Articles

Medieval Women's Guides to Food

during Pregnancy: Origins,
Texts, and Traditions*
MELITTA WEISS-AMER

Abstract. The dietary guidelines contained in medieval Arabic, Latin, and

vernacular pregnancy-regimens are analyzed and their origins explored. In
their emphasis on eating disorders such as morning-sickness and pica, the texts
are shown to follow more closely Greek, Roman, and Byzantine sources than
the conservative pregnancy-regimens of Hindu medicine, although medieval
Arabic compilers were familiar with both the Eastern and Western tradition. A
shift in audience from professional and male to lay and female is observed
when the Latin pregnancy-regimensof school medicine are translated into the
vernacular and later printed either separately or in conjunction with books on
midwifery and gynecology.
R6sum6. Ce texte analyse les origines et la nature des directives dietetiques
contenues dans les regimes alimentaires pour femmes enceintes, b i t s en
langues arabe, latine ou vernaculaires. En insistant sur les d6ordres nutritionnels comme la ccmaladie du matin* et le pica, ces textes montrent qu'ils s'inspirent davantage de sources grecques, romaines ou byzantines, que des
regimes similaires proposes par la mkdecine hiidoue -quoique les compilateurs arabes connussent aussi bien la tradition orientale que celle de ltOccident.
Un glissement de l'ecoute, qui passe de l'homme professionnel A celle de la
femme, plus concernhe par les questions pratiques, est observe lorsque les
regimes de l'ecole latine de medecine sont traduits en langues vernaculaires, et
lorsque, plus tard, ils sont imprimes sbparement ou A l'interieur des livres
d'obstbtrique ou de gyn6cologie.

In the twentieth century prenatal care has evolved into a specialized

field of medicine for which entire clinics are set aside, equipped with
Melitta Weiss-Amer, Department of Modern Languages and Literatures and Department
of History of Medicine, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario N6A 3K7.

CBMH/BCHM / Volume 10:1993 / p. 5-23

MELITTA WEISS-AMER

the latest in monitoring technology. In her book The Captured Womb,

Ann Oakley follows this development, which has gradually turned
pregnancy into a "pathological" state closely supervised by the medical profession.' Although the author denies that prenatal care in the
modern sense of the word existed in earlier centuries, she concedes
that "some idea of taking care of pregnant women has. . . been built
into most societies' ways of managing childbirth throughout h i s t ~ r y . " ~
What exactly this idea was with respect to the nutrition of the pregnant
woman is the subject of this article.
Realizing that the food eaten during pregnancy affects both the
mother and the child, and therefore not just the present but also future
generations, medical writers over thousands of years have felt the need
to address the issue in some form or other.3In the Middle Ages such information was usually contained in the pregnancy-regimens of school
medicine, which were conservative in nature and which dealt with topics in addition to food, such as air, exercise and rest, sleep and waking,
repletion and excretion, and the passions and emotions of the pregnant
woman. Although Western school medicine was firmly rooted in the
Greek tradition, the pregnancy-regimen as a genre of medical literature
is non-existent in the works of Hippocrates and Galen. It is only with
Byzantine authors such as Oribasius, Aetius of Amida, and Paul of
Aegina that we find the beginnings of this type of literature. However,
with the exception of Aetius, these writers still show a strong orientation towards pathology, focusing on disorders and their correction
rather than on conservation and hygiene, a slant which is characteristic
of Greek medicine as a whole. A system of prenatal care which stressed
conservation and hygiene can be found in Ancient Hindu medicine,
and like its medieval Arabic and European counterparts, Sanskrit pregnancy-regimens prescribed a comprehensive lifestyle for the pregnant
woman, ranging from the air she breathed and the food she ate to the
right amount of exercise and sleep as well as attention to her emotional
well-being.
With regard to the nutrition of the pregnant woman, three major
themes emerge in the examined Hindu and Graeco-Roman sources:
morning sickness, pica, and the diet for optimal fetal development. But
not all of them were considered of equal importance in the respective
cultures. When the Arabs made the conservative pregnancy-regimen
an integral part of the medical discourse, they had access to both the
Hindu and Graeco-Roman tradition. This raises the question of what
role, if any, Sanskrit literature played in shaping the medieval Arabic
concept of nutrition during pregnancy, which was later adopted by European school medicine and lived on in Latin and the vernacular well
into the early modern period.

Medieval Women's Guides to Food during Pregnancy

HINPU, GREEK, AND ROMAN SOURCES

In Hindu medicine Rasa, the digestive product of the mother's food, is

listed as one of the five factors responsible for procreation, together
with mother, father, soul, and wholesomeness.4With such a prominent
position being ascribed to food, it is not surprising that early Sanskrit
compilations of medicine such as the Ayurveda of Caraka and SuSruta
provide ample information on the correct nutrition of the pregnant
woman. SuSruta warns of "dry, stale and dirty food as well as that prepared overnight," and recommends food that is "amply sweet, palatable (Hridya), well-cooked, prepared with appetising drugs and
abounding in fluid s~bstances."~
Before and during pregnancy a
woman is to avoid certain foodstuffs and eating habits which, according to Caraka, can result in impairment of pregnancy, abortion, or an
offspring suffering from diseases. They include the intake of sharp and
hot food, too much or too little food, and the addiction to "wine, inguana [sic] flesh, pork, fish, sweet, sour, pungent, bitter, and astringent
foodstuffs, as well a ~ s a l t . " ~
Both texts then provide a sophisticated diet-plan which is to be adjusted according to the month(s) of pregnancy. SuSruta's regimen, for
instance, contains the following guidelines:

Special regimen during the period of Gestation:

During the first three months of pregnancy an enciente [sic] should partake of
food abounding in sweet, cool and fluid articles. Several medical authorities
recommend a food made of Shashtika rice with milk, to be given to her specially in the jhird month of gestation, with curd in the fourth, with milk in the
fifth and with clarified butter in the sixth month of pregnancy. Food largely
composed of milk and butter, as well as relishing (Hridya) food with the soup
of the flesh of jhngalti (wild) animals should be given to her in the fourth, food
with milk and clarified butter in the fifth, adequate quantity of clarified butter
prepared with (the decoction of) Svadamshtrl, or gruel (Yavlgu) in the sixth;
and clarified butter prepared with (the decoction of) the Prithak-parnylcli
group in adequate quantities in the seventh month of gestation. These help the
foetal development.. . . Henceforth up to the time of delivery the enciente
should have liquid food (Yavlgu) made up of emollient substances (fats) and
soup of the flesh of Jlngala animals (deer, etc.). If treated on these lines the enciente remains healthy and strong, and parturition becomes easy and unattended with evils.'

