Rupescissa (Johannes De), Liber Lucis

Johannes de Rupescissa, Liber lucis, followed by alchemical and medical receipts, in French and Latin, on paper, France, mid 15th century.

Contents

1. ff. 1-10r: Johannes de Rupescissa (Jean de Roquetaillade), Liber lucis, in Latin, including three drawings of alchemical apparatus (f. 8r).

f. 1r: Incipit: Liber lucis super lapide philosophali a magistro Iohanne de rupeciza compositus. / [M]ateria lapidis est vna res vilis ...

f. 10r: Explicit: ... dicta medicina ad album, vel ad rubeum fuerit preparata. / Finis libri lucis lapidis philosophalis a supra dicto magistro Iohanne de rupeciza compositus.

2. ff. 11r-21v: Alchemical and medical receipts, in French and Latin.

Mid 15th century

1 volume

On paper; 21 leaves; collation: 1¹²⁺¹ (xiii added) with quire signature 'a1-a6' in black along lower-edge, 1⁸; old foliation '95-115' in brown ink in upper margin, omitting no. 108, and with number on f. 13 illegible; modern foliation '1-21' in pencil in upper right corner, followed here. 200 x 139 mm. Copied (28-35 lines to a page) in a small current French Gothic by two contemporary hands: Hand 1: ff. 1-10r for Johannes de Rupescissa; Hand 2: ff. 11r-21v for alchemical and medical receipts, identifiable as the second hand in MS. 523 (ff. 16v-17v). Three rough pen-drawings of alchemical apparatus (f. 8r). Modern limp parchment binding made of a leaf from part of a legal document in Latin, dated 1480.

Purchased 1933.

The manuscript was formerly bound as second in a composite volume together with MSS 523 [Miscellanea Alchemica XX] and 418 [Liber de aquis] (in this order), as suggested by the list of contents at the beginning of the miscellany (f. 1r of MS. 523), and confirmed by the old foliation in a 16th-century hand running consecutive in the upper margin of rectos in all three manuscripts (faint in MS. 418 and the present one).

The manuscripts were separated into three volumes some time in the late 19th or early 20th century, and bound in wrappers made of parchment leaves from different medieval manuscripts.

Catalogue description modified in 2016. For original description, see S.A.J. Moorat, Catalogue of Western Manuscripts on Medicine and Science in the Wellcome Historical Medical Library (London: Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, 1962-1973), vol. 1, p. 521.