[Sca-cooks] cuskynoles / kuskenole (DEAF article)

[emilio szabo]

<< Still trying to figure out whether this new cuskynoles is really an import 
from the Arab world or whether just the name was, 

or whether it is just coincidental name similarity. >>


There is an article "KUSKENOLE" in the "Dictionnaire Etymologique de L'Ancien 
Francais" (DEAF); it is in fascicle J4-5/K, published in 2008. This dictionary 
also deals with anglo-norman texts and words.

The autor, Frankwalt Moehren, traces the history of the word _kuskenole_ to 
Giambonino da Cremona (his word form is "cusculenez") and his middle latin 
translation of the recipes from Ibn Jazlas work. As for the arabic form, he 
quotes al-Baghdadi and mentions persian "husk-nan" (without the accents) 
'sec-pain' ('dry bread, biscuit, a kind of sweetmeat').

About the middle latin form "cuskabenchi", we found in the Schachtafelen and in 
Ibn Butlan, he says (I translate quick and dirty from the French): "The _b_ 
seems to be an error for _n_, given that the two letters have the same sign in 
arabic, the only difference being punctuation: the arabic sign with a point 
above means _b_, with a point below means _n_."

He quotes the passage from the anglo-norman cookerybook in ms. BL Add. 32085, 
edited by Hieatt and Jones. Apart from that, he discusses another quote from 
another anglo-norman text by Walter of Bibbesworth ("... Quant averas mangé de 
kakenole"; from: Le tretiz). However, this quote is problematic for reasons, I 
need not discuss here.

Moehren also quotes an article by Anna Martellotti: 

"Quinquenelli zoè rafioli". In: Annali della Facoltà die Lingue e Letterature 
Straniere dell' Università di Bari, s. III, 15 (2001) 351-372. 

(I did not see that and I have only little hope that I get it without ILL.)

E.