These minute dietary rules have no counterpart in Greek medicine.

Heinrich Fasbender,who in the nineteenth century studied the material on obstetrics and gynecology contained in the Corpus Hippocraticum, and compared it with that in Hindu medicine, came to the conclusion that while there are common traits, Sanskrit literature was much
more detailed in some areas, especially dietetics of pregnancy and del i v e r ~As
. ~ to the latter, the Ayurveda of SuSruta has, for instance, gone

MELITTA WEISSAMER

down in history as one of the earliest testimonies for a Caesarean operation performed on a dead woman, a procedure not mentioned in the
Corpus Hippocratic~m.~
More recently, Jean Filliozat in his book on the
origins of Indian medicine and its Greek parallels, has argued that in
particular the Hippocratic texts Diseases of Women and Nature of Woman
were strongly influenced by Indian medicine, and that the Persians
may have acted as mediators in the transfer of knowledge prior to the
expedition of Alexander.lo
Hippocrates, in commenting on the diseases of pregnant women, repeatedly mentions mistakes in nutrition as a factor which can cause
abortions. Pregnant women suffering from anorexia or fainting, or consuming too much or too little food are in danger of aborting, and so are
women who in the early stages of their pregnancy eat and drink acrid
and bitter things they are not used to, or substances which upset their
stomach.ll
In his description of the symptoms of pregnancy, Hippocrates mentions cravings for strange foods and a reduced intake of food due to
loss of appetite and nausea.12When the cravings of the mother are for
things which are not normally used as foodstuffs, and when such desires are met, this can have detrimental consequences for the child, as
the author explains in the Book on Superfetation: "Si une femme enceinte
a envie de manger de la terre ou des charbons, et en mange, l'enfant qui
est mis au monde porte sur la tete LIII signe provenant de ces ~ h o s e s . " ~ ~
The Hippocratic text most often quoted in medieval Arabic and Latin
compendia of medicine is the collection of Aphorisms, of which Book V
is devoted to human reproduction. But unlike the Ayuroeda with its
abundance of material on prenatal care, or the above-mentioned works
of the Corpus Hippocraticum with their occasional dietetic references, it
contains virtually no information regarding the diet and lifestyle of the
pregnant woman.14
Galen, the most prolific writer of the Graeco-Roman period, likewise
ascribes a relatively minor role to the conservative aspects of pregnancy. This is not surprising, given that, as Joseph Needham has
pointed out, only 7 percent of Galen's works deal with human reproduction, compared with 37 percent in Aristotle or 31 percent in Albertus Magnus.15 Although Ursula Weisser raises doubts as to the accuracy of such a statistic, it nevertheless can be seen as an indication
that pregnancy was an area Galen was not particularly interested in.16
A phenomenon he does describe in detail, however, is an eating disorder common in many pregnant women, which he calls citta.
This desire usually occurs in women abounding in an exceedingly bad humor
and in pregnant women, and it is called citta. This desire makes them crave

Medieval Women's Guides to Food during Pregnancy

sour, very bitter, and sometimes acrid things, or on occasion even Cimolean
earth, shells, extinguished coals, or certain strange foods.''

According to Galen, this stage is followed by vomiting and nausea in

the fourth month. In his etiology of citta the author is strongly indebted
to Hippocrates and in addition may have drawn from Aristotle's Generation of Animals, especially in his explanation of the causes for the disorder, as the following quotations from Galen and Aristotle, respectively, illustrate:
For in the first two months the fetus attracts to itself too little blood, because it
is still small, since at that time what is contained in the uterus is not yet called
fetus, but that which has been conceived. As it gets bigger, however, and uses
more food, and consumes not just the best of what is in the veins, as I have said
earlier, but needs a variety of things, it also consumes blood of lesser quality together with the rest.

. . . and most women are troubled in this way rather more at the beginning,
just after they have conceived, because although the fetation is able to prevent
the evacuation, yet as it is so small it does not at first use up any amount of the
residue; afterwards, when it does take up some of it, it relieves the trouble.lB

When Pliny wrote his Natural History in the first century AD, he included a section on pregnancy, abortion, and delivery in Book VII. In
his description of the signs of pregnancy he, in keeping with his Greek
forerunners, puts strong emphasis on women's eating disorders. "On
the tenth day from conception pains in the head, giddiness and dim
sight, distaste for food, and vomiting are symptoms of the formation of
the embryo."19 And although he does not give a detailed account of the
right diet during pregnancy, he does provide an example of the bad effects mistakes in nutrition can have on the progeny: "mothers eating
food that is too salty bear children lacking nails."20
Pregnant women's cravings for thirfgs not normally associated with
food continued to capture the imagination of the male medical community during the Graeco-Roman period as well. In the second century
AD Soranus of Ephesus was the first to deal with female physiology
and human reproduction separately. In his Gynacia he devotes seven
questions to cittosis, and gives the following definition of the disorder
which he calls cissa:
37. What is cissa?
The craving for unusual food which occurs in pregnant women at a certain
time together with an unstable stomach, an abundance of humors, and nausea.21

He maintains that cissa normally starts in the second month of pregnancy and in some cases may last almost until delivery. Among the

