SC - Earliest cookbooks (was: Help: Scottisch ...)

[Thomas Gloning]

<< The earliest European manuscript cookbook, so far as I know, is
Apicius, which predates Platina, believed to be the first printed
cookbook, by a thousand years or so. >> (David/Cariadoc)

There is some dispute as to whether the work of Platina or the
"Küchenmeisterei" is the "first printed cookbook". To be sure, it is
only a matter or words ("what are the conditions for calling something a
cookbook?"). Personally, I don't care much about priority, but the
question has some consequence for Apicius ...

The question is, whether or not the work of Platina is a cookbook. Those
of you who have read or flipped through the book, would perhaps be
inclined to say that it is a dietetic work that _contains_ a very large
section with cookery recipes (that come from Martino) together with
passages on other dietetic matters (nature of food stuffs without
recipes, notes on sexuality, wake and sleep, exercise, etc.).

In case [A] you are inclined to call this dietetic work with a large
section of cookery recipes a cookbook, the first printed cookbook is
indeed the work of Platina, otherwise [B] it would be the
"Küchenmeisterei" (1485).

In case you prefer option [A] the first European manuscript cookbook
would not be Apicius, but could be something like Cato's 'De agri
cultura': an agricultural treatise that _contains_ a section with
cookery recipes.

Thomas
(The earliest cookery recipes, I know of, are those in the Yale
Babylonian collection, ca. 1700 B.C.; edited by Jean Bottéro).