Volume 2

Bibliographical notes on histories of inventions and books of secrets : Six papers read to the Archæological society of Glasgow April 1882-January 1888 / by John Ferguson.

  • John Ferguson
Date:
1895-1915
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Bibliographical notes on histories of inventions and books of secrets : Six papers read to the Archæological society of Glasgow April 1882-January 1888 / by John Ferguson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    219/408 (page 11)
    Andriessen’s Kunst-Boeck, 1549; but of the first part, relating to the removal of spots and stains, etc., I have found no Dutch or German original, although there is a general resemblance to the receipts which are contained in several of the collections. 17. The translator, who uses the initials L. M. only, was, it is generally agreed, Leonard Mascall, of whom notices are given by Fuller,* Tanner,! and others, and a summary of them by Thomson Cooper. J According to these authorities, he belonged to an old family settled at Plumsted, in Sussex; was the first, says Fuller, “who brought over into England from beyond the seas Carps and Pippins . . . about the fifth year of the reign of King Henry the Eighth, Anno. Dom. 1514,” though Cooper and others call this statement erroneous. The “ Registrum parochiae de Farnham Royal comit. Buckingh.” was written “per me Leonardum Mascall generosum, clericum coquinae de hospitio reverendissimi patris dom. Matthaei Cantuar. archiepiscopi. 25 Jun. a.d. mdlxxiii.”; that is, he was clerk of the kitchen in the hospitium of Matthew Parker, archbishop of Canterbury. Tanner adds that he died and was buried at Farnham Royal, 10 May, 1589, but Fuller says: “The time of his death is to me unknown.” Donaldson’s § account of Mascall is different. He says that nothing is known of his parentage, birth, education, or general employments: he only relates of himself that he was chief farrier to King James, and dedicated his work [on cattle] to Sir Edward Montague Knight. His practical know- ledge, adds Donaldson, “relates chiefly to diseases, with a small notice of the animal and its breeding, but such as it is, a large advancement was made by it towards an improved practice.” Donaldson also says that Mascall “has always been reckoned a genius in that department of human industry,” meaning agriculture. * Thomas Fuller, The History of the Worthies of England, London, 1662, II., p. 113. t Thomas Tanner, Bibliotheca Britannico-Hibernica, Londini, 1748, p. 517. % Dictionary of National Biography, London, 1893, XXXVI., p. 404. §John Donaldson, Agricultural Biog7-aphy: containing a Notice of the Life and Writings of the British Authors on Agriculture, from the earliest date in 1480 to the