10'

MELITTA WEISSAMER

remedies he mentions are the occasional day of fasting or, if this is not
possible, many small meals preceded by water and followed by wine,
as well as dry and astringent foods.22
Soranus's work, parts of which have come down to us only in the
fifth: and sixth-century translations of Caelius Aurelianus and Moschi0n,2~does not yet contain a conservative list of foodstuffs for optimal fetal development of the type found in Hindu, Arabic, or European pregnancy-regimens.
The first comprehensive set of guidelines for prenatal care was put
together by Oribasius in the fourth century AD. In Book V, Chapter 1,
of his Synopsis, he describes the disorders common in pregnant women
and provides the appropriate regimen to correct the various afflict i o n ~Not
. ~ ~surprisingly, all of them are eating disorders: overeating,
frequent vomiting, increased secretion of saliva, heartburn, and nausea. Against vomiting and over-eating he recommends walks, foods
that are not too bitter and not too sweet, fragrant white wines (especially when they are five years old), drinking in moderation, a medicinal potion to be taken before and after the meal, as well as a cataplasm
to be applied externally on the cardia. Heartburn is cured by drinking
small sips of warm water, by taking leisurely walks, and by putting
soft wool on the abdomen. Work and more or less extended trips are
also a means to restore the pregnant woman's appetite. Nausea is
cured by eating a variety of savory foods and dry starch. The latter is
especially beneficial to women who have a craving for earth. Large
women who suffer from nausea should on occasion eat acrid things,
particularly mustard. The regimen ends with various cures for oedematose feet.
Aetius of Amida, a sixth-century Byzantine compiler, provides an
extended version of Oribasius's regimen in Book XVI of the Tetrabiblon
which deals with gynecology and obstetric^.^^ Chapter 10, entitled
"Concerning the Morbid Appetite (Pica) of the Pregnant Woman, According to Galen," begins with an etymology of the disorder which,
Aetius maintains,
gets its name (pica) from the noisy bird, the magpie. On the other hand, others
feel that the name is derived from the ivy plant which is called citta by the
Greeks. It is so called because the ivy is wont to attach itself to any nearby
plant. So women suffering from the pica crave various foods which are either
sensuous or di~agreeable.~~

While Aetius's association of the ailment with the plant ivy was not
taken up by later authors, the association with the magpie has survived
in medical textbooks from ancient Byzantium until the modem era. According to Paul of Aegina, a seventh-century Byzantine writer who
copied Oribasius's regimen almost verbatim, pica was named after a

'

Medieval Women's Guides to Food during Pregnancy

bird for two possible reasons: the bird's variety of colors, or its proneness to the same afflictionaZ7
Francis Adams identifies the bird as the
jay (Corvus glandarius), whereas Julius Berendes suggests the German
translation Holzheher (Garrulus glandarius), and points to the North
American blue jay (Cyanocitta cristata) which has citta as part of its
name. However, since all three terms cissa, citta, and pica appear in the
scientific names of birds of the genus Cowidae, a precise identification
of the animal in question is very d i f f i ~ u l tModern
.~~
medical dictionaries generally agree that it is the magpie after which the disorder was
Following his etymology of pica, Aetius gives an explanation of its
causes and symptoms in which he shows familiarity with a tradition
that can be traced back to Galen, Aristotle, and hippo crate^.^^ Aetius's
subsequent regimen, though similar to that of Oribasius, is much more
detailed when it comes to the foods that are recommended and those
that are harmful to women suffering from pica:
They should abstain from sweet foods eaten with bread; they should drink old,
tawny, fragrant wine which is a little tart. The fluid ifitake should be moderate
so that the food may not remain undigested in the stomach. It is advisable to
serve before the meal preserved olives with soft bread; also five to seven bitter
almonds, or coarse barley meal kneaded with the juice of Cretan pomegranates, or endive, or marsh grown asparagus or lettuce. And also poultry which is
not too fat nor too strong. Also it is advisable to give pig's feet, snout and stomach, and freshly caught fish. After meals, one should give raisins, pomegranates and pears. All these are to be given in a moderate quantity; and those who
have an aversion to eating must be enticed by a delightful variety of foods.
Those who desire to eat sand should be given nothing but freshly baked
bread.31

Aetius then lists a number of drugs, ointments, and poultices which

help control pica. In cases of severe affliction he recommends that the
woman "be allowed to eat pickled fish and radishes in sour honey [vinegar sweetened with honey]."32The section on oedematose feet, which
formed the end of Oribasius's regimen, is a separate chapter in Aetius.
It is followed by the first genuine conservative pregnancy-regimen in
Greek, which is also the first attributed to a woman: "On the Management of the Pregnant Woman, According to A ~ p a s i a . " ~ ~
It is not clear who this Aspasia was that is credited with more than 10
chapters in Aetius's book.34Over the centuries historians of medicine
have tried to identify her as a beautiful Phoenician, mistress of the
Kings of Persia, Cyrus the younger and Artaxerxes, as Aspasia of
Miletus of Pericles fame, as a derivation of the name Aspasios, or the
title of a lost text on diseases of women.35All these hypotheses have
been refuted by Walther Schonfeld on the grounds that to this day
nothing is known of Aspasia beyond the references in A e t i ~ s . ~ ~

