THE LEGEND OF MICHAEL SCOT — CONCLUSION 215 



legend as far as the close of the fourteenth century. 

 During the next hundred years no notable addition 

 seems to have been made to it, nor does it appear 

 to have attained any further expression of a remark- 

 able kind in the region of pure literature. But 

 the fifteenth century had by no means forgotten 

 Michael Scot, nor the tales that embodied his 

 mysterious fame. This, in fact, seems to have 

 been the period when most of the magical works 

 attributed to the philosopher's pen were composed, 

 and commended to the world under the reputation 

 attaching to so great a name. Such are the spell, 

 which exists in writing of this age, in the Lauren- 

 tian Library of Florence,^ the Geomantia of the 

 Munich Library,^ and, perhaps, the Cheiromantia. 

 As, however, a tract on at least one of these latter 

 subjects is attributed to Gerard of Cremona in the 

 Vatican list,^ it is possible there may here have 

 been only some not unnatural confusion between 

 two authors who were closely associated in much 

 of the literary work they accomplished in Spain. 



To the sixteenth century belongs the mock- 

 heroic poem entitled De Gestis Baldi, composed by 

 the famous macaronic writer Teofilo Folengo, who 

 wrote under the assumed name of Merlin Coccajo. 

 A considerable passage in this curious production 

 is devoted to Michael Scot, of whom the poet 

 speaks in the following terms : 



' Ecce Michaelis de incantu regula Scoti, 

 Qua, post sex formas, cerae fabricatur imago 

 Demonii Sathan Saturni facta plumbo 

 Cui sufRmigio per serica rubra cremate 



1 PI. Ixxxix. sup. cod. 38. 2 ^q. 489. 



3 Fondo Vaticano 2392, p. 97vo. and 98ro. See Boncompagni, Delia 

 vita e delle opere de Gherardo Cremonese ; Eoma, 1851, p. 7. 



