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BY ANDREW BOORDE by W “THE BREVIARIE OF HEALTH” BY ANDREW BOORDE By W. G. AITCHISON ROBERTSON, M.D. EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND T is not difficult to discover in reading To his patron, Cromwell, he sent from this early medical work that we have in Spain “the seedes off reuberbe, the whiche it an example of the priest-physician, a come owtt off Barbary. In thes partes very usual combination in the early ytt ys had for a grett tresure.” In April, days of medical practice. 1536, he wrote to Cromwell: IAndrew Boorde or Borde was born at I am now in Skotland, in a lytle unyversyte Boords Hill, near Cuckfield, in Sussex, of study named Glasco, where I study and England, about 1490, and thirty years later practyce physyk . for the sustentacyon off he was appointed suffragan bishop of my lyuyng . trust yow no Skott, for they Chichester. He belonged to the Carthusian wyll yowse flatteryng wordes; and all ys order of monks and for many years lived falshode ... it is naturelly geuen, or els it is an austere life of fasting, abstaining from of a deuellyshe dysposicion of a Scottysh man, all animal food. At length, however, in the not to love nor favour an Englishe man. year 1528, we find him writing to the prior A year later he returned south but the of Hinton Charterhouse “I am nott able to inhabitants of London seem to have treated byd the rugorositie off your relygyon.” him as badly as the Scotch, calling him an This brought him a dispensation, and sub­ apostate and a good-for-nothing, and other­ sequently he traveled abroad “for to have wise slandering him. the notycyon and practes of Physyche in After the dissolution of the monasteries by divers regyons and countres.” He returned Henry viii, in 1538, Boorde set out on a to England in 1530. prolonged tour through Europe, traveling Having ^tended the Duke of Norfolk in a as far as Jerusalem. He remained at Mont­ dangerous illness and having thus secured pellier for some time “the most nobilis his favor, Boorde was “convocated to universite of the world for phisicions and wayte on his prepotent mageste,” Henry surgions; the hed universite in all Europe VIII. Not satisfied with his medical education for the practes of physyche.” and desirous to “have a trewe cognyscyon If he had not already written, it was at of the practes of Physyche” he visited “uny- Montpellier he completed his “Fyrst Boke versities and scoles approbated” including of the Introduction of knowledge,” his Orleans, Poictiers, Toulouse and Mont­ “Dyetary,” his “Breuyary of Health”^ and pellier, in France, Wittenberg in Germany his (now lost) “Boke of Berdes” (beards). and, in company with nine Englishmen and The latter is known only through the publi­ Scotchmen, he went on a pilgrimage to cation, “Barnes in the defence of the Rome and Compostella. On returning to Berde,” or “The Treatise answeryinge the England in 1534 he again submitted to the boke of Berdes, compyled by Colleyn discipline of Charterhouse where he was Clowte, dedycated to Barnarde barber “keppt in thrawldome” until liberated by dwelling in Banbery, 1543.” Boorde had his friend Cromwell. The latter sent him evidently written in condemnation of the abroad on a political mission. In a letter to wearing of beards, but here he is accused of Cromwell, dated June 20, 1535, from Bor­ having become drunk in the house of a deaux he writes, “few frendys Ynglond Dutchman, and of having vomited over his hath in theys partes of Europe (Normandy, long beard so that he had to shave it off France, Gascony, Bayonne, Castille, Spain, next morning because of its vile odor. Portugal, etc.) as Jesus, your louer knowth.” 1 Published in 1547. Boorde was again in London in 1542 and of our Soverayne Lorde Kyng Henry the from here he removed to Winehester. A Eyght. companion book to the Breviaric, his This black letter work has been reprinted “Astronamye,” he “dyd wrctt and make in the early English Text Society’s scries, this boke in iiii daycs, and wrcttcn with edited by F. J. Furnivall, m.a. and published one old pen with out mcndyng.” His later in 1870. days, however, were passed under a cloud, The “Breviaric of Health” consists of a for Dr. John Poynet, bishop of Winchester, compendium of diseases arranged without records in 1556 that “within this right method, though nominally the subjects arc yere” it was proved before the justices grouped under their Greek or Arabic names. that Boorde had kept three loose women in Each subject begins with a short descrip­ his chamber at Winchester “and the harlots tion of the meaning and derivation of the openly in the stretes and great churchc of title. This is followed by a brief account of Winchester were punished.” On April 9, the causes of the disease, succeeded by 1549, Boorde made his will in the Fleet “a remedy” which consists mainly of an prison in London to which he had been re­ enumeration of the various drugs which may moved “on its being discovered that he had be administered. A better conception of the kept a brothel for his brother-bachelors” work may be arrived at by citing passages and where he died (it is said from poison in it, then by endeavoring to summarize which he had taken) on the 25th of the the treatise as a whole. same month. It is stated that Boorde was the author of The Breviarie of Health; wherein doth follows several other books, but as they are no longer Remedies, for all maner of sicknesses and diseases, the which may be a man or woman, in existence, it is impossible to determine expressing the obscure terms of Greeke, Araby, their authorship. In his Introduction to the Latin, Barbary and English, concerning Physick “Fyrst Boke of the Introduction of Knowl­ and Chirurgerie. edge,” the first printed specimen of the Compiled by Andrew Boord, Doctor of Gypsy language is found in his description Phisicke; an Englishman: now newly corrected of Egypt. He alludes to the Englishman’s and amended, with some approved medicines whimsicality in dress in these lines printed that never were in print before this impression below a rude woodcut of an Englishman and are aptly placed in their proper chapters by standing naked with a pair of scissors in one men skilfull in Physicke and Chirurgerie. hand and a piece of cloth in the other: Imprinted at London by Thomas Este, 1598. The book ends: I am an Englishman, and naked I stand here, Musyng in my mynd what rayment I shal were; Here endeth the first booke examined in For now I wyll were this, and now I wyll were that; Seforde in June the yere of our Lord 1546 and Now I wyl were I cannot tel what. in the raigne of our Soverayne Lord King Henry the Eyght, King of England, Frauixce and The full title of “The Fyrst Boke of Ireland the xxxviii yere. Knowledge” runs: A part of the prologue is as follows: The fyrst Boke of the Introduction of A Prologue to Phisitions egregious doctours knowledge. The whyche dothe teache a man to and maisters of the Eximious and Archane speake parte of all maner of languages, and to Science of physick, of your Urbanitie exasperate know the usage and fashion of all maner of not your selves against mee, for making of this countreys. And for to know the moste parte of little volume of phisicke. Considering that my all maner of coynes of money, the whych is pretence is for an utilitie and a common wealth. currant in every region. Made by Andrew Borde, You to be extolled and highlie to bee preferred of Physicke Doctor; Dedycated to the Right that hath, and doth studie, practise and labour Honourable and gracious lady Mary, daughter this sayde Archane Science, to the which none inarcious persons can nor shall attaine to the fast to the Crosse for our sinnes and redemption. knowledge; yet fooles and incipient persons will Then first let him call to him his spirituall enterprise to smatter and to meddle to minister phisitian, which is his ghostlie father, and let medicines; a fie on such a one now a days will him make his conscience cleane and that he bee practise either by a bluide booke. O Lord what in perfect love and charity and if he have done a great detriment is this to the noble science of any wrong let him make restitution if he can physicke that ignorant persons will enterprise and let him make a formall will or testament to meddle with the ministration of phisicke . settling everything in a dew order for the wealth A phisition must have surely his astronimy to of his soule. Then let the pacient provide for know how, when and at what tyme everye his body and take counsell of some expert medicine ought to bee ministered. I have now phisitian. He must take care not to displease discharged my conscience in showing the truth the phisitian or chirurgion, for if so ther is as God knoweth, who send all manner of neither Lord nor Ladye can have any service or phisitions a true knowledge in phisicke, that pleasure of them. they the which be sick and diseased may have The Preface to the Readers of this booke: a remedie. Gentle Readers, I have taken some paine in A Propheme to Chirurgions (abbreviated). making this booke to doe sicke men pleasure Masters of Chirurgerie ought to bee experte in and whole men profit.
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