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MELITTA WEISSAMER

The pregnancy-regimen begins with a caveat against mental disturbances and overactivity, acrid foods and foods which predispose to flatulence, vigorous enemas, too much or too little food or drink, as well as
loss of blood. Recommended are "moderate amounts of food which are
suitable to the stomach, trips in a sedan chair, short walks, gentle massage, and wool spinning."37 At about the eighth month of pregnancy
the amounts of food and exercise are to be reduced, and constipation is
to be corrected by such foods as "juice of ptisan, cooked sorrel, mallow
and lettuce." In the ninth month frequent baths are recommended.
With the possible exception of Aspasia's regimen, all representatives
of the Hindu and Greek medical tradition examined above are male
discourses dealing with an intrinsically female experience, namely that
of pregnancy. When it comes to women's diet, however, the emphasis
is different in the texts of ancient India and Europe.
The Ayurveda of Caraka and SuSruta ascribes eminent importance to
the right food during each phase of a woman's pregnancy-and even
as much as a week before cohabitation, if a son of excellent qualities is
desired.38Considering that weakness, timidity, lack of wisdom, ignorance, unsteadiness, heaviness of lower limbs, intolerance, slackness,
and softness are among the characteristics determining the female
sex?9 it is understandable that the chapter on procreation in the Caraka
Samhita with its focus on excellent progeny, deals with procreating
male children only.40If there is any doubt as to the sex of the fetus in
the early stages of the pregnancy, a special therapy, purizsavana, is administered to the woman in order to guarantee a male child. Mistakes
in nutrition are mentioned briefly in Hindu medicine together with
their disastrous effects on the health of the progeny.41As to the symptoms indicative of pregnancy, they do include such eating disorders as
"excessive salivation, loss of appetite, vomiting, anorexia, liking for
taking sour things, and liking for all types of food-both wholesome
and unwholesome," but these are not elaborated on in the pregnancyregimen.42
In Hellenic medicine, on the other hand, the connection between the
diet of the mother and the quality of the progeny is less pronounced.
The focus in the Greek texts is clearly on eating disorders and corrective nutrition. In particular it is morning sickness and women's craving~
for strange things which are discussed at great length in the literature, thus illustrating once again the strong orientation of Greek medicine towards pathology.
MEDIEVAL ARABIC AND EUROPEAN PREGNANCY-REGIMENS

As noted, Hindu and Greek medicine show a number of common

traits. While the question as to precisely how and when the exchange of

Medieval Women's Guides to Food during Pregnancy

13

medical knowledge between ancient India and Greece took place is still
far from being resolved, it is a fact that the two systems came together
during the Arabist period. According to Manfred Ullmann, the Arabs
in the early Middle Ages had access to translations of Hindu works of
medicine in addition to the extensive translations from Greek and
S y r i a ~His
. ~ study
~
of the Arabic medical literature makes clear that basically all the classical works of Ayurveda belonging to the Brihat Trayee
(greater triad), i.e., Caraka-Samhitn, Sus'ruta-Samhitif,and AsfangahrdayaSamhita, were known to the Arabs, and were quoted by such renowed
physicians as Rhazes and A~icenna.4~
In an appendix to his book Paradise of Wisdom, the Arabic writer Aba l-Hasan 'Ali ibn Sahl Rabban
at-Tabari gives a summary of Hindu medicine based on translations
of the works by "Caraka, SuSruta Vagbhata (Astangahrdaya) und
Madhavakara ( N i d t i ~ ~ a )As
. " ~Ursula
~
Weisser points out, this appendix also includes information on the Hindu theory of human reproducti~n.~~
While Arabic medicine throughout the Middle Ages was essentially
Hippocratic and Galenic in nature, it is conceivable that familiarity
with the Hindu system led to a shift in emphasis from pathology to
preventive medicine, and the development of "new" genres of texts
such as the conservative regimens for pregnancy, childbirth, and childrearing.
When Arabist writers, above all Johannitius, Haly Abbas, Rhazes,
and Avicenna put Greek medicine into a theoretical framework for
which they used as ordering principles Galen's sex res non naturales
(namely air, food and drink, exercise and rest, sleep and waking, repletion and excretion, and the passions and emotions), they created a type
of literature which gained enormous popularity among the Arabs, and
which in medieval Europe came to be known as Regimen ~anitatis.4~
In
dealing not only with healthy adults but with all stages of a person's
life, Arabic Regimen-literature brought pregnancy, childhood, old age,
and convalescence, regarded as the neutral state between sickness and
health, into the realm of preventive medicine. Given the availability of
Hindu medical literature, it is possible that Arabic compilers in their
search for material on the ideal lifestyle of the pregnant woman, turned
to the conservative regimens of the Ayurveda which contained ample
information on virtually all the non-naturals. An analysis of the Arabic
pregnancy-regimens will show whether actual dietary guidelines were
adopted from Hindu medicine.
Around 900 AD Rhazes was one of the first Arabic writers to include
a pregnancy-regimen in his regimen-cycle of the Liber de medicina ad Alman~orem.~~
Although in the incunabulum used for this analysis the
regimen is entitled "De regimine infantis et pregnantis," it deals only

14

MELITTA WEISSAMER

with ,the pregnant woman, and puts strong emphasis on nutrition.

