This short manuscript, formerly bound with four early printed books, is a medical glossary that gives the English and Flemish equivalents of the Latin names for herbs. Each set of synonyms is arranged alphabetically, with large red capitals (A, B, C, etc.) to mark the beginning of each section. As the names that come after the first in any set are not repeated under subsequent letters of the alphabet, the number of sets under each letter diminishes as the alphabet progresses. The first half of the manuscript (fols 1r–22r) contains an index for the second half (fols 23r–48r).

Throughout the manuscript are notes in the same late 16^th-century hand, including a passage on the Battle of Lepanto (fol. iiiv), excerpts of poems (fol. 22v), and recipes to aid conception (fol. 48v). One page of verse contains select lines from Quid inde, a poem recorded as early as the 13^th century (see British Library, Harley MS 3724) that was familiar as the inscription on the now-destroyed gates of Bologna, and often published in the 17^th century.

 

Literature: Neil R. Ker and Alan J. Piper, Medieval Manuscripts in British Libraries, Volume IV: Paisley–York (Oxford, 1969), pp. 635–36; Paul Yeats-Edwards, Winchester College (Warden and Fellows’ Library) Medieval Manuscript Collection: Brief History and Catalogue (London, 1978), p. 11; John H. Harvey, ‘Vegetables in the Middle Ages’, Garden History, vol. 12, n.2 (Autumn, 1984), pp. 89–99, 98, n.4; John H. Harvey, ‘The First English Garden Book: Mayster Jon Gardener’s Treatise and Its Background’, Garden History, vol. 13, n.2 (Autumn, 1985), pp. 83–101, 91; Richard Foster, ‘Robert Hedrington and Wynkyn de Worde at Winchester College’, New College Notes, 7 (2016), pp. 1–5, 2, n.10.

Provenance: Unknown, at Winchester College by 1634.

Location: Fellows’ Library