Catalogue: Pharmaceutics

Kitāb al-Aghdhiyat al-marḍá   (MS A 82, item 3)

(Nourishment for the Ill)

كتاب الاغذية المرضى

by Abū Ḥamid Muḥammad ibn ‘Alī ibn ‘Umar Najīb al-Dīn al-Samarqandī (d. 1222/619 H)

ابو حامد محمد ابن على ابن عمر نجيب الدين السمرقندى

Kitāb al-Aghdhiyat al-marḍá (Nourishment for the Ill) was one of the essays making up the compilation referred to under the title: al-Najibiyat al-Samarqandiyah. The essay was also known by the title At‘imat al-mardá.

For other copies, see Ullmann, Medizin, p. 201 note 6; and A.Z. Iskandar, 'A study of al-Samarqandi's medical writings', Le Museon, vol. 85 (1972), p. 459 note 60. For seven copies in Turkey, see Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, editor, Fihris al-makhtutat al-tibb al-Islami bi-l-lughat al-‘arabiyah wa-al-turkiyah wa-al-farisiyah fi maktabat turkiya; Catalogue of Islamic Medical Manuscripts (in Arabic, Turkish, and Persian) in the Libraries of Turkey, prepared by Ramazan Sesen, Cemil Akpinar, and Cevad Izgi (Istanbul: Research Centre of Islamic History, Art and Culture, 1984), pp. 374-5.

Illustrations

The opening page of Kitāb al-Aghdhiyat al-marḍá (Nourishment for the Ill) by Najīb al-Dīn al-Samarqandī (d. 1222/619). The copy was completed on 14 Dhu al-Qa‘dah 1012 (= 14 April 1604) by a copyist named Muḥammad ibn Musá ibn Muḥammad.

Physical Description

Arabic. 25 leaves (fols. 177b-201a); 21 lines per page. Dimensions: 21 x 14.7 (text area 15.5 x 8) cm; 21 lines per page. The title occurs on fol. 177b, line 6. The author is not given. This treatise, which is preserved in other copies, is generally attributed to Najīb al-Dīn al-Samarqandī.

It is dated in the colophon on fol. 201a (lines 16-19): 14 Dhu al-Qa‘dah 1012 (=14 April 1604). The copyist is given as Muḥammad ibn Musá ibn Muḥammad.

The text is written in a small, careful, and consistent naskh script, in dense black ink with headings in red-brown. The handwriting appears to be identical to that of the preceding item. The text area has been frame-ruled. There are catchwords.

There are some marginalia. Fol. 177a contains casually written recipes in various later hands. The treatise itself begins on fol. 177b.

The volume consists of 202 leaves. Fol. 87b has two later notes giving recipes. Fols. 88ab and 89a are blank. Fol. 202b contains miscellaneous later therapeutic notes and recipes, in Arabic and Turkish. The entire volume is written on the same type of paper. Item 1 (fols. 1a-87a) is Najīb al-Dīn al-Samarqandī's Kitāb al-Aghdhiyah wa-al-ashribah (MS A 82, item 1); item 2 (fols. 89b-176b) is his Kitāb al-Qarābādhīn ‘alá tartīb al-‘ilal (MS A 82, item 2); item 3 (fols. 177b-201a) his Kitāb al-Aghdhiyat al-marḍá here catalogued; and item 4 (fols. 201b-202a) is the al-Risālah fī al-as’ilah al-ṭabī‘īyah al-Ḥārithīyah (MS A 82, item 4).

Binding

The front cover is made of red leather over pasteboards. It has a blind-stamped central medallion, scalloped and with internal vegetal design. Blind quadrant lines and diagonals, decorated with S-stamps radiate from the central design. The wide frame is formed of blind fillets on either side of blind-tooled S-stamps. The spine and back cover are recent red-leather replacements. There are modern paper pastedowns and endpapers.

Provenance

There are owners' notes on fol. 1a (not dated).

The volume was purchased in 1941 by the Army Medical Library from A. S. Yahuda who acquired it in Damietta, Egypt. According to A.S. Yahuda's notes, he assigned the manuscript the number ELS 1691 Med. 20 - a number also written in the volume.

References

Schullian/Sommer, Cat. in incun. & MSS. p. 324, entry A82 no. 3.

Hamarneh, "NLM", p. 99, where this item is mistakenly identified as another copy of NLM MS A80.1 that is in fact a different treatise by Najib al-Din al-Samarqandi.

NLM Microfilm Reel: FILM 48-127 no. 6.