Rhazes begins with a caveat against all foodstuffs that are acrid and bitter, such as capers, lupines, and unripe olives, and foodstuffs which
provoke urine and menstruation, such as chick-peas, green beans, and
especially rue. He recommends delicate foods that generate good humors, suppress nausea, and strengthen the cardia, such as the meat of
chicken, partridge, and kid. The pregnant woman is advised to drink
good, fragrant and slightly diluted wine in small quantities. To fight
nausea and ~ l g u a a ?the
~ syrup of sour and styptic foods is to be taken.
Furthermore, food should be eaten many times during the day, and not
just in one big meal. Lost appetite can be restored by eating acrid things
in small quantities, such as onions, mustard, and the like. To chew
mastic and white incense also helps, as does eating quinces and pomegranates, sour apples, and limes. Concluding his remarks on nutrition,
Rhazes again warns of bad foods and the mixing of bad and diverse
foods in the stomach.
In the pregnancy-regimen Rhazes hence deals with three aspects of
the woman's nutrition: foods to be avoided, recommended foods, and
cures for nausea and lost appetite. The author provide? concrete information on the foodstuffs in question, which many of his' Greek forerunners did not do, but stops short of offering a complete diet-plan for the
individual months of pregnancy of the type found in Caraka and
SuSruta.
One of the most influential books for medieval Arabic and European
medicine alike, surpassed only by Avicenna's Canon medicinae, is the
Liber pantegni written by Haly Abbas in the tenth century.50His pregnancy-regimen is embedded in a "Regimen omnium etatum," which in
turn is part of the "Regimentum sanitatis partic~lare."~~
In an introduction to the regimen, Haly Abbas lists retention of the menses, nausea, vomiting, saliva, pain in the cardia, and cittosis as the signs of pregnancy. In the manuscript consulted for this analysis, women's cravings
are described as the desire for "bad things" such as eels. Since eels
were a common foodstuff in medieval kitchens, we must assume that
the scribe, not familiar with the etiology of citta, substituted argilla
(clay) with anguilla (eel). As remedies Haly Abbas recommends the
syrup of pomegranates, nutmeg, and aloe, and the smell of fragrant
substances. The food and drink to be consumed during pregnancy include chicken and kid with the vinegar of wild grapes, and fragrant,
slightly diluted wine. Meals should be eaten two to three times a day in
modest quantity. Haly Abbas, too, warns of foods which are sour, bitter, diuretic, and provoke menstruation, such as black chick-peas,
green beans, rue, fenugreek, and celery. The author then discusses a
variety of remedies for constipation, flatulence, bad cravings, and

Medieval Women's Guides to Food during Pregnancy

other complications, and concludes the regimen with recipes for inducing labor.
There are without doubt strong similarities between the regimens of
Rhazes and Haly Abbas, and yet in the Liber pantegni greater emphasis
seems to be put on corrective nutrition. This tendency is even more
pronounced in Avicenna's Canon. A pregnancy-regimen of the type
found in Rhazes and Haly Abbas is included in the Canon in Liber 3,
Fen XXI, Tractatus 2, where it is part of Avicenna's treatment of sexuality, male and female reproductive organs, and their diseases.52Compared to his predecessors, Avicenna provides substantially more information and focuses more clearly on the eating disorders common during pregnancy.
In the regimen entitled "De regimine vniuersali pregnantis" his discussion of the various aspects of nutrition begins with a reference to
the bread a pregnant woman should eat, followed by the foodstuffs
that are bad for her, many of which were encountered earlier in Rhazes
and Haly Abbas: acrid and bitter foods, such as capers and unripe olives, and those provoking menstruation, such as green beans, chickpeas, and sesame. Avicenna then turns to the day of conception and
lists two beverages which, according to Hippocrates, enhance fertility:
"savic in aqua,"53 and fragrant, fine, old wine. In the second month of
pregnancy the woman is advised by Avicenna to eat raisins, sweet
quinces, pears, and things which whet her appetite, as well as apples
and pomegranate^.^" The regimen concludes with recipes for electuaries, of which the electuarium de margaritis (pearl electuary) became
enormously popular in Medieval Europe, where it found its way into
many compilations of medicine.55
Avicenna apparently deemed the appetite of the pregnant woman so
important that after a comparatively brief regimen for the wetnurse,
"De regimine enixe," he returns to the subject once more and devotes
an entire chapter, "De appetitu pregnantis," to corrective nutrition. In
it he provides information on ways to restore lost appetite, to rectify appetitus malus (cittosis?),and to reduce a woman's appetite. He also gives
a recipe for an electuary against flatulence, and various remedies
against vomiting.
In the Arabic pregnancy-regimens "food and d r i n k is without
doubt the most prominent of the non-naturals. More detailed information is now included on recommended foodstuffs than was contained
in the Greek sources, and yet none of the regimens provides a diet-plan
comparable to those found in Hindu medicine. With eating disorders
and corrective nutrition still being discussed extensively in the texts,
Arabic dietetics of pregnancy seems to be indebted more to the Western than the Eastern tradition.

16

MELI'ITA WEISSAMER

In general, European pregnancy-regimens followed the models of

Rhazes and Avicenna, with the occasional insertion of passages from
Hippocrates' Aphorisms. One of the earliest European regimens originated in Salerno, and is included in the treatise De passionibus mulierum,
which circulated in Europe under the name of T r ~ t u l a . ~ ~
Trotula introduces her regimen with a warning not to mention anything in front of a pregnant woman which she cannot have, since unfulfilled desires may lead to abortion. She is quick to point out, however, that her statement does not apply to the strange cravings pregnant women often experience. Instead of advocating that these desires
be met, she provides a recipe for rectifying the disorder: "Quod si appeteret argillam, uel cretam, uel carbones, dentur ei fabae coctae cum
zuccharo" ("If she craves clay, or chalk, or coal, she should be given
cooked beans with sugar"). When the woman approaches labor, the
author recommends light, digestible foods. After other foodstuffs she
should eat poultry, quinces, and pomegranates, which is consistent
with the information found in Rhazes and Avicenna (see above). The
regimen concludes with remedies against flatulence.
In the twelfth century Salerno was superseded by Montpellier and
Paris, which quickly became the new centers of medical learning. Consequently Avicenna's Canon emerged as the undisputed work of reference, and with it a strong emphasis on the eating disorders of pregnant
women can be observed in the regimens compiled in France. The following are three examples from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries:
Bernard de Gordon's Lilium medicinae, recognized as the first medical
text of medieval Europe to mention Caesarean birth,"7 contains a pregnancy-regimen. In his nutritional guidelines the author focuses on the
pregnant woman who has enormous appetite. According to Bernard,
she should eat roasted, fried, asd fragrant foods, and conclude her
meals with cooked pears, pomegranates, roasted hazel-nuts, roasted
chestnuts, or roasted chick-peas.58The compiler appears to have supplemented the information he found in Avicenna's regimen on corrective nutrition, that roasting is useful for reducing a woman's appetite,
with concrete examples.
In his Regimen sanitatis Magninus Mediolanensis, a contemporary of
Bernard, follows perhaps most closely Avicenna's Canon.59Practically
all the advice he gives in the chapter "De regimine pregnantis" is derived from Avicenna's general pregnancy-regimen and the regimen on
the appetite of the pregnant woman.
One of the earliest examples in French is part of Aldebrandino de
Siena's thirteenth-century compilation Le rigime du corps.60Aldebrandin0 introduces the section "Comment le [sic] femme se doit garder

