Catalogue: Magical/Astrological Medicine

al-Manāfi‘ al-bayyinah wa-mā yaṣilu bi-al-arba‘ah al-azminah   (MS A 89, item 3)

(The Evident Benefits and What Pertains to the Four Seasons)

المنافع البينة وما يصل بالاربعة الازمنة

Anonymous

An anonymous general medical treatise emphasizing magical medicine, extracted from a number of authors. The following authorities are listed on p. 258 (lines 6-8) as sources: Dakiyus (Dioscorides?), Jalinus (Galen), al-Iskandar (Alexander the Great), Hirmīs (Hermes Trimegistus), Aflatun (Plato), Ḥunayn ibn Isḥāq, al-Tabari, Ibn Zakarīyā’ [sic] al-Rāzī (Rhazes), al-Mansurī [sic], Ibn Wāfid, and Ibn al-Nafīs.

A heading on p. 257, line 2, describes this work as Kitāb fī al-tibb mimma jama‘ahu Jalinus (Book on Medicine that summarizes Galen); however, this work cannot be attributed to Galen, as it cites sources of the 13th century A.D. It is not related to the Arabic version of Galen's De usu partium, as Claudius F. Mayer suggested (see C. F. Mayer, "The Collection of Arabic Medical Literature in the Army Medical Library", Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 1942, vol. 2, p. 210).

No other copy has been identified.

Physical Description

Arabic. 34 pages (Pages 257-290). Dimensions 21.5 x 14.5 (text area 13.5 x 8) cm; 22 lines per page. The title is given on p. 258, line 8. No author is given. A heading on p. 257, line 2, describes this work as Kitīb fī al-tibb mimma jama‘ahu Jalinus (Book on Medicine that Summarizes Galen); however, this work cannot be attributed to Galen, as it cites sources of the 13th century A.D.

The copy is dated in the colophon (p. 290) where it is said that the unnamed copyist completed it in 1197 (= 1782-3). The same copyist appears to have transcribed the three main items in the volume.

A complete copy. The text is written in a North African (Maghribi) script using black ink with headings in red. The text area has been frame-ruled. There are catchwords. Possibly the same hand is found in all three main items in the manuscript.

There is rather extensive marginalia. The volume has been paginated rather than foliated, with the pages numbered every other page beginning with item 1.

The coarse ivory paper has vertical laid lines single chain lines, and watermarks (three large lunar crescents). The paper is lightly soiled with thumbing and worm-eaten. The edges has been trimmed from their original size to fit the binding. The same paper was used for all three main items in the volume.

The volume consists of 293 pages and 13 preliminary pages (Preliminary pages [6-7] and [12-13] are blank; numbered pages 182-184, 256, 272, 291, and 293 are blank). Item 1 (pp. 1-181) contains a treatise on sexual hygiene, al-Rawḍ al-yāni‘ fī aḥkām al-tazwīj wa-ādāb al-majāmi‘, by al-Tamakrūtī (MS A 89, item 1), and item 2 (pp. 185-255) is Kitāb al-Īḍāḥ fīi asrār al-nikīḥ by al-Shayzarī (MS A 89, item 2). The 3rd item (pp. 257-290) is the anonymous general treatise on magical medicine, al-Manāfi‘ al-bayyinah wa-mā yaṣilu bi-al-arba‘ah al-azminah here catalogued. Preliminary pp. [1-5] contain anonymous magical procedures and invocations useful for illness, dated 1198 [= 1783-1784] (and fols. 46a-59b an anonymous medical manual (MS A 89, item[a]); preliminary pp. [9-11] consist of an unidentified alchemical fragment (MS A 89, item [b]). Page 292 contains a protective invocation. Preliminary p. [7] is blank except for a two-line casual note.

Binding

The volume is bound in green/black marbled paper over red leather over pasteboard front and back covers and envelope flap. There is a red leather spine and doublures of yellow/blue/green/red printed paper. There are plain paper endpapers.

Provenance

The volume was purchased in 1941 by the Army Medical Library from A. S. Yahuda (ELS 2366; Med. 372?) who acquired it in Tangier, Morocco.

References

Schullian/Sommer, Cat. of Incun. & MSS.,pp. 327-8, entry A89, where it is said to be 'based chiefly on Galen'.

NLM Microfilm Reel: FILM 48-129 no. 6