Franchières, Jean de. fl. 1447-1488.

La faulconnerie. [Incipit:] Cy commence ung livre de medecine de faulcons et de tous autres oyseaulx de noble plumaige.

[France], c. 1485-1500.

Folio (283 x 202 mm.). MANUSCRIPT. xliii, [1] leaves. In a single Gothic hand (cursiva libraria) in brown ink, 28 lines per page, writing frame c. 200 x 150 mm., margins partly ruled in drypoint, an additional 7-line recipe in a slightly later hand on the final recto. Retrospective blind-decorated calf (slightly rubbed).

Retrospective blind-decorated calf (slightly rubbed).

            A COMPREHENSIVE VERNACULAR COLLECTION OF MEDICAL TREATMENTS FOR FALCONS AND OTHER BIRDS OF PREY based on Middle Eastern practice. On Falconry preserves “a didactic literature...specific to the Latin East, of which we would know nothing without Jean de Francières” (Richard, tr.). The author, a Knight Hospitaller, composed it at Rhodes between 1458 and 1466. He relied on the lost treatises of Melopin (falconer to the prince of Antioch), of Michelin (attached to the king of Cyprus), and of Ayme Cassian (who served the Grand Master of the Knights of Rhodes).
            After considering the appearance and habits of seven species of falcon, Franchières provides advice on care and dietetics then describes ailments, their symptoms, diagnosis and treatment. He first discusses diseases affecting the head, including earache and nasal congestion, impaired vision and epilepsy. Many recipes use animal-derived ingredients (i.a., ground tortoise shell and lizard feces to treat cataracts). Cassian’s preparation of lard, sugar and bone marrow is considered a general panacea. The section on internal diseases includes treatments for kidney and bladder stones. Michelin’s remedy for the latter involves a lamb’s heart soaked in donkey milk, while Melopin recommends crushed deer horn for intestinal worms. Fractures, claw injuries and plumage damage come last. Remedies include RESIN-BASED “CASTS” FOR BROKEN WINGS AND TINY IRON RODS TO SECURE FEATHERS IN PLACE.
            Some thirty manuscripts of On Falconry survive. That offered here is of the first redaction, before the addition of chapters on training and husbandry. Our text is consistently more accurate and elaborate than the first printed edition (Paris 1531/2; no U.S. copies). It gives the correct spellings of unusual ingredients, explicitly attributes more remedies to the three masters and includes FOUR UNPUBLISHED RECIPES. Much of our manuscript’s opening is absent from the print and manuscript copies I have examined, as is its closing sentence, Franchières’ advice to speak to the falcon in a sweet and gentle voice.
            In very good condition (light foxing, restored short worm trail in the gutter). From the libraries of Jean-Baptiste Huzard (1755-1838; Catalogue...deuxième partie 1842) 5003, subsequently rebound), Henri Gallice (1853-1930; bookplate) and Marcel Jeanson (1885-1942). In 1955, Jeanson’s heirs sold the manuscript to bookseller-bibliographer Jules Thièbaud; it then passed to Pierre du Verne d’Orcet 1892-1960; Bibliothèque cynégétique (2016) 98).
¶Richard, “La Fauconnerie de Jean de Francières et ses sources” in Le Moyen Âge 69 (1963) 893-902; Smets & Van den Abeele, “Manuscrits et traités de chasse français du Moyen Âge” in Romania 116 (1998) 336 (this copy); see Harting’s Bibliotheca Accipitraria 145 and Thièbaud’s Bibliographie des ouvrages français sur la chasse 427-8.

Item #09966

Price: $72,000.00