'

Medieval Women's Guides to Food during Pregnancy

17

quant ele est en~ainte"with the quote from Pliny's Natural History, in
which the Roman author warns that too much salt in the diet of the
mother results in babies being born without nails. The thrust of the regimen is based on Avicenna and Rhazes. Hence, foodstuffs believed to
provoke urine and menstruation are to be avoided; tender meats of
young animals and poultry, on the other hand, are recommended together with slightly diluted wine. To whet a woman's appetite, pears,
pomegranates, and sour apples are listed. This is followed by the recipe for an electuary which is said to comfort the stomach and the rest of
the body, and which constitutes the French translation of Avicenna's
electuarium de margaritis.
By the end of the thirteenth century, Rhazes' Liber and Avicenna's
Canon had also become the standard textbooks at Italian universities,
as the pregnancy-regimen in Book I of Guilielmus de Saliceto's Summa
conservationis et curationis illustrate^.^^ Guilielmus, who was trained in
Bologna and wrote the regimen sometime after 1275,62also makes extensive use of Hippocrates' Aphorisms in addition to Rhazes and Avicenna. Like many authors before him, Guilielmus differentiates be- tween the nutrition of pregnant women who enjoy a healthy appetite,
and those who experience eating disorders such as cittosis. Appetitus
mendosus is the term he uses to describe the cravings for coal and clay.63
In 1493 a German translation of Guilielmus' text was made by the
physician Bartholomaus Scherrenmiiller at the request of Graf
Eberhard im Bart and his wife Barbara who had problems conceiving
an heir. But Scherrenmiiller's translation of a pregnancy-regimen was
by no means the first. The shift from Latin to German had in fact begun
over 150 years earlier with a brief regimen included in Ortolf voq
Baierland's A r ~ n e i b u c h h
. ~ ~it the author follows by and large the Arabist tradition and warns of bitter foodstuffs while recommending
wholesome food which generates good blood, such as the meat of
chicken, partridge, and kid. Not surprisingly, Ortolf, too, favors wine
over all other beverages.
The advent of the plague in the mid-fourteenth century made the
survival of mankind a concern for everyone and triggered a massive
wave of translations into the vernacular. In addition to physicians, the
clergy now became increasingly involved in translating texts such as
the regimen-literature of medieval school medicine, thus making accessible to the literate what was once the prerogative of the latinate.65
One of the most popular German pregnancy-regimens was composed
ill 1429 by a cleric from Freiburg by the name of Heinrich L a ~ f e n b e r g . ~ ~
The author is clearly familiar with European school medicine, and does
not hesitate to exploit it for the propaganda purposes of the church. He
achieves this primarily by stripping the medical discourse of all ele-

18

MELITTA WEISSAMER

ments which run counter to church doctrine, and declaring the "censored" version the will of God.67In nutritional matters he advises the
pregnant woman to eat food in moderation without going hungry or
thirsty. A caveat against coarse, tough food such as beef, pork and
smoked meat, beans, lentils, barley, raw fruit, and fish caught in ponds,
is followed by the recommendation to eat veal, kid, chicken, partridge,
small birds, venison, and soft-boiled egges. Diarrhea, constipation, and
medicinal potions with the exception of a mild laxative are to be
avoided.@The parturient woman is to be given hot milk or
and the woman who has just given birth, light food from hens and
chickens, and light white wine.70
The shift from Latin to the vernacular also brought about a change in
audience from professional and male to lay and primarily female. And
with it came a shift from corrective nutrition with its sometimes complex medical recipes to the standard nutrition of the pregnant woman.
Laufenberg, for instance, provides only simple remedies requiring
readily available ingredients which can be prepared by the pregnant
woman or her entourage. For more serious disorders the author suggests that the woman consult a doctor, and buy her electuaries in an
ap~thecary.~~
The trend towards expanding on the regular foodstuffs and their effects on the woman becomes especially evident in an Italian regimen
written by a contemporary of Laufenberg, the physician Michele Savonarola. Chapter 2 of his treatise Ad mulieres ferrarienses de regimine
pregnantium et noviter natomm usque ad septennium begins with a conservative regimen which discusses all six non-naturals, but puts the
strongest emphasis on food and drink." In using Avicenna and Galen
as hissmain sources on nutrition in general, and pregnancy in particular, Savonarola evaluates foodstuffs of all the traditional food-groups
found in medieval school medicine with regard to their positive and
negative effects on the pregnant woman: the meats of four- and twolegged animals, fish, other sea-food, fruits, roots, seeds, grains, herbs,
citrus fruits, milk and dairy products, oil and fat, sweeteners, spices,
wine, and other beverages. Following the treatment of the non-naturals, Savonarola turns to the question of appetite and, like Avicenna,
gives a detailed account of the various eating disorders common during pregnancy, as well as their re me die^.'^
Savonarola's treatise, written in Italian and dedicates to the women
of Ferrara, is the culmination point in the development of the pregnancy-regimen. Never before and never after, it seems, was there so
much attention paid to all aspects of pregnancy, and especially to nutrition. In the sixteenth century German regimens, for example, were
mostly reworkings of Laufenberg's text, printed separately or in con-

Medieval Women's Guides to Food during Pregnancy

19

junction with the new literature for widwives and authors such as Eucharius Rosslin and Jacob R~eff.'~
CONCLUSION

