Simon, Kilian

Album of architectural sketches, designs for mazes, an astronomical and agricultural calendar, extracts, notes, and quotations in German and Latin: with a few medical receipts. On the first leaf within a pen-drawn architectural frame is written: 'In usum P. Kiliani Simon Ord. S. Ben. ad S. Stephan Wirceb[urg] Professi 1740'. The first 61 ff. contain 'oeconomicae et astronomicae ex antiquitate collectae'-a kind of agricultural calendar, in German. The medical receipts are found on the versos of ff. 2-68: they have a title: 'Verschiedene versuchte and approbirte Haus-Mittel für allerley Zuständt and Kranckheiten'. The latest date, 1771, is found in a chronogram in pencil on fol. 143v. Produced in Würzburg.

1740 -1771

1 volume 148 ff. obl. 8vo. 121/2 × 14 cm. Original morocco binding, with brass clasp. Fol. 145 has been cut out.

Purchased at Sotheby's 10/5/1923, Lot 301.

In Sotheby's Catalogue this MS. is entered under 'Kilian', but it seems more probable that the Author's name was 'Simon'-possibly a member of the Kilian family. An artist Philip Andreas Kilian [1714-1759] is recorded-but he did not live at Würzburg, and was not a Benedictine monk.

Database description transcribed from S.A.J. Moorat, Catalogue of Western Manuscripts on Medicine and Science in the Wellcome Historical Medical Library (London: Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, 1962-1973).

From the Rosenheim Collection, with a label and press-mark 'A.i.'