280 Aster History: Pupits of ALBERTUS 
XLVIII. Atspertus AND HENRICUS DE SAXONIA 
Albertus Magnus, like most great writers, was doomed to have 
his fame beclouded by spurious and unworthy works ascribed to 
his pen. One of these, the De miradbilibus mundi, is of unclaimed 
authorship ; another, the De Secretis Mulerum,* a treatise on em- 
bryology (of great interest in the history of medicine, though dif- 
fuse and wordy like much mediaeval speculation), was by one Hen- 
ricus de Saxonia, a pupil of Albertus Magnus, and who may have 
studied under him together with Thomas de Cantiprato at Cologne. 
A third, the De virtutibus herbarum, better known as Lider aggrega- 
tionis, an oft-printed + but most worthless { production as Pritzel 
deemed it, is now ascribed to one Frater Albertus de Saxonia,§ 
a master of philosophy, says Echard, at Paris, about 1300 A. Hs 
* Earlier printers issued the Secretis and the ——— mab we ; my edition 
ig fie former, ‘‘ Albertus Magnus de Secretis Mulierum cum commento,’’ Rome, 
9, has no hint regarding the dated Lider ees of cei of 1493, of the 
seaadian of which its writer seemingly was not aware. 
This 1499 edition of the Secrefis is a thin quarto of 112 unnumbered pages, in a 
books ; it begins with the words “ Tractatus Henrici de Saxonia, Alberti Magni disc 
puli, de Secretis Mulierum, quem ab Alberto excerpsit.”’ 
The discursive commentary by some unknown Joannes, which accompanies the 
text, cites the ancients as Hippocrates, acu and Galen, also Macer, Avicenna a and 
verroes: it bears the name ‘‘ Expositio super Henricum de Saxonia de secretis mu- 
i, % 
ong plants mentioned by this commentator Joannes, is his list of aphrodisiacs 
in chapter 3 of Book 1, including ‘* piper, pillegium, testiculi vulpis, crocus orientalis, 
semen lini,’’ but with no mention of the e ryngium by which Phaon charmed Sappho. 
Later than the commentary, the — prefixed another title, ‘* A/bertus Magnus 
de Secretis Mulierum cum commento”’ ; m rely a device of the printer to gain notice; 
and so far successful that it has caused i identification of his work with Albertus 
Magnus on the part of some bibliographers to the present time 
er had an earlier edition, printed by Anton Sorg, at Augsburg, in 1489 (and 
Me 
another, at Frankfort, 1615), which agreed with the preceding (Meyer, 4: 7°): 
: ; 1615) agreed wi preceding (M De pie 
* An early edition of the Aggregationis is that ascribed to Reyser at Eichstadt, of 
about 1478. 
} “Libri miserrimi,”’ Pritzel’s no. 11849—a thin octavo of 31 unnumbered Page 
without name of place, writer or author 
‘* Echard discovered (Meyer, 4: 83) among its rare MSS, (0 
in England) an English MS. of uncertain oe claiming to be written, 
Magnus but by Frater Albertus de Saxoni 
ne in Paris and tw° 
not by Albertus 
