[Sca-cooks] What cookbook is this?

[Volker Bach]

I wouldn't recommend a full translation, that's probably too much effort for what is in large parts a rather dull, antiquarian text. The Ars Magirica seems to me to be a Humanist effort to collect "what we know about cookery" more than asnything erlse. Some of its contexts are very interesting (cibus Maius went over very well at an event last year), but a lot of it is rather dry "And this is what the Ancients called this food, and Apicius say A, and Pliny says B, and that source I've read to show off how smart I am says tangetially related C".  

Notwithstanding which, it is a very nice book. And the Swiss consider the cheesem,aking letter a national treasure, naturally. 

Giano




________________________________
 Von: Stephanie Ross <the.red.ross at gmail.com>
An: sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org 
Gesendet: 18:42 Dienstag, 26.Februar 2013
Betreff: Re: [Sca-cooks] What cookbook is this?
 
Adelisa wrote:

"I was poking around Google when I stumbled across this:

http://books.google.com/books?id=ujYhXYQixeIC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

It appears to be a scanned copy of a book printed in 1563, covering magic,
diet, recipes, etc. My extremely limited Latin isn't up to the task of
really figuring out what this is all about (and the glosses seem to be in
Greek, which I don't know at all).

Anyway, enjoy. I'd love to know more about this book."

This is info I found out at addall.com:

[publisher: Zurich, Jakob Gessner, [1563]. [bound with:] [GESSNER,
Conrad]. Sanitatis tuendae praecepta cum aliis, tum literarum studiosis
hominibus, & ijs qui minus exercentur, cognitu necessaria. Zurich, Jakob
Gessner, [?1561].] Two works in one vol., 8vo, pp. [xvi], 227, [29]; 23;
occasional light staining; a very good copy in a contemporary vellum
wallet-binding, a trifle spotted, and shrunken; from the library of the
Swiss physician Johann Lorenz Löeli (or Löelig), with his ownership entry
dated 1694 on title, several marginal annotations in his hand and his
armorial engraved bookplate on front paste-down. I. FIRST EDITION OF A
GASTRONOMIC TREATISE BY THE GERMAN PHYSICIAN, THEOLOGIAN, AND POLYMATH,
TOGETHER WITH ONE OF THE EARLIEST TREATISES ON SWISS CHEESE. The work was
edited posthumously by Willich’s brother-in-law Wolfgang Justus, and has a
preface by Conrad Gessner. Willich systematically treats the equipment of a
kitchen, various foodstuffs and kitchen products, such as marzipan, cakes,
meat, lard, dairy products, eggs, vegetables, fruit, grain, rice, oils,
honey, sugar, mushrooms, spices and herbs. On many occasions the vernacular
German words of the foodstuffs are given. There follow a few chapters on
cooking fish, with some thirty species listed in Latin and German. The next
chapters deal with poultry, birds, bread, and nuts. Besides preparation
methods from antiquity, Willich gives several ‘modern’ recipes, for example
tongue cooked with grape or cherry juice, spiced with juniper berries, a
recipe from Breslau in Silesia.Jacob Bifrons, from the Romansch-speaking
part of Switzerland, presents with his De operibus lactariis (pp. 220-7) a
very early treatise entirely devoted to a very early treatise entirely
devoted to cheese production in the Engadin. Bifrons describes the
production, storage, and ripening process, providing exact measurements of
the ingredients.

II. Second edition (first, 1556) of Gessner’s work ‘on hygiene, the use and
abuse of cosmetics by women, and against the superstitious belief that
bloodletting should be performed according to astrological indications’
(Wellisch p. 81). Originally written for Johann Wegmann, a Zurich
councillor, as a present for the carnival season of 1556, Gessner comments
on texts from Pliny, Cicero, and Celsus, and adds his critical notes on the
luxuries of his contemporaries.

I. Adams W188; B.IN.G. 2059; Bitting p. 499 (‘the book is rare’); Cagle
1234; Durling 4740; Simon, *Bibliotheca Bacchica *II 708; VD16 W3223;
Vicaire 875; Wellisch A.58; not in Wellcome.

II. VD16 G1709; Wellisch A41.2; see Adams G555, B.IN.G. 925, Durling 2073,
Simon,*Bibliotheca Bacchica *II 309, Vicaire 401, and Wellcome 2803 for the
first edition; not in Cagle. ..

Hopefully this book will become someone's next translation project! The
book itself is available for about $35.

AEschwynne
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