Click the images to see the full-size versions.

Matteo Silvatico Liber pandectarum medicinae 1480

Liber pandectarum medicine omnia medicine simplicia contine[n]s / quem ex omnibus antiquorum libris aggregauit examius artium & medicine doctor Matheus Siluaticus ... [edited by Matthaeus Moretus].

Encyclopedic collection of medicinals. Latin.
Label on cover: Liber
pandecta aggaruri [?] / Math. Brixensus; translation of label on first page: From the library of the Ecclesiastical Lattern College at St. Nicholas.

[Strasbourg : Adolf Rusch, ca. 1480].
Publisher (initial place): France
[308] leaves (the first blank) ; 40 cm. (fol.).
1480
Lane Catalog Record

Based on a manuscript completed in 1317, dedicated to King Robert of Sicily. Includes dedication by Matthaeus Moretus, editor who prepared the index in 1470. Includes quotations from eleventh century herbalists Simon of Genoa and Serapion the Younger. Illuminated.

The Liber pandectarum medicinae by the Mantuan physician, Matteo Silvatico (d. 1342) is a dictionary of drugs with references to their uses by such authorities as Avicenna, Mesue, Serapion, Galen and Dioscorides. First published in the 1470s this work filled a practical need and went through many editions in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. -- The Lane copy is of special interest for its printing by the so-called "R Printer" (Adolf Rusch) of Strassburg, and for its original chained binding, complete with all the metal bosses and clasps, and the original chain. It is one of very few rare medical books extant that preserve the original chain from a chained library. The pages of the copy are also rubricated by hand in the style of medieval manuscripts. There is an unusual seventeenth century bookplate on the front pastedown.

—J. Norman, 2006