When in the early medieval period Arabic physicians created the genre
of the pregnancy-regimen based on Galen's six non-naturals, and consequently made pregtancy a part of preventive medicine, they had access to the predominantly male medical discourses of Ancient India
and Greece. While on the question of food Hindu medicine stressed the
excellence of a male progeny through the right diet of the mother,
Greek physicians, who until the Byzantine Period did not organize
their information regarding pregnancy in special regimens, seemed
more concerned with phenomena such as morning-sickness and cittosis
and their cures. In their nutritional guidelines Arabic regimens were
found to follow more closely the Western than the Eastern sources. A
typical Arabic regimen would provide a list of recommended foods, of
foods to be avoided, and remedies for eating disorders. European
school medicine generally followed the Arabic model and continued to
discuss pregnancy in the context of preventive medicine. Numerous
Latin regimens were compiled in the West, and were geared towards a
professional male audience. The advent of the plague led to an increase
in translations into the vernacular, and the fusion of the male medical
with the male clerical discourse when churchmen such as Heinrich
Laufenberg acted as translators and "editors" of medieval school medicine. As women became more and more the target group for these vernacular versions, pregnancy-regimens were taken out of the context of
preventive medicine and e;entually integrated in books dealing
mainly with human reproduction and women's health.
I

NOTES

* I would like to acknowledge anonymous readers for their comments on this article
and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada for financial
support.
1 Ann Oakley, The Captured Womb: A History of Medical Care of Pregnant Women (Oxford
and New York: Basil Blackwell, 19M).
2 Oakley, The Captured Womb, p. 11.
3 Obstetrical and gynecological sources from the earliest Egyptian papyri to the twentieth century can be found in Heinrich Fasbender, Geschichte der Geburtshlilfe (Jena:
Gustav Fischer, 1906); and Harvey Graham, Eternal Eve (Altrincham: Heinemann,
1950). See also Theodore Cianfrani, A Short History of Obstetrics and Gynecology
(Springfield, 111.: C. C. Thomas, 1960). For information on the medieval and early
modem period see Paul Diepgen, Frau und Frauenheilkunde in der Kultur des Mittelalters (Stuttgart:Georg Thieme, 1963);and Audrey Eccles, Obstetrics and Gynecology
in Tudor and Stuart England (London:Croom Helm, 1982); for obstetrics and gynecol-

20

MELITTA WEISSAMER
ogy i n art see Harold Speert, Iconographia Gyniatrica: A Pictorial Histoy of Gynecology
and Obstetrics (Philadelphia: F. A. Davis, 1973).
Ram Karan Sharma and Vaidya Bhagwan Dash, eds. and trans., AgniveSa's Caraka
Samhitd: Text with English Translation & Critical Exposition Based on Cakrdpani Datta's
Ayurveda Dipikd, Chowkhamba Sanskrit Studies, Vol. 94 (Varanasi: Chowkhamba
Press, 1977), p. 367; the work is "a compendium made b y Charaka (2nd century AD)
from an earlier work o f Agnivera, based u p o n the lectures o f his master Atreya (6th
century BC)"; see Fielding H. Garrison, An Introduction to the Histoy of Medicine, 4th
ed. (Philadelphia and London: Saunders, 1929),p. 70.
Kaviraj Kunjalal Bhishagratna, ed. and trans., An English Translation of the Sushruta
Samhita Based on Original Sanskrit Text, Vol. 2, Chowkhamba Sanskrit Studies, Vol. 30
(Varanasi:Chowkhantba Press, 1963), p. 216f.; the text was written i n the fifthcentury
according to Garrison, History of Medicine, p. 70. It is not clear what the translator o f
Susruta means b y "appetising drugs"; the passage reads "Such food is t o b e given as
she wants, but it must be soft, thin, sweet, oleaginous, and what promotes the internal
heat" i n Thomas Alexander Wise, commentay-on the Hindu system of Medicine: An Exposition of Ancient Hindu Medicine as Embodied in Sanskrit Literature (London 1860; Amsterdam: APA-Oriental Press, reprint, 1981), p. 415.
Sharma and Dash, Caraka Samhitd, p. 475f.
Bhishagratna, Sushruta Samhita, p. 217f.
Heinrich Fasbender, Entwicklungslehre, Geburtshiilfe und Gyniikologie in den Hippokratischen Schrifen (Stuttgart:Ferdinand Enke, 1897), p. 44.
Fasbender, Entwicklungslehre, Geburtshiilfe und Gyndkologie,p. 57; and Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski, Not of Woman Born: Representations of Caesarean Birth in Medieval and
Renassiance Culture (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990), p. 22f.; according to
Blumenfeld-Kosinski Caesareans o n living women are a more recent phenomenon,
i
presumably starting i n early Jewish culture.
JeanFilliozat, The Classical Doctrine of Indian Medicine: Its Origins and Its Greek Parallels,
translated b y Dev Raj Chanana (Delhi:Munshiram Manoharlal, 1964), esp. p. 255; the
Hippocratic treatises i n question are "De la Nature d e la Femme," Vol. 7 , p. 312-430,
and "Des Maladies des Femmes," Vol. 8, p. 10-462, o f Emile Littre, ed. and trans.,
Oeuvres Compl8tes dlHippocrate, 10 vols. (Paris:J. B. Bailliere, 1839-61).
"Des Maladies des Femmes." v. 67.69.
"Elle a des envies d'aliments &ranges; m&mepeu d e nourriture cause des dbgoGts et
des nausbes" b e e "Des Maladies des Femmes." v. 79).
"De la ~ u ~ e r f k t a t i o ni,n" Littrb, ed., ~ippocrate)
61.s,'~.487.
Inge Miiller-Rohlfsen, ed., Die Lateinische Ravennatische Llbersetzung der Hippokratischen Aphorismen (Hamburg:Hartmut Liidke, 1980), p. 150-53.
Joseph Needham, A History of Embryology, 2nd ed., rev. with the assistance o f A.
Hughes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1959), p. 86.
Ursula Weisser, Zeugung, Vererbung und prdnatale Entwicklung in der Medizin des arabisch-islamischenMittelalters (Erlangen: Hannelore Liiling, 1983),p. 40f.
"De symptomatum causis lib. I," Chap. 7 , Paragraph 1 i n C. G. Kiihn, ed., Galenus:
Opera Omnia (= Medicorum Graecorum Opera quae exstant, Vol. 1-20), Vol. 7 (Leipzig
1821-33; Hildesheim: Olms, reprint, 1964-65), p. 133; the English translations are m y
own, unless otherwise indicated, and are based o n Kiihn's Latin translation.
"De symptomatum causis lib. I," p. 133; and Aristotle, Generation of Animals,
translated b y A. L. Peck (Cambridge: Harvard University Press and London: William
Heinemann, 1963, Book IV, Chapter 6, v. 463.
Pliny, Natural ~ i s t o r yWith
: an ~ & l i s hfranslation in Ten Volumes, translated b y Harris
Rackham, Vol. 7 [London:William Heinemann and C a m b r i d"~ eHarvard
:
Universitv
Press, 1963), ~ o o VII,
k Chapter 6, p. 533.
Pliny, Natural Histoy, p. 535.
Valetin Rose, ed., Sorani Gynaeciorum Vetus Translatio Latina (Leipzig: Teubner, 1882),
p. 15.

