[Sca-cooks] Noce d'India

[E. Rain]

with apologies to those who've already seen this...

Hi all, I have a litle spice mystery on my hands.I have a 14th c italian
recipe which calls for both "Noce d'India" and "Noce Moscato" among the
spices.

now "noce moscato" is given as nutmeg in both my modern Italian
dictionaries, Florio (16th c. ital dicitonary) and the majority of my
secondary sources (such as the glossary of Scully's cuoco neapolitano).

Florio lists "Noce d'India" as "an Indian nut" obviously some item he was
unfamiliar with, but different from nutmeg.

However in the Cerruti  14th c. Italian Tacuinum Sanitatus, "Nux India" is
translated as
nutmeg, and there is no listing for "Nux moscato"

Oh and Florio lists "Macis" for mace, so it's probably not that...

any brilliant insights?
Eden
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Eden Rain
raghead at liripipe.com