Leiden, Universiteitsbibliotheek Vossianus Lat. F. 96A Vossianus Lat. F. 96A Medicinal recipes

Abstract

156a. Leiden, Universiteitsbibliotheek

Vossianus Lat. F. 96A

Medicinal recipes

[Ker -, Gneuss -]

HISTORY: A loose fragment containing medicinal recipes, diets, and the Egyptian days. It was discovered in the 1890s by the Leiden librarian S. de Vries in MS Vossius Lat. F. 96, a combined manuscript consisting of three separate sections of historical texts, two of which originate from Fleury, the third from France, unspecified (de Meyier 1973: 210-14). This may suggest a Fleury provenance for the fragment too (Mostert 1989: 96). In 1908 the fragment was given its separate shelf mark (de Meyier 1973: 215). It has been dated by Fleuriot (1964: 18) to the late Sc, and by Schlutter (1910: 239) to the 9c; it contains some seventy integral Breton words, regarded by Fleuriot as the oldest preserved specimen of the Breton language. Stokes (1896), the first to publish the contents of the leaves, designated it as a "Celtic leechbook." Though the script is insular, the ancient Breton glosses have led Fleuriot ( 1964: 18) to suggest that the fragment originates from Landevennec in Brittany. Stuart (1979: 239-41) notes parallel texts of the "Dies egyptiaci" in manuscripts from Amiens and Laon, both of which are related to the Leiden fragment. Apart from the Celtic glosses-one of which is Irish, the rest Breton-the fragment contains OE: one gloss and one word in the text. This manuscript was not included or even mentioned by Ker, presumably because he doubted that it contained genuine evidence of Anglo-Saxon (cf. Lambert 1986: 318).