[Sca-cooks] online glossary//Closet for Ladies

[johnna holloway]

Greetings from Johnnae llyn Lewis.

The recipe reproduced below from the 1636 A CLOSET FOR LADIES
AND GENTLEWOMEN, (which was posted here on Friday, 20 July 2001,
at 20:52) is remarkably similar to recipe #70 from the
manuscript identified as A BOOKE OF SWEETMEATS, pp.269-272,
published as part of Martha Washington's Booke of Cookery,
as edited by Karen Hess in 1981.

#70 is entitled "To Make A Restoratiue Marmalet."
The recipe calls for the same green ginger, citron,
oringo roots, cocks stones, red nettles, rochet, plantan seeds,
"ye back & belly of a fish called scincus marinus",
diaseterion, .... all featured in the recipe from A CLOSET FOR
LADIES AND GENTLEWOMEN. Lacking is the call for "Cantarides."

Given that A CLOSET FOR LADIES AND GENTLEWOMEN was published
as early as 1608, it is possible that the recipe #70 was copied
from that given in A CLOSET. Or it could be that both share
another common source. Hess notes that A CLOSET, 1608, and
"our manuscript contain a number of parallel still room recipes."
She did not mention the explicit connections between this recipe
#70 and the one cited in A CLOSET.

With regard to the terms:

COCKS STONES:  Hess gives these as "the testicles of a rooster."
(I do have to wonder given the early quotations under the OED
entry for gizzard.. if what is meant here are not stones found
in a gizzard of a cock...but no matter.)

ROCHET: is rocket (Eruca sativa).

SCINCUS MARINUS: is not a fish, but a lizard from the Sahara. Hess
identifies it as "scincus officinalis" used in medicine for
millennia.

DIASETERION: is diastyrion which provides the aphrodisiac Satyrion
(Orchis), known commonly as DOGS STONES, SERAPIAS STONES, and GOATS
STONES.

Sincerely,


Johnnae llyn Lewis

Johnna Holloway

--------------------from July 20, 2001----------------------------

A Closet for Ladies and Gentlewomen, 1636 - To make another sort of
Marmelade very comfortable for any Lord or Lady whatsoever.
Take of the purest greene Ginger, six drammes; of Eringo and Saterion
roots, of each an ounce and a halfe: beat these very finely, and draw
them
with a silver Spoone thorow a haire searce: take of Nut-kernels and
Almonds
blanched, of each an ounce, Cocks stones halfe an ounce, all steeped in
honey twelve houres, and then boyled in milke, and beaten and mixed with
the rest: then powder the seeds of red Nettels, of Rockes, of each one
dram; Plantane seeds halfe a dramme; of the belly and back of a fish
called
Scincus marinus, three drammes; of Diasaterion, foure ounces; of
Cantarides, add a dramme; beat these very finely, and with the other
powder
mix it: and so with a pound of fine sugar dissolved in Rosewater, and
boiled to Sugar againe, mingle the powder and all the rest of the
things,
putting in of leafe gold six leaves, of pearle prepared two drammes,
Oile
of Cinamon six drops: and being thus done, and well dried, put it up in
your Marmelade boxes, and gild it, and so vse it at your pleasure.

As you see it says Rockes, not Rocket. At first I thought it was a
description of the nettles, but it says of each one dram, so it's two
things being described.  If y'all know what Saterion, Scincus marinus,
Diasaterion, and Cantarides are, feel free to jump in to the
conversation.

Regards,

Cindy