London, British Library, Sloane MS 405

Contains medical recipes.

Date: s. xv

Scribes:

Medieval owners:

Original location or linguistic profile:

Magic Category: medical charms

Specific magic texts: Verse charm against wounds

Charm motifs: Y conjure

Online Information: Entry in the Middle English Compendium HyperBibliography

Entry in the DIMEV

Digitised: No

Bibliography: Ralph Hanna, ed. “The Index of Middle English Verse and Huntington Library Collections: A Checklist of Addenda.”Publications of the Bibliographical Society of America 74 (1980): 235-58: 242.

Lea T. Olsan. “The Corpus of Charms in the Middle English Leechcraft Remedy Books.” In Charms, Charmers and Charming: International Research on Verbal Magic. Edited by Jonathan Roper. Great Britain: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, 214-237.

 

London, British Library, Sloane MS 56

Liber medicinarum of John Arderne.

Date:  s. xv^in-med

Scribes: Willelmus de Seton

Medieval owners:

Original location or linguistic profile:

Magic Category: charms, medical

charms, protection

charms, thieves

Specific magic texts: Two charms against thieves, a charm in verse to staunch blood (flum jordan) (f. 100v), and one in verse referencing Jesus on the cross (f. 100). The medical charms are in a slightly later hand of the mid-fifteenth century than the rest of the manuscript.

Charm motifs: Flum Jordan

Online Information: Detailed Record from the British Library Catalogue

Entry in the DIMEV

Digitised: No – there are some images on the British Library website.

Bibliography: Lea T. Olsan, “Charms and Prayers in Medieval Medical Theory and Practice,” Social History of Medicine, 16 (2003): 343-66.

—. “Latin Charms of Medieval England: Verbal Healing in a Christian Oral Tradition.” Oral Tradition 7:1 (1992): 116-142.

Suzanne Eastman Sheldon. “Middle English and Latin Charms, Amulets, and Talismans from Vernacular Manuscripts.” PhD diss., Tulane University, 1978.

London, British Library, Harley MS 1600

A copy of the “Leechcraft” discussed by Lea Olsan in “The Corpus of Charms” (see below).

Date: s. xv

Scribes:

Medieval owners:

Original location or linguistic profile:

Magic Category: charms, medical

charms, protection

charms, thieves

Specific magic texts: Medical charms for fevers (3); the hawe; whether a patient will live or die; worm in the ear; toothache; falling evil; wounds (2, one in verse); and a charm against thieves

Charm motifs: Christus tonat
Coniuro te vermiculum
El elþe
Five croppes
In Bedlam God
Jaspar Melchior Balthasar
Pater est
St. Susanne
Toby
Tres boni fratres
Virgo Apollonia
Y conjure

Online Information: Entry in the DIMEV

Digitised: No

Bibliography: Lea T. Olsan. “The Corpus of Charms in the Middle English Leechcraft Remedy Books.” In Charms, Charmers and Charming: International Research on Verbal Magic. Edited by Jonathan Roper. Great Britain: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, 214-237.

Suzanne Eastman Sheldon. “Middle English and Latin Charms, Amulets, and Talismans from Vernacular Manuscripts.” PhD diss., Tulane University, 1978.

London, British Library, Egerton MS 833

A medical manuscripts. Contains the Liber de Diversis Medicinis.

Date: s.xv^ex

Scribes:

Medieval owners:

Original location or linguistic profile: Northern

Magic Category: charms, medical

Specific magic texts: Charm to staunch bleeding in verse.

Charm motifs: Flum Jordan

Online Information: Entry in the DIMEV

Digitised: No

Bibliography: Catherine Rider. “Following a Recipe Through Different Manuscripts.” The Recipes Project Blog. November 12, 2013.

London, British Library, Arundel MS 272

A collection of medical recipes and the Agnus Castus. A copy of the “Leechcraft” discussed by Lea Olsan in “The Corpus of Charms” (see below).

Date: s. xv

Scribes:

Medieval owners:

Original location or linguistic profile: West Midlands (Derbyshire and Staffordshire)

Magic Category: charms, medical

Specific magic texts: Charms for fevers; hawe; toothache; to staunch bleeding; whether a patient will live or die. Also includes Latin charms for sick pigs and for sick cows (fol. 30v).

Charm motifs: Five croppes
Flum Jordan
Iesus sedebat
Iesus that was in
Longinus miles
Pater est
Stabat Iesus
Toby

Online Information: Entry in the Manuscripts of the West Midlands database

Entry in the DIMEV

Digitised: No

Bibliography: Lea T. Olsan.“The Corpus of Charms in the Middle English Leechcraft Remedy Books.” In Charms, Charmers and Charming: International Research on Verbal Magic. Edited by Jonathan Roper. Great Britain: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, 214-237.

London, British Library, Additional MS 33996

A copy of the “Leechcraft” discussed by Lea Olsan in “The Corpus of Charms” (see below). Contains a copy of John of Gaddesden’s Rosa Medicinae. Contains texts in Latin, Middle English, and Anglo Norman.

