SOURCE: “Introduction,” in Healing and Society in Medieval England: A Middle English Translation of the Pharmaceutical Writings of Gilbertus Anglicus, Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1991, pp. xv-lxxiii.

In the following excerpt, Getz provides background information about the nature and importance of Gilbertus Anglicus's collection of pharmaceutical recipes.

The Middle English Gilbertus Anglicus consists for the most part of medicinal recipes, grouped according to the diseases for which they were useful. These recipes in turn were arranged roughly from the head downward, with the text divided into chapters that are introduced by simple guides for diagnosis. The text also defined for its readers many Latin medical terms. The Gilbertus translation shares material with other Middle English recipe collections, although it is not clear whether the Middle English or Latin version of the Compendium was the source of this shared material.

The recipes found in the Middle English Gilbertus derive...