, 1904, p. 39. Aldobrandinus of Florence or Sienna may or may not be the same as the Italian poet Aldobrandino da Siena. f. 1.

2. 'Comment la face saint Jehan baptiste fu aporte de Constantinoble en la cite d'Amiens': a translation of the Latin narrative, attributed to Richard de Gerberoy, Bishop of Amiens (1205-1212), and printed in Acta Sanctorum, June, tom. v, p. 639, and by Riant, Exuviae Sacrae Constantinopolitanae, Geneva, 1877, i, p. 35, of the discovery by Walo of Sarton, a canon of Picquigny, and afterwards of S. George's church [ ] at Constantinople, of relics at the back of the altar there, how he gave the head of S. George to Marestmontiers [near Montdidier, Somme], the arm of S. George to Picquigny, the finger of S. George to Sarton, and the face of S. John Baptist to Amiens. Beg. 'Lomme (sic, for Comme) il soit chose conuenable de descripre et signifier la maniere comment la glorieuse face de monseigneur saint Iehan Baptiste fut translatee et apportee en France'; ends 'Et fut faite ceste translacion a leglise damiens le xviie iour de decembre l'an mil deux cens et six. Ce ottroya dieu auquel soit gloire', &c. f. 176.

Vellum; ff. 152. 14¹/₂ in. x 10 in. Late XV cent. Double columns. Sec. fol. '-mens sicomme'. Executed in Flanders. Initials in gold and colours. On f. 1 is a half-page miniature representing a doctor lecturing and patients waiting. In the lower margin of the border are inserted the arms of Charles Somerset, Earl of Worcester (K.G. 1496), enclosed in a Garter, the whole on a ribbon of sixteen stripes, altemately red and blue. The same scribe and artist probably executed 20 B. IX, which contains both these treatises, and possibly also 19 B. X, in which Le Régime de Santé is followed by a different work. Old Royal press-mark 'no. 1299'; cat. of 1666, f. 15; not in CMA.