Date: s. xiv-xv (c. 1450)

Scribes:

Medieval owners:

Original location or linguistic profile:

Magic Category: charms, animal

charms, medical

charms, protection

talismans

Specific magic texts: Charms to staunch bleeding; fevers (4); hawe; bloody flux; live or die; childbirth; worm in the ear; toothache; falling evil; wounds (2, one in verse); wicked spirits. Charms appear on fols. 76v–148v. Contains instructions for an amulet for conception that can be tested by suspending it over a tree to make it bear fruit (fol. 153v). Also has a charm for the farcy (a form of glanders) following the leechcraft.

Charm motifs: Ante portam
Christus tonat
Coniuro te vermiculum
El elþe
Five croppes
Flum Jordan
Iesus sedebat
Iesus that was in
Longinus miles
Pater est
St. Susanne
Stabat Iesus
Toby
tres boni fratres
Virgo Apollonia
Y conjure
Ysmael

Online Information: Entry in the DIMEV

Digitised: No

Bibliography: Tony Hunt. Popular Medicine in Thirteenth-Century England: Introduction and Texts. Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1990.

Lea T. Olsan. “Charms and Prayers in Medieval Medical Theory and Practice.” Social History of Medicine 16:3 (2003): 343-366.

—.“The Corpus of Charms in the Middle English Leechcraft Remedy Books.” In Charms, Charmers and Charming: International Research on Verbal Magic. Edited by Jonathan Roper. Great Britain: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, 214-237.

—. “Latin Charms of Medieval England: Verbal Healing in a Christian Oral Tradition.” Oral
Tradition 7:1 (1992): 116-142.

Suzanne Eastman Sheldon. “Middle English and Latin Charms, Amulets, and Talismans from Vernacular Manuscripts.” PhD diss., Tulane University, 1978.

T.M. Smallwood. “Conformity and Originality in Middle English Charms.” In Charms, Charmers, and Charming: International Research on Verbal Magic. Edited by Jonathan Roper. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, 87-99.

London, British Library, Additional MS 33381

A 13th-century manuscript with 14th- and 15th-century additions. Contains religious tracts and Euclid’s Elements. Possibly used as a prayer book, most of the texts relate to Ely Priory in some way.

Date: s. xiii^med, xv

Scribes:

Medieval owners: Ely Priory

Original location or linguistic profile: Ely, Cambridgeshire

Magic Category: charms, medical

charms, protection

Specific magic texts: Two charms: to staunch bleeding and against evil, both in verse (fol. 151v).

Charm motifs: Christ was done on a tree
Flum Jordan

Online Information: Entry in DIMEV

Decorated initial from fol. 128r on the British Library website

Page from September in the Calendar

Entries in the Schoenberg Database of Manuscripts

Digitised: No

Bibliography:

London, British Library, Additional MS 19674

One of the Leechcraft manuscripts discussed by Lea Olsan (see below).

Date: s. xv

Scribes:

Medieval owners:

Original location or linguistic profile:

Magic Category: charms, medical

Specific magic texts: Charm for a wound in verse. The leechcraft comprises fols. 7r-34v.

Charm motifs: Y conjure

Online Information: Entry in DIMEV

Digitised: No

Bibliography: Lea T. Olsan. “The Corpus of Charms in the Middle English Leechcraft Remedy Books.” In Charms, Charmers and Charming: International Research on Verbal Magic. Edited by Jonathan Roper. Great Britain: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, 214-237.

London, British Library, Additional MS 9066

Contains a copy of the Gesta Romanorum.

Date: s. xv^ex

Scribes:

Medieval owners:

Original location or linguistic profile:

Magic Category: charms, protection

Specific magic texts: Charm against the Fiend in verse (fol. 77v) – described on DIMEV as “St Katherine’s charm for banishing despair”.

Charm motifs: Foul fiend away thou flee

Online Information: Entry in the DIMEV

Entry in the Middle English Compendium HyperBibliography

Digitised: No

Bibliography: Sidney John Hervon Herrtage, ed. The Early English Version of the Gesta Romanorum. EETS e.s. 33 (1879); repr. 1962: 404.

Suzanne Eastman Sheldon. “Middle English and Latin Charms, Amulets, and Talismans from Vernacular Manuscripts.” PhD diss., Tulane University, 1978.

Oxford, Bodleian Library, Rawlinson MS D. 328

Contains a variety of religious and educational texts such as riddles, grammar, “A litel boke of dotrine for ionge gentil men”, etc.

Date: s. xv

Scribes:

Medieval owners: Walter Pollard (owner from 1444-45)

Original location or linguistic profile: Plymouth, Devon

Magic Category: charms, medical

Specific magic texts: Charms for worms (using a variation of the coniuro te vermiculum motif substituting abjuro); for fevers; for bleeding (Longinus charm (2); Flum Jordan (fols. 192r-v)

Charm motifs: Coniuro te vermiculum
Coniuro vos febres
Flum Jordan
Longinus miles

Online Information: Entry in the DIMEV

Digitised: No, but one folio is available on the Digital Bodleian site.

Bibliography: