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Catalogue: Medical Poetry

Ḥifz al-ṣiḥḥah manzūum (MS P 25, item 3): (The Maintenance of Health, Versified); كتاب حفظ الصحه منظوم; possibly by Ismā‘īl ibn Muḥammad al-Ḥusayn al-Jurjānī (d. ca. 1136/531); اسماعيل بن محمد الحسين الجرجانى

Ismā‘īl ibn Muḥammad al-Ḥusayn al-Jurjānī was widely known for his Persian-language medical encyclopedia titled The Treasure of Khvarazm'Shah of which NLM has several versions (MS P 5) (MS P 14) (MS P 25, item 1). Jurjānī is known to have also written a treatise titled Ḥifz al-ṣiḥḥah (The Maintenance of Health); see Richter-Bernburg, "UCLA", p. 3 and p. 6 note 53. Whether the original treatise of that title composed by Jurjānī was in verse or in prose is not specified in the historical sources. It is also possible that this poem is related to the Persian treatise Risalah-i ḥifz al-ṣiḥḥah that is preserved in a manuscript at NLM, MS P 29, item 3 margin.

The author is not actually specified in the manuscript of this Persian poem. Since Jurjānī is known to have written a Persian treatise on such a topic, there is a strong possibility that this manuscript is either a copy of a metrical treatise written by Jurjānī in the early 12th century or it is a later versification by an unnamed poet of a prose essay by Jurjānī. On the other hand, an Arabic poem with a similar title (Urjūzah fī ḥifz al-ṣiḥḥah) attributed to Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna) is preserved today in two manuscript copies, and it is possible that this Persian poem was based on the Arabic original by Ibn Sīnā. For Ibn Sīnā's Arabic poem, see G.C. Anawati, Mu'allafat Ibn Sina: Essai de bibliographie Avicennienne (Cairo: Dar al-Ma‘arif, 1950), p. 177 no. 117.

The Persian versified treatise consists of seven sections (babs) and a conclusion (khatimah).

No other copies are recorded.

Ḥifz al-ṣiḥḥah manzūm (MS P 25, item 3)

Illustrations

Folio 80b from MS P 25 featuring the opening of Ḥifz al-ṣiḥḥah manzūum (The Maintenance of Health, Versified). The thick, opaque, slightly-glossy yellow-brown paper has only indistinct laid lines occasionally visible. The paper is waterstained. The treatise is written in two columns, with an unrelated prose text written in the margins. The text were written in a medium-small careful, professional ta‘liq tending toward naskh script. The text area has been frame-ruled, and space was allowed for frames to enclose the metrical treatise; Black ink with headings in red and green.

MS P 25, fol. 80b

The opening, with title, of the versification of a treatise on the maintenance of health. The name of the versifier is unknown. The original Persian treatise may have been by Jurjānī (d. ca. 1136/531 H), whose essay by that title is otherwise lost. The copy is undated but must predate 1791, when an owner's stamp was added.

Physical Description

Persian. 16 leaves (fols.80b-95a). Dimensions c. 22 x 13.2 (text area 17.5 x 19.2) cm; frames for central text 11.8 x 6.9 cm. 15 lines per page. No author is given. The title is provided at fol. 80b, line 2, as Kitāb Ḥifz al-ṣiḥḥah manzūm.

The copy is undated. The appearance of the paper, ink, and script suggests a date of the late 17th to early 18th century. It must have been completed before an owner's signature and stamp was placed in it in 1796/1211.

The metrical treatise is written in two columns on each folio, with an unrelated prose text (medicaments, in alphabetical order) written in the margins. The central text and the marginal text were executed by the same hand, in a medium-small careful, professional ta‘liq tending toward naskh script. The text area has been frame-ruled, and space was allowed for frames to enclose the metrical treatise; on earlier folios frames of two blue lines enclose the central text, but they were not drawn on the folios containing this item. Black ink with headings in red and green.

There are later interlinear and marginal notes.

The thick, opaque, slightly-glossy yellow-brown paper has only indistinct laid lines occasionally visible. The paper is waterstained. Some leaves have been repaired and strengthened; fols. 2 and 3 are guarded. The edges have been trimmed from their original size.

The volume consists of 162 leaves and one preliminary folio. The preliminary folio and folio 1a are blank. The volume contains a collection of 8 metrical treatises on medical topics in addition to a fragment of an encyclopaedia. Item 1 (fol. 1b) is a fragment of an abridgement of an encyclopaedia by Jurjānī (MS P 25, item 1); item 2 (fols. 2a-80a) is the poem by ‘Alī ibn shaykh Muḥammad ibn ‘Abd al-Raḥmān (MS P 25, item 2); item 3 (fols. 80b-95a) a poem possibly based on a treatise by Jurjānī that is here catalogued; item 4 (fols. 95a-98b) anon. poem on cure in a hour possibly based on a treatise by Rāzī (MS P 25, item 4); item 5 (fols. 99a-117a) versification of a treatise by Jaghmīnī (MS P 25, item 5); item 6 (fols. 117b-118a) anon. poem on leprosy (MS P 25, item 6); item 7 (fols. 118b-156b) anonymous Turkish poem with Persian commentary (MS P 25, item 7); item 8 (fols. 157b-160b) anon. poem on regimen and therapy (MS P 25, item 8); item 9 (fols. 161a-162a) anon. poem on materia medica (MS P 25, item 9). The marginal item (MS P 25, margin) occuring on fols. 2a-159a and 160a-162b is an anonymous prose treatise on materia medica and regimen. There are occasional unexplained blank central spaces on leaves where the marginal treatise continues around the edges of the folios. In two of these central blank spaces (fols. 75a and 76a) a much more recent and casual hand has placed two 16x16 magic squares. The order of the leaves comprising the volume may not be entirely correct.

Binding

The volume is bound in a modern library binding of pasteboards covered with tan leather, with "Khamrah Aghā, Jawāhir al-maqāl 1796" in gilt on the spine. There are modern pastedowns and endpapers.

Provenance

At five places in the volume (fols. 75a, 76a, 95a, 98b, and 162b) a later hand in a good calligraphic script has repeated the same statement: "The owner and possessor of this medical book called Jawāhir al-maqāl is Khamrah Aghā ibn Rustum ibn Muḥammad Aghā ibn Khiḍr Aghā ibn Mīr Khamrah ibn Mīr Mīzā ibn Aḥmad Beg, in the year 1211 [= 1796-7]." An owner's stamp accompanies these statements. Sommer (Schullian/Sommer, Cat. of incun. & MSS., p. 338) interpreted this name as referring to the compiler of the collection, giving the name as Khamrah Aghā ibn Rustam Aghā ibn Muḥammad; the name, however, is clearly that of a later owner.

The volume was purchased in 1941 by the Army Medical Library from A.S. Yahuda, who acquired it in Ebril in northern Iraq (ELS 1685 med 45).

References

Schullian/Sommer, p. 338 entry P25, where the name of an owner of the volume is misinterpreted as the compiler of the collection; Sommer also attributed the poem to Jurjani.

NLM Microfilm Reel: FILM 48-136 no. 5.