Medieval Women's Guides to Food during Pregnancy

21

22 Rose, Sorani Translatw, p. 16.

23 Caelius Aurelianus, Gynaecia: Fragments of a Latin Version of Soranus' Gynaeciafrom a
Thirteenth-Cektuy Manuscript, edited by Miriam and Israel Drabkin (Baltimore: Johns
Hopkins University Press, 1951); and Moschion, La Gynaecia di Mtlscione, edited and
translated by Rino Radicchi (Pisa: Editrice Giardini, 1970).
24 Charles Victor Daremberg and Uko Cats Bussemaker, eds., and trans., Oeuvres d'Oribase, 6 vols. (Paris: Impr. nationale, 1851-76), Vol. 5, Book I, p. 196-98.
25 James V. Ricci, trans., Aetios of Amida: The Gynecology and Obstetrics of the VIth Centuy
A.D. (Philadelphia and Toronto: Blakiston, 1950).
26 Ricci, Aetws of Amida, p. 20-22.
27 Julius Berendes, trans., "Des Paulos von Aegina Abriss der gesammten Medizin in
sieben Biichern," Janus, 1(1908): 7.
28 Francis Adams, trans., The Seven Books of Paulus Aegineta, Vol. 1 (London: syden&m
Society, 1844), p. 3; Berendes, "Paulos von Aegina," p. 7. Compare, for instance, Magpie (Pica pica), Steller's Jay (Cyanocitta stelleri), Green Magpie (Cissa chinensis), listed
under "Crows" in Christopher M. Perrins and Alek L. A. Middleton, The Encyclopedia
of Birds (New York: Facts on File Publications, l98S), p. 442-47.
29 Dictionnaire des Sciences Mtdicales, Vol. 42 (Paris: C. L. F. Panckoucke, 1820), p. 347:
"Pica [ . ..] pie (parce que cet oiseau avale souvent des mati&resterreuses ou pierreuses, etc.); Stedman's Medical Dictionay, 22nd ed. (Baltimore: Wikliams & Wilkins,
1972), p. 971; and Cyril Williarh H. Havard, Black's Medical Dictionay, 36th ed. (London: A. &C. Black, 1990), p. 532.
30 "All of these symptoms develop especially because of an excess of bloody humor
which is customarilv exmlied via the vessels of the uterus at each monthlv period;
this bloody humor &hit& is suppressed by the pressure of the foetus, rises ipward
and attacks the stomach, particularlv sensitive (at this time). For this reason (to satisfy
this depraved humor) th'ese womei crave various and odd foods, some salty, som;?
acrid; some crave for ordinary sand, oyster shells and ashes. Often thismorbid condi. tion may last up to the fourth month. In the beginning only a moderate amount of
blood carries nourishment to the foetus; subsequently, as the foetus develops, it
draws more nourishment. Thus as more of the bad humor is removed (from the blood
stream) by virtue of repeated vomiting spells, and by carrying more to the uterus to
nourish the foetus, the above mentioned symptoms cease" (Ricci, Aetios of Amida,
p. 21; compare with Galen and Aristotle, supra, note 18.
31 Ricci, Aetws ofdmida, p. 21.
32 Ricci, Aetios of Amida, p. 21.
33 Ricci, Aetws of Amida, p. 22f.
34 Thirty-eight chapters are assigned to specific authors by Aetios: ten to Aspasia, nine
to Soranos, six to Philumenos, five to Archigenes, two to Leonides, two to Philagrios,
one to Galen, and one to Aesclepiades. The contents of one chapter was abstracted
from Archigenes and Leonides, and the contents of another from Rufus and Aspasia
(see Ricci, Aetws of Amida, p. 173).
35 See Ricci, Aetws of Amida, p. 12, note 37.
36 Walther Schbnfeld, Frauen in der abendlrYndischen Heilkunde: Vom klassischen Altertum
bis zum Ausgang des 19.Jahrhunderts(Stuttgart: Ferdinand Enke, 1947),p. 43f.
37 Ricci, Aetws of Amida, p. 22.
38 "If she desires to have a son with a massive body, white complexioned with the
strength like that of a lion, with vigour, purity and strong mind, then from the first
day of her purificatory bath [after the menstruation] she should be given manhta
[thin gruel] prepared with white barley by boiling it with the milk of a white cow
having a white calf and mixing it with ghee and honey in a silver or bronze vessel to
drink every morning and evening continuously for one week. In t k morning she
should take food preparation made of sali rice or barley along with curd, honey, ghee
or milk" (Sharma and Dash, Caraka SatphiZd,p. 466f).
39 Sharma and Dash, Caraka Sumhit#, p. 394.

'

MELITTA WEISSAMