Mellon MS 37

JOHN OF RUPESCISSA
 De consideratione quinte essentie, anonymously translated
into English and slightly abbreviated, with some short
recipes in English
 England, perhaps Bury Saint Edmunds, unsigned, about 1556

Paper codex in English with brief passages in Latin, 4to., 212 x 150, ff. 48
correctly foliated in a seventeenth-century hand; f. 21 is numbered but blank
and ff. 22-24 are unnumbered and blank though counted in the foliation.
Written throughout by a single hand in a good, late English gothic cursive
with italic elements, sloping slightly to the right, and with a few standard
abbreviations, in single column 155 x 98, 21-24 lines to the page, bordered
and ruled in blind. Signatures throughout on the first 4 ff. of each quire,
catchwords often but not always at page-endings. No color, no illustrations.
Collation: 1-68. Paper with watermark of a gloved hand with five-pointed star
protruding on stem from tip of third finger, initials "FO" on back of hand,
and fleur-de-lys on cuff of glove, most clearly visible on ff. 22 and 24,
most similar to Briquet 11341 and following, 11377 (datable not after 1559)
having the same initials, though not the lily.

BINDING: Bound originally in a fourteenth-century English binding of
sheepskin or deerskin over shaped wooden boards with somewhat later rebacking
of similar material, from the Franciscan convent of Babwell outside the North
gate of Bury Saint Edmunds, single thong strap and metal stake missing from
covers, modern leather title label. Pressmarks "12" and "24" on slips of
paper glued to backstrip. Original parchment pastedown and flyleaf at
beginning, pastedown only at end.

PROVENANCE: Belonged to or read by Wylliam Browne, 1567, with his very finely
written calligraphic inscription on the verso of f. 48; slightly annotated by
an unidentified English hand of the early seventeenth century; J. Cobbe,
eighteenth century, who supplied a small slip of paper with a brief index of
contents, glued to the second flyleaf, recto; Numbers "12" and "24,"
pressmarks from an old library, written on paper labels glued to backstrip of
binding; Denis Duveen, with his inked number 67, acquired from Herbert
Reichner (bookseller), New York; Mellon MS 117, acquired with the Duveen
collection. De Ricci-Bond 28 (117).

CONTENTS

Front parchment pastedown, verso: [Blank except for Duveen number "67" at
upper left corner.]

First parchment flyleaf, recto: [In a fourteenth-century English court hand:]
De Conventu fratrum minorum Babewallie Ex dono fratris Archi [baldi?] | de
Hepworth - | [in another, perhaps fifteenth- century gothic cursive hand:]
Almanak [superscript insertion:] perfacti iudei [? then, continuing on the
line:] de motu omnium planetarum | [The almanac or table which seems to be
called for here is absent, but the matter written on the final pastedown,
q.v., may relate to this entry.]

First flyleaf; verso: [Headline in the hand ofthe main text or a very similar
one:] powder soluteyf [sic for "salutifer"?] | Recipe in somer whyt flowers
of elder as moch as ye wyll | ... [line 7:] for the ston or for the
stranguryon | Recipe a hand full of Rehyn wede and of fresse buter the
quantite | of a note ...

Second parchment flyleaf; recto: [In a good early seventeenth-century English
italic hand:] The Contents | A Briefe of the Booke of | Quintessence written
by John | de Rupe-Scissa; and divided | into 2 Bookes fol. 1. | 2. the
confection of Aqua Mirabi- | lis fol 47.1 [Glued to this page is a slip of
paper, ca. 80 X 15, apparently torn from the address leaf of a letter, as
part of a name written large appears on the verso, written in an
eighteenth-century English hand, reading:] Chemica | John de Rupe scissa | on
the quintessence | abridged. Eng [lish] - 1 | 2. the confection of | aqua
mirabilis 47 | 1556 | J Cobbe | [verso blank.]

Third parchment flyleaf recto: [In the seventeenth-century hand as a
headline:] The contents ofthe Booke | [beginning line 1, written in two
columns, a table of chapter headings of the abbreviated Rupescissa,
beginning:] The tavell of the fyrst boke | the ferst chator [sic] ys the
prolog- | ge of the quintessens | ... [Ends column 2, line 28:] the .21. c.
ageyne the fever an the | crampe | [verso blank.]

f. 1r, headline: Johannem de Rupescissa [sic] f. 1r, 1: Her folow a brefe
takyn of the boke of quintessensy | of all thyngs that byn changyd fro one
kynd | to anothyr kynd...

f. 1r, 14: [In left margin:] capitulum. 1. [then, from beginning of the
line:] Thys ys the thyng that all men seke for a thyng I mad that ys
profytabyll to the use of man ...

