328 
PHARMACEUTICAL MEETING. 
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. Sala- 
dinus 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 9000 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 pas¬ 
sage : 
• • 
“ Collige etia in isto mese mana ta in oriete qm in Calabria quia tunc ros ille 
“ preciosius de celo cadit.” 
Contemporary with Saladinus lived Giovanni Gioviano Pontano (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 Manna; this effusion notices in very cir¬ 
cumstantial terms the collection of manna by the peasants on the banks of the 
Crati in Calabria, describing the production of the drug in language which may 
be rendered thus: 
* * * There in the middle of summer under a burning sun, while heat pre¬ 
vails, and the cloven earth gapes,—when no breeze is stirring and the humid air is 
still, it [the manna] gradually exudes and, condensed as a viscid fluid, runs into 
drops and thickens on the thirsty leaves,—and further hardened by successive suns, 
it acquires the appearance of wax and the taste of honey. Such as the bees obtain 
by their instinctive art and mutual aid, this, nature produces for the medicinal use 
of mankind. 
I subjoin the passage in a foot-note. * 1 
In the second half of the fifteenth century flourished Kaffaele Maffei, called 
also Volaterranus, a learned and voluminous writer, who among other works 
anonymously by Gian Francesco Pagnini under the title of Pella Pec-ima e di varie altre 
Gravezze imposte dal Commune di Firenze etc., Lisb. e Lucca, 1765-6, 4°, III. 99; IV. 
96-98. Some valuable information on Pegolotti and his writings may be found in Colonel 
Yule’s Cathay and the way thither, Lond. 1866. (Hakluyt Society) Vol. II. 279. 
1 Quinetiam Calabris in saltibus, ac per opacum 
Labitur ingenti Crathis, qua coerulus alveo, 
Quaque etiam Syriis sylvse convallibus horrent 
Felices sylvse, quarum de fronde liquescunt 
Divini roris latices, quos sedula passim 
Turba legit, gratum auxilium languentibus segris. 
Illic sestate in media, sub sole furenti 
Dum regnat calor et terras finduntur hiantes 
# * m # # 
Cum nullae spirant aurse, et silet humidus aer 
Contrahitur paulatim, et lento humore coactus 
In guttas abit, et foliis sitientibus hserens 
Lentescit, rursumque diurno a sole recoctus 
Induit et speciem cerse, mellisque saporem. 
Quodque et apes prajstant arte, ingenitcque favore 
Hoc medicos natura hominum producit in usus. 
Pontani Opera , Venet. 1513, Lib. Meteor, p. 113. 
