Mellon MS 20

 ALCHEMICAL COMPILATION, in Latin, with later additions in Latin
 and German
 Low Countries, unsigned, about 1490, with additions, about 1790

Paper codex, 8vo., 140 x 104, originally f. 150, of which 146 remain, plus 7
ff. inserted; the first and one other f. are pasted down at the beginning, 4
ff. lacking from the first quire, the last f. of the last quire pasted down;
the leaves not pasted down partly and correctly foliated in an old hand,
perhaps that of the writer of the codex, 5-6, 9-132, the remaining ff.
numbered 133-149 in modern pencil, the final pastedown unnumbered; ff. 1 and
? (one other at beginning), 5-6, 14, 19-20, 29-32, 42-46, 52, 56-58, 84,
134-150 (the first two and the last pasted down), all originally blank, but
f. 84 and many ff. after f. 133 later used for further entries by another
hand or hands; the inserted ff., all of which are smaller than the leaves of
the codex, occur singly after ff. 9, 35, 36, 48, 49, 70, and 94; no
catchwords, no signatures. In the following collation the seven inserted
slips are indicated within brackets after the number of leaves in the quires
in which they occur; in the text of the dcscription they are referred to as
f. 9-bis, f. 35-bis, etc. Collation: (1)^^8-4?, (2)^^12[+1], (3)^^12,
(4)^^14[+2], (5)^^12[+2] (6)^^14[+1] (7)^^12, (8)^^14[+1], (9-11)^^12,
(12-13)^^8. Single column, 100 x 59, 20 lines to the full page of the
original part of the codex, varying in the additions; the written space
bordered by faint, single lines in plumbate, the lines for writing ruled in
blind; no pinholes. The original part of the codex written throughout in a
very fine, neat, and clear humanistic hand, with heavy standard abbreviation,
and using a considerable range of alchemical symbols; the later additions
consist of Latin sections written in a neat italic and German passages in
flowing cursive, perhaps both by a single hand of the eighteenth century.
Inks in the original section brown to almost black, the later portions in
light to dark brown. Headings of procedures in red and blue alternating in
the original section, and with some capitals stroked red; no color in the
additions. No ornament. Virtually no correction. Frequent marginalia by the
original writer. Paper (except perhaps the inserted leaves) with watermark of
outstretched hand, the fingerjoints indicated, a four-leafed petal extending
from the tip of the third finger, the wrist and cuff of a sleeve also
depicted, comparable to Briquet 11423, noted in towns of northern France and
the Low Countries in the period 1493-1501, at Utrecht in 1493. (See Briquet's
notes on the group of papers 11,417 to 11,435, p. 575.)

BINDING: Probably original binding of stiff parchment over paper boards,
flaps over the fore-edge, probably dating from about 1525, conceivably later,
as the manuscript contents do not appear to have been bound at the time of
writing in any case; flat spine with modern inscription in brown ink,
"Alchemical | Recipes," original blue edges.

PROVENANCE: The unidentified compiler of the volume, who certainly wrote it
for his own use, as the text makes clear; an unidentified German owner in the
late eighteenth century; the second leaf pasted down at the beginning of the
codex may contain an ownership inscription on its concealed recto side, part
of the bleed from which is visible on the exposed verso; Denis Duveen, with
his inked number 42; Mellon MS 21, acquired with the Duveen collection.

CONTENTS

ff. 1r-4v: [Lacking. Foliation begins with f. 5, but f. 4 may be pasted down
inside front cover.]

ff. 5r-6v: [Blank except for foliation.]

f. 5r, 1: Ad tingendum [Lead] colore [of Gold] | Recipe x p x c [?] calcis
vive... [Ends f. 9v, 9:] fundum calx nigra quam liquefac et est [Gold]
perfectum. |

f. 9v, 10: Ad inaurandum [Lead] vel [Tin] | Recipe de altero eorum frustum...
[f. 9v, 18:] ... Et si | non sit satis pro una vice iteretur bis vel ter. |

f. 9-bis: [An inserted slip of paper, 72 X 100, containing closely written
additional brief procedures on recto and verso. On the verso, beginning line
4, are the following entries:] Pe. [Petrus?] dixit quod ex 5 libris [of Tin]
positis in potto iacente... [line 6:] Dicit helias quod [Lead] in balneo vel
in fimo positum dissolvitur in aquam per se. | Doctor polonus dixit Pone
rotulos [of Lead] in filo ferreo sic ut unus non tangat | alium...
 [These individuals are unidentified, but "Pe." is probably to be read as
"Petrus" and may be the "Petrus de delft" cited on f. 49-bis, and "helias"
may be "helias de ordine beati francisci" cited on f. 48-bis, while the
"Doctor polonus" seemingly does not recur.]

f. 10r, 1: Opus nobile de anima seu aqua [of Lead] | Recipe laminas [of Lead]
mundas et pone eas in cu- | curbita... [f. 11r, 9:] Et nota quod aqua quam
super vocavi animam [of Lead] | vocatur etiam aqua [of Lead] . Et potest
fieri de | [Tin] eodem modo ut de [Lead] ù | [Further related procedures
follow. Ends f. 11v, 15:] et tunc ponatur super furnellum ad fixandum | Vide
de hoc latius inter fixationes cinobrij. | [The fixations of Mercury are
found on ff. 53-55 On f. 11r, 15 is the mention:] ... hoc | dicit sanctus
thomas in florido suo. | [The text continues with processes involving tin
through f. 13r, 13, while the remainder of ff. 13-14 are blank; beginning of
f. 15r are recipes for the softening of iron and other metals; f. 16v is
blank, followed by hardening procedures. On f. 17v a procedure by "Quidam
alius in traiecto" and another by "Quidam monachus de anglia" are mentioned.
Various treatments of metals including rubification and albification follow.
On the inserted slip f. 35-bis is a note:] H. de traiecto mose [sic] dixit
mihi quod arsenicum cru- | dum misit pulverizatum ... [An "albificatio"
written on f. 36r cites Joannes du bois as its author; on the inserted slip
f. 36-bis is a recipe including the mention, "Magister Joannes de herr sic
dissolvit (Tin) ..."; on f. 37r is a passage canceled by dotting beneath the
lines which attributes another albification to Joannes du bois, and still
another similar recipe is attributed to Magister Johannes Borchle on f. 38r;
ff. 41v-46v are blank. On f. 47r begins a series of twelve "Congelationes
Mercurii," one of them on f. 47v with the mention that:] Magister nicolas
dixit mihi pro | magno secreto quod [Mercury] amalgamatus cum [Silver] con- |
gelatur et fixatur cum predicta medicina. | [On f. 48-bis is a recipe ending
with what appears to be the name of the source, "Ruychroc"; this, however,
has been canceled with the note at the end in darker ink, "Mendacium est
bertrandus probavit." On the inserted slip f. 49-bis two procedures are
attributed to Petrus de delft and Dominus de barbenson. A great many recipes,
nearly all of them metallurgical, follow. In a section on Oils of Silver on
f. 79v is a repetition of the recipe supplied to the compiler by Magister
Nicolas written earlier on f. 47v. On f. 75v is a marginal recipe for another
Oil of Silver with a note of the source, "Ex antiquario iudoci"; the same
source may have been indicated on f. 35-bis in an incomplete note which seems
to read "ex antiquo [?] libro iudoci," so that it is uncertain whether
Iudocus was an antiquarian or the possessor of an old book. A long series of
fixations begins on f. 80r, ending on f. 98r, 10:] ... et erit probatum in
omni | examine. Antonius van der kandt | [It is uncertain whether Antonius
was the author of the whole section or, what is perhaps more likely, only the
last procedure in the group. Beginning on f. 99r is a collection of sixteen
procedures involving transmutation into silver and gold and for making the
philosophers' stone. Frequent changes of ink and stylus, soiling of the
paper, and slight damage to edges and corners, as noted in the Summary below,
suggest that this quire was kept unbound over a more or less long period of
time, and that different recipes were entered into it as attempted in the
laboratory. Most are long and very complex, and all are anonymous, although
Nicolaus of Cues is mentioned on f. 129v. Ends f. 133r, 11:] ... tunc eius
partem unam | super mille partes metallorum imperfectorum. | [The remainder
of the writing in the codex is by eighteenth-century German hands, probably
one individual, writing a German cursive for the passages in German and an
italic for Latin passages . On ff. 133v-136v this hand has supplied an index
of contents to the volume; f. 137 is blank, as are ff. 143 and 146-148. The
remaining leaves have a collection of recipes in German and Latin for
preparing sealing, caulking, and adhesive compounds, suitable for stopping or
repairing objects made of glass, clay, and stone; another group contains
smelting and refining procedures, with this note on f. 145v:] Anno 1650 wart
in Brabant ein minie gefunden die | wart also geprobiert ... [A few recipes
for making analytical substances, here called "Cement," and for lead glass
follow, with modern pencil notes on f. 150r listing names which occur in the
manuscript, the verso pasted down.]
 [Anonymous, Alchemical compilation, in Latin, with later additions in Latin
and German, apparrently the holograph of the original compiler, not
identified.]

SUMMARY: Though the whole of the manuscript has suffered some marginal
water-staining since it was bound, it appears certain that other stains and
damage occurred while the separated quires, or groups of them, remained
unbound. This may be seen clearly by comparing the end of quire [11] with the
beginning of quire [12], i.e., f. 134v with f. 135r opposite it; the former
has a heavy stain and is much soiled at the bottom, while the latter shows no
sign of either. Also, f. 125 has a small marginal loss at top, the result of
a burn by fire, or perhaps by chemicals, and other leaves of this quire, the
eleventh in the codex, have sustained loss at the upper right corner not
shared by leaves in the adjoining quires. This factor, when taken in
conjunction with the nature of the contents of the original portion of the
codex, is forceful evidence for the hypothesis that MS 20 consists of the
laboratory notes of a practicing alchemist in the Low Countries at the end of
the fifteenth century. Also noteworthy is the long list of individuals, many
with typically Flemish names, and some specifically noted as from Delft, from
Utrecht (two individuals?), from Antwerp, and from Barbancon (in northern
France), including Petrus de Delft (ff. 9-bis? and 49-bis), a certain person
in Antwerp (f. 11v), a certain person in Utrecht (f. 17v), a certain monk
from England (f. 17v), Iudocus (ff. 35-bis and 75v), H----- from Utrecht (f.
35-bis), Joannes du bois (ff. 36r and 37r), Magister Joannes de herr (f.
36-bis), Magister Joannes borchle (f. 38r), Magister Nicolas (f. 47r and
79v), Ruychroc (? f. 48-bis), Bertrandus (f. 48-bis), the Lord of Barbancon
(f. 49-bis), Antonius de ruyct (f. 64v), Jacobus de gymnich (f. 67r),
Sedacina (? William Sedacerius, f. 70-bis; compare TK 982 and T III, pp.
628-629), Hans veteranus (f. 94-bis), and Antonius van der kandt (f. 98r) .
As may be seen, most of these names of specific, living persons, all
apparently practitioners in early alchemy, occur for the most part on the
inserted leaves which, though carefully enough written, have the look of
notes written on scraps of paper by contrast to the more formal (and
therefore proven?) entries, complete with colored headings, of the main body
of the codex. Note also that leaves or pages were originally left blank at
the end of every quire, plus nearly twenty blank leaves at the end, certainly
planned for subsequent additions to the book as convenient. In addition to
the unidentified names of presumably living scientists listed above, the
codex has a few references to well known authors and texts (though none of
these brief passages has been specifically identified), such as: Helias OFM,
ff. 9-bis and 48-bis; Saint Thomas (Aquinas?), "in florido suo," f. 11r;
Raimundus (Lull?), ff. 114v-115r; and Cardinal Nicolaus of Cues (1401-1464)
who, it may be noted, was partly educated by the Brothers of the Common Life
at Deventer. The contents of MS 20 are confined to laboratory procedures,
designed primarily to color metals and to carry out other operations with
various substances; a few procedures noted on the inserted leaves have been
canceled suggesting, as do marginalia modifying some procedures, and as is
clearly the case on f. 48-bis, r, where the compiler has written after a
canceled entry in darker, bolder writing, "It's a lie; Bertrand proved it,"
that the compiler was preoccupied with practical alchemy that could be
demonstrated successfully in the laboratory. One may note the compiler's
interest in careful measurements of substances employed, which are far more
specific in this manuscript than those usually seen. The codex is
particularly precious as the earliest wholly practical alchemy in the Mellon
collection, and as the product of a laboratory practitioner of a remote
period; but among the manuscripts in the collection written before 1500, MSS
2, 7, 9, and 19 also contain substantial groups of practical
procedures.