f. 20r, 19: salte ys mad or preparat to the wsce [sic for "use"] of medycyne
| [The last line is blank, as are the verso of f. 20 and ff. 21-24, to allow
for the insertion of missing text which was never supplied.]

f. 25r, headline: [In the seventeenth-century hand:] Generall medicines. |
[in the hand of the copyist:] In the name of our lord Jhesu cryste her be- |
gynnyth the second boke the whych ys clepyed the | boke of generall medysyns.
In curynng and helpynng | of all mann men [sic, the last two words doubtless
a misreading for "manner" on the part of the copyist] of infyrmyteis ...

f. 45v, 16: quintessens or aqua ardent in his absens. Deo gracias | [one-line
space] Explicit tractatus de consideratione .Ste. cenncie [sic] | secundum
magistrem Johannem de Rupescissa. 1556. [In the margin below written on nine
lines in smaller writing by the scribe is a quotation from an unidentified
work ascribed by the copyist to Lull, beginning:] In cura autem unius gutte
summe vomitatis dens creavit nostram quintan essentiam [garbled?] | et
quintam essentiam sanguinis humani quelibet enim per se ... [Ends line 9:]
tempus vel dies curat ipsum patientem. RAIMUNDI LULII |
 [John of Rupescissa, De consideratione quinte essentie, anonymously
translated into English and abbreviated; the version is most like that
recorded by DWS 292.xxxviii, but Mrs. Singer does not mention abbreviation.
Occurring as marginal insertions by the copyist on ff. 30r, 37r, 44v, and 45v
(the last partially transcribed above) are short passages in Latin all
attributed to Ramon Lull, but not otherwise identified.]

f. 46: [Blank ]

f. 47r, headline: [In the seventeenth-century hand:] Aqua mirabilis | [line
1, in the hand of the copyist:] Take aqua vite distyllyd of the best Redde
wyne to the summe | of .14. pounds and putt yt in .2. potts well glasyd ...
[The very long recipe contains a lengthy list of spices and herbs to be
included, and closes with an extended list of the illnesses the medicine will
cure, ending f. 48r, line 4:] ... It restraynyth laxe- | nes of the wombe. It
helpyth lipur. palsies. dropcyes | It makyth olde men mery and many other
affects | the which is in the usyng of yt | [remainder of f. 48r blank.]
 [Unidentified recipe for Aqua mirabilis.]

f. 48v, top margin: [In pencil, modern hand:] S. 3-36 [possibly indicating
"Sotheby's, March 1936"? Then, below, at position of line 1, very finely
written over a flourish in a calligraphic English hand in very dark brown
ink:] Wylliam Browne 1567 | [remainder of the page blank.]

Lower parchment pastedown: [Partly faded but mostly legible table of the
apparent motion of planets, eleven lines, perhaps related to the inscription
on the first flyleaf, not transcribed. Remainder blank.]

SUMMARY: The pervasiveness of John of Rupescissa's work on the Fifth Essence
and its importance to European readers from the later fourteenth until well
into the sixteenth century, and especially in the fifteenth, is amply
documcnted by the large number of extant manuscripts. The text has already
been noted in nine other manuscripts in the Mellon collection, in Latin in
MSS 9.29, 11.1, 14.1, 21.1, 24.7, 26.1, and 32.7, and twice in differing
German translations in MSS 16 and 30.5, mostly of fifteenth-century date. The
somewhat abbreviated English version found in MS 37 is rare and apparently
unpublished. Both the writing, which is clear and practiced throughout if not
very elegant, and the paper support the date of 1556 at the end; and the
beautiful inscription of Wylliam Browne, dated 1567, provides a further
terminus. The most curious feature of the codex is its binding, a
fourteenth-century English cover, which cannot be a modern recasing as the
original scribe of the codex, or a strict contemporary writing a virtually
identical hand, has written recipes on the first flyleaf, verso, a parchment
leaf conjugate to the front pastedown. The most likely explanation lies in
the history of the Franciscan convent which was established at Bury Saint
Edmunds in 1257 despite opposition from the great abbey there. After periods
of friction and comparatively peaceful coexistence, the friars rebuilt their
house at Babwell, outside the north gate of the town, and there were about
forty friars there in 1300. In 1538 the warden of the convent "was reported
to have spoken treasonably, but to have apologized, and he surrendered in
December to the bishop of Dover," after which the house ceased to exist (see
Knowles and Hadcock, Medieval Religious Houses, England and Wales, revised
edition, London, 1971, pp. 222, 224). Not many years after the closing of the
Franciscan convent of Babwell, the fourteenth-century covers of one of its
manuscripts, still with the convent's ownership inscription, were used to
jacket the present copy of Rupescissa in English; the fate of the original
contents, perhaps an almanac or perpetual calendar, is unknown. It is
possible that MS 37 was written in the vicinity of Bury Saint
Edmunds.