Medical Lenten sermons: Libro muy provechoso para todo fiel christiano intitulado sermonario quadragessimal medicinal

VACA (Gabriel), O.F.M. Libro muy prouechosso par todo fiel christiano, Intitulado Sermonario Quadragessimal Medicinal. Valladolid: a costa del licenciado Antonio de Sopuerta y de Andres Fanega Mercader de libros ([printed] en cassa de Sebastian Martinez), 1553.

A rare and unusual collection of medically-themed Lenten sermons intended for delivery throughout the period of Lent; believed to exist only in a handful of copies in Spain and Brazil. In Spanish vernacular.

The titlepage features a striking woodcut overprinted in red depicting a bed-bound invalid appealing to Christ on the cross, with the phrase 'infirmus sum sana me domine' (Ps. 6:3, 'Heal me Lord, I am weak', with words transposed). The First Wednesday sermon (f.ix) bears a small woodcut within the letter 'D' showing Joseph fleeing Potiphar's wife, a symbol of the temptations of moral sin in Christian iconography. Also features a small woodcut of the crucifixion with the Virgin & St. John, on f. [2] with motto 'Michi absit gloriari nisi in cruce domini nostri Iesu Christi' [St. Paul. Letter to the Galatians 6.14], and a large woodcut device (featuring a putti) on verso of last leaf with motto from St. Paul [To the Philippians 2, 10 - At the name of Jesus every knee shall bow …]

The author, Gabriel Vaca was a Franciscan friar. Throughout the sermon he draws parallels between the treatment and well-being of the soul - through prayer, contemplation and devotion - and that of the physical body. Physiological ailments and practical medical procedures are detailed and encapsulate traditional, humoral understandings of the body sat alongside emerging, empirical approaches to medical science typical of the period.

This type of medical sermon was known as a quadragessimal medicinal, i.e. a sermon delivered on the last Sunday of Lent, or during the Lent period - Quadragesima means 'Lent' - the Lenten fast consisted of or lasted for 40 days, a period of reflection on human frailty.

The following information was provided by Dr Hazel Tubman, Maggs Bros:

"A rare and unusual collection of Lenten sermons with medical language, procedures and themes at their core; the only copy known outside Spain.

The striking woodcut on the title page, unusually and laboriously 'perked', or overprinted in red, depicts a bed-bound invalid appealing to Christ on the cross, with the phrase 'infirmus sum sana me domine' (Ps. 6:3, Heal me Lord, I am weak, with words transposed). Accordingly, over the course of these sermons and indicated by the term 'Comparacion' in the margin, the writer, a Franciscan friar, draws parallels between the treatment and well-being of the soul - through prayer, contemplation and devotion - and that of the physical body. The Lenten period traditionally being one of reflection on human frailty - as cited on fol. xi, 'man is made from, and shall return to dust' - the consistent use of medical metaphor here is fitting, and notable.

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the physical state of the body as a hint of its spiritual condition was a popular and established trope in religious writing and sermonizing, both before and after the Reformation, and for Catholic and Protestant alike; 'the bodies of men and women were all at once a marvel of anatomy, a subject of art and a metaphor for Christian society. The body continued to serve as a barometer of the soul' and 'provided evidence of moral degradation' (C.H.Parker, 'Diseased Bodies, defiled souls: Corporality and Religious Difference in the Reformation', Renaissance Quarterly, 2014, 1278-92).

Unusually, here medical detail is used solely as a point of comparison, rather than as an indicator of, spiritual wellbeing. Not only that, but alongside calling on the then standard authorities on physical health - Galen and Avicenna - and discussing the humours, the author here describes physiological ailments and practical medical procedures in some detail; in many ways, encapsulating the shape of thought in this period, in which traditional, humoral understandings of the body sat alongside emerging, empirical approaches to medical science.

Thus, in the prologue, the theologian Antonio de Sopuerta begins by stating that the doctor cannot cure a patient with medicine, without first evacuating the humours which rule the body. He quotes Aristotle (De anima 2) who says 'Actus activorum in patiente [et] praedisposito' and goes on to compare the approach to physical and spiritual health and how the soul's doctor must proceed. In contrast, the sermons themselves contain practical medical references, and describe, for example, sandalwood oil and 'unguente blanco' being used to treat different ailments (fol. xii); the care taken by a surgeon when faced with a significant arm wound (fol. xxxiii); bloodletting (fol. lviii); the impact of hot weather on health (fol. lxxxiii); diet (fol. xxiv); and regular bowel movements (fol. xc), among others. Bloodletting in particular is returned to, with a later passage (fol. xcvii) describing the need for the insertion of a warm needle to successfully draw blood; there are also repeated references to 'las llagas', sores, and their treatment.

All the medical knowledge and examples deployed appear to relate to minor procedures, and in their anecdotal, experiential feel are a fitting representation of the relationship between the Franciscan order, and medicine & the natural sciences in the early modern period. Alongside long-standing interest in and research into the natural sciences - from philosopher and experimental scientist Roger Bacon (c.1220-1292), to early engagement with alchemy in the production of medical remedies (see Campbell, et al. 'Alchemy and the Mendicant Orders of Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe', Ambix, 2018, 201-9) - the Franciscans were a mendicant order: their work took them beyond monastic confines and was crucially centred around preaching to and engagement with wider society. Thus, they 'acted as physicians from the very beginning of the Order, since they regarded it as their duty to nurse the sick' (Fr. J.M. Lenhart, 'Science in the Franciscan Order: A Historical Sketch', Franciscan Studies, Jan. 1924, 5-44) and reputedly played an important role in the treatment of plague sufferers during the Black Death.

The 'public' nature of their work may also account for the strong connection of Franciscans with preaching. Lenten sermons, or sermons quadragesimales, have been written since the time of the Fathers and throughout the Middle Ages, authored by, for example, Bernardino of Siena, by Olivier Maillard, by Petrus de Palude and by Savonarola. There were dozens of editions (most in Italian) of those by Robert Caracciolo (d. 1495), a fifteenth-century Franciscan who was made bishop of Aquino and Lecce, and the Franciscan tradition (which of course extended to sermons on other liturgical seasons) extended into the sixteenth century. The sermons here are to be delivered throughout Lent on Sunday, Wednesday and Friday and begin with that for Ash Wednesday. The last sermon is that for the Resurrection (beginning on f. 140v), following a lengthy sermon on the Stations of the Cross.

1553

1 volume The titlepage has been printed in black and over printed in red. In this case, the red additions are both decorative - highlighting parallel iconographic details in the surrounding border - and as a way of drawing attention to the title of the work and the author: ' Libro muy prouechosso par todo fiel christiano' (true book for all faithful Christians) and 'Compuesta por el padre fray Gabriel Vaca predicor (composed by father Gabriel Vaca).

Gabriel Vaca was a Franciscan author (dates unknown). Sebastian Martinez (fl. 1551-3) was an established publisher of medical publications in Spain at the time, presumably in Valladollid where this was printed - the collection has another publication by him from 1551: Libro de la anothomia del hombre / (Book of the anatomy of man) [Bernardino Montaña de Monserrate] which also bears a special title page according to the catalogue - a shield with the lettering 'Ave Maria' Antonio de Sopuerta (dates unknown) was a 16th century theologian who appears to have funded the compilation according to the inscription. He is described as a 'licenciado' in the publication line and, interestingly, was also recorded as such in a 1541 trial for bigamy in Veracruz in Mexico where he is recorded as the visitador of the diocese there - see 'Heretical Plagues' and Censorship Cordons: Colonial Mexico and the Transatlantic Book Trade, Church History, Vol 75, Issue 1, March 2006, footnote 61. Andres Fanega (dates unknown) was a 'Mercader de libros', a book merchant according to the publication line.

Purchased from Maggs Bros, Sep 2020.

Inscription on the title page of the Jesuit Biblioteca de Montilla, in the province of Cordoba. M.A. Sanchez Herrador lists a copy of this title in his inventory of the library (see La biblioteca del colegio de la encarnacion de los Jesuitas de Montilla (unpubl. DPhil thesis, Cordoba, 2015)), very likely this copy; the library was dispersed in 1774 after the suppression of the order and the majority moved to Cordoba (see pp.76-9) where this volume entered. The Episcopal Library of Cordoba, with inscription on title page in an eighteenth-century hand. Also inscribed on the title page are the Inquisitor's approval at the head, dated 1707, and a contemporary price note at the foot, presumably for the text without the binding ('five reales the paper').