358 



1869. 



Saladinus, 

 1488. 



G. G. Pon- 

 tano. 



HISTORICAL NOTES ON MANNA. 



Calabria as wine, oil, corn, cheese, salted meat, nuts, chestnuts, 

 soap, and oranges, but makes no reference to manna. 1 



The earliest actual mention of manna as "an Italian drug 

 that I have found, is in the Compendium Aromatariorum of 

 Saladinus, printed at Bologna in 1488. Saladinus was 

 physician to one of the Princes of Tarentum in Calabria; 

 neither the date of his birth nor that of his death is known, 

 but it would appear that he was living between A.D. 1442 and 

 1458 ; for he states that during his time the King of Arragon 

 punished his druggist at Naples by a fine of 9,000 ducats and 

 degradation from office, because the king's physicians having 

 prescribed white coral as an ingredient of a cordial electuary, 

 the druggist not possessing it, substituted red coral. This 

 incident affords a clue to the age of Saladinus, for it was 

 Alphonso V., King of Arragon who laid siege to Naples, 

 captured it in 1442, and died in 1458. 



The work of Saladinus to which I have alluded is a sort of 

 handbook for the aromatarius or druggist, and is remarkable 

 for much practical good sense. Besides numerous formulae and 

 descriptive notices of drugs, it contains a calendar enumerating 

 the herbs, flowers, seeds, roots and gums to be collected in each 

 month ; and in terminating the list for May there occurs the 

 following passage : 



"Collige etia in isto mese inana ta in oriete qm in Calabria 

 quia tune ros ille preciosius de celo cadit." 



Contemporary with Saladinus lived Giovanni Gioviano 

 Poutano (A.D. 1426 1503), a celebrated historian, statesman, 

 philosopher and poet. Among his numerous writings is a work 

 entitled Liber Meteororum, in which there is a poem headed De 

 Pruind et Rore et Mannd; this effusion notices in very cir- 

 cumstantial terms the collection of manna by the peasants on 



1 Pegolotti's work forms the third volume and Da Uzzano's the fourth, of 

 the book published anonymously by Gian Francesco Pagnini under the title 

 of Delia Decima e di varie altre Gravezze Imposte dal Commune di Firenze, 

 etc., Lisb. e Lucca, 1765-6, 4, iii. 96 ; iv. 96-98. Some valuable inform- 

 ation on Pegolotti and his writings may be found in Colonel Yule's Cathay, 

 and tfie Way Thither, Lend. 1866. (Hakluyt Society) vol. ii. 279. 





