THE MEDIEVAL HEALTH HANDBOOK: Tacuinum Sanitatis ...

THE MEDIEVAL HEALTH HANDBOOK: Tacuinum Sanitatis by Luisa Cogliata Arano (George Brazilier: $20.). During the late 13th and early 14th Centuries, a number of health handbooks circulated in manuscript from throughout Europe. Based on Arabic herbal and medicinal treatises but illuminated in the late Gothic style of northern Italy, these texts offered advice on diet, clothing and weather predicated on the belief of that bodily functions were controlled by four cardinal fluids, or humors--blood, phlegm, choler (yellow bile) and melancholy (black bile). Roses, which are “cold in the second degree, dry in the third,” were recommended for “inflamed brains”; acorns helped retention but might prevent menstruation, a danger that could be neutralized by “eating them roasted with sugar.” These charming illustrations and silly nostrums make Arano’s scholarly text seem very dry.