Treatises of fistula in ano, hæmorrhoids, and clysters / by John Arderne, from an early fifteenth-century manuscript translation. Ed., with introduction, notes, etc., by D'Arcy Power.

  • Arderne, John, active 1307-1370.
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Treatises of fistula in ano, hæmorrhoids, and clysters / by John Arderne, from an early fifteenth-century manuscript translation. Ed., with introduction, notes, etc., by D'Arcy Power. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    grenous inflammation of the vermiform appendix would present all the characters of poisoning to the lay mind. Failure after an operation was liable to be followed by the most undesirable consequences to the leech. King John of Bohemia, from whose body Edward the Black Prince took an ostrich feather for his crest, sewed up his French leech in a sack and threw him into the Oder because he had not cured his cataract as he had promised. Arderne must have led an interesting and adventurous life, and his treatises contain many sidelights on contemporary events. He appears to be the only contemporary authority for the story of the means by which Edward the Black Prince obtained the ostrich feather which has since become the cognisance of the heir apparent to the English throne. The passage runs as follows, “We are not able to cure rhagades unless the remedy can be put through the anus either as a clyster or by means of a suppository, since remedies applied outside are either useless or do very little good. We ought, therefore, to work with stimulating applications until the wound is clean, and afterwards with applications which both heal and dry, as has been said already in the chapter on internal piles, to wit, where Kastar is painted—and Nastar is a kind of clyster or enema known as a glister- pipe.—The feather of the Prince of Wales is also shown there, viz. on the preceding page. And note that Edward the eldest son of Edward King of England bore a similar feather above his crest, and he obtained the feather from the King of Bohemia, whom he killed at Cressy in France. And so he took the feather which is called an ‘ ostrich feather,’ which that most noble Lord King had used hitherto to bear above his crest. And in that year when our Lord the strenuous and warlike Prince departed to God, I wrote this little book of mine with my own hand, viz. in the year one thousand three hundred and seventy-six. And our Lord Edward the Prince died on the sixth June on Trinity Sunday at Westminster during the great Parliament, and may God assoil him, for he was the very flower of chivalry, without peer in the world.” 1 1 “Rhagades curare non possumus nisi medicinis infra anum inferamus aut in clystere aut modo suppositorii quia medicinae exterius appositae parum vel nihil prosunt, unde primo oportet cum corrosivis operare ad mundificationem et postea cum consolidantibus et desiccantibus ut praedictum est capitulo de haemor¬ rhoid. infra anum latentibus ubi nastare depingitur et penna Principis Walliae, viz. folio praecedente. Et nota quod talem pennam albam portabat Edwardus primogenitus filius Edwardi Regis Angliae, super crestam suam. Et illam pennam conquisivit de rege Boemo, quern interfecit apud Cresse in Francia. Et sic assumpsit sibi illam pennam quae dicitur ‘ Ostrich fether,’ quam prius Dominus Rex nobillissimus portebat super crestam suam et eodem anno quo