The Quadripertitus Hermetis in Anglo-Norman

Tony Hunt

he first book of the Cyranides, a Greek work in four books dealing with medicine and ,1 contains chapters in which Tthe making of a talisman is described, each talisman receiving its power from a precious stone, from the figure engraved on it, and from the part of a plant or animal joined to it. It is a compilation of two earlier works, one said to be by Kyranos, king of Persia, who in the prologue of the compilation attributes his knowledge to Trismegistos. The transmission of the translation of this work goes back to the 12th Century. In the little treatise derived from it and attributed to “Hermes”2 there is added a strong astrological element and the resulting Quadripertitus Hermetis thus treats of the fifteen stars, fifteen precious stones, fifteen plants, and the fifteen designs. It is simply one of a vast number of works surviving in late medieval manuscripts which are attributed to, or associated with, Hermes. It was used by Gower in Book 7 of the Confessio amantis.3 It was Ptolemy, mentioned in the Anglo-Norman redaction but not in the Latin, who distinguished fifteen stars of the first magnitude. The Greek text is lost and the Latin one that has survived is a translation of the summary version by Messalah in the 8th century. This Latin text was further reduced in the adaptation attributed by some to “Enoch,” by others to Thebith ben Corat. The present Anglo-Norman version of the Quadripertitus was first noticed by Paul Meyer and summarily

1 See Lynn Thorndike, A History of Magic and Experimental Science II (New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1923) 229-35. 2 The Latin text is edited from five manuscripts by Louis Delatte, Textes et vieux français relatifs aux Cyranides, Bibliothèque de la Faculté de Philosophie et Lettres de l’Université de Liège XCIII (Liège / Paris: Faculté de Philosophie et Lettres – Liège / Librairie Droz, 1942) 235-75, followed by the summary adaptation attributed to “Enoch,” 276-89. 3 See Confessio amantis, ed. Russell A. Peck, III, TEAMS (Kalamazoo: Western Michigan Univ. Press, 2004), Bk.7, vv. 1271-438, and notes on 453-55. 172 Tony Hunt recorded in the catalogue of Dean and Boulton.4 MS Cambridge, Trinity College 0.5.32 (1313) comprises two volumes, the first of which dates from the first half of the 14th century and is notable for a complex divinatory work with diagrams (fols. 1r-10v), without instructions for how to use it, sometimes known as Pronosticon Socratis Basilei,5 the Quadripertitus (fols. 11ra-16va), a section on numbers (fol. 16va/b), a treatise on land surveying (fols. 17ra-20ra), and more divinatory tables written in squares and columns (fols. 20v- 25r). They are succeeded by a lunary in Anglo-Norman verse (fols. 25va-28va), known as the Lunaire Salemon, a brief invocation to the Virgin (fol. 28va/b) and a list of perilous days (fol. 28vb). In the text of the Quadripertitus edited below I have omitted the symbols (imagines et caracteres) which accompany the final section of the treatise, just as they are omitted in Delatte=s edition of the Latin, and in MS Oxford, Bodleian Library Ashmole 1471 (fols. 50r-56r), because of their complexity.6 Additions to the Latin source are indicated by braces { }.

[Liber Hermetis de quindecim stellis, quindecim lapidibus, quindecim herbis, et quindecim imaginibus]

[fol. 11ra] Cy comence le livre Hermes le philosofre parlaunt des .15. esteilles greyndres fixes et .15. pieres preciouses, .15. herbes vertuouses et des .15. figures miraculouses.

Adounques entre moutz des autres choses que les aunciens sages moustreront en lour escritz, cestui Hermes, tresauncien piere des phylosofres et com des benoits dieux,7 fyst cest livre et le departi en quatre parties pur ceo que principalment quatre vertues des choses sount en ycele contenuz, c’est asavoir des esteilles, pieres, herbes et

4 See Paul Meyer, “Les Manuscrits français de Cambridge,” Romania 32 (1903):18- 120, here 115-6 and Ruth J. Dean & Maureen B.M. Boulton, Anglo-Norman Literature: A Guide to Texts and Manuscripts, ANTS O.S.3 (London: Anglo-Norman Text Society, 1999) no. 327. The Latin manuscripts are listed in Thorndike 220-21n7, who also refers to the Trinity translation. 5 See Tony Hunt, “Les Pronostics en anglo-normand: méthodes et documents,” in Richard Trachsler, ed., ‘Moult obscures paroles’. Études sur la prophétie médiévale (Paris: Presses de l’Université Paris-Sorbonne, 2007) 29-50, here 44. 6 The same symbols as in the Trinity copy are found in MS Oxford, Bodleian Library, Ashmole 341 fol. 127r/v, albeit with some loss of text owing to severe cropp- ing of the page. 7 “quasi unus ex benedictis a Deo philosophis,” 241/6.