The "Tabula Antidotarii" of Armengaud Blaise and Its Hebrew Translation (review)

Michael McVaugh and Lola Ferre. The "Tabula Antidotarii" of Armengaud Blaise and Its Hebrew Translation. Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, vol. 90, pt. 6. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 2000. ix + 218 pp. Ill. $22.00 (paperbound, 0-87169-906-0).

Even though Armengaud Blaise's Tabula antidotarii was translated into Hebrew by Estori ha Parhi in Barcelona around the year 1306, the two men must have known each other years before in Montpellier: Armengaud was a student in the city's faculty of medicine, while Estori belonged to a scholarly family, the Tibbonides, headed by Jacob ben Machir. Jacob and his friends were involved in a lively scientific exchange with some of the university's professors, notably with Arnald of Villanova and Bernard Gordon. Armengaud—Arnald's nephew—distinguished himself in this scholarly community by translating Greco-Arabic works into Latin through Hebrew intermediaries. He may have paid a dire price for his "Hebraism," for none of the archival documents (see appendix 2, pp. 170-95) discovered by our authors mentions a university graduation title ("magister in medicina") attached to his name.

When the Jews were expelled from France in the summer of 1306, Estori, now a refugee, renewed his connections with Armengaud, who had become a physician to the royal house of Aragon. Estori found it useful to translate a short treatise by his friend, a list of compound medicines in a tabular layout for the use of practitioners. The seventy-three drugs dealt with included syrups, electuaries (more than thirty), pills, laxatives, and opiates. With their help a physician may have treated illnesses of the stomach and the liver, the kidneys, and the bladder, as well as of the generative members. In most cases the ingredients were quite simple ones (plants, fruits, liquids) available in southern Europe. There is a question whether the last five prescriptions of the Tabula originate from Armengaud's pen; in any event, we do not have Estori's translation for them (see pp. 9-10).

Professors McVaugh and Ferre, who have prepared facing Latin and Hebrew texts (and have added an English translation to the original) had to resolve difficulties common in cases where autographs do not exist. Obviously much effort and careful attention were invested by both our colleagues, for they have produced impeccable editions with alternative readings presented at the bottom of the page.

The confrontation between the Latin and the Hebrew reveals some of the features of Estori's translation, indeed its shortcomings. It is easy to establish that his is not a word-by-word translation, and that in many instances (e.g., entry no. 20 on p. 60) he omitted whole sentences. It seems also that he did not work on the Latin text but was helped—as was usual then—by a colleague who rendered it orally into the Romance vernacular. Also, he did not realize that the hyssop mentioned in entry no. 15 (p. 51) is the Hebrew "Ezove," and that "Gazila" in the previous entry (p. 41) is none other than the "Tsvi" mentioned so often in the Hebrew poetry of the time.

The publishers of the American Philosophical Society have generously provided photographs of two pages of the Latin base manuscript (Vatican City, Palat. Lat 1165), as well as the entire Hebrew version of London's rabbinic library no. 140. It is regrettable, however, that a photograph of Estori's prologue (pp. 168-69), which is found only in MS Parma R. 347, did not find a place in the present edition. Having struggled myself with this mutilated and frequently incomprehensible prologue, I believe that scholarship would have benefited considerably if easy access to the text had been provided to as many other paleographers as possible.

The translation of a Latin work into Hebrew was not a breathtaking innovation around the year 1300: by then, Italian Hebraists like Judah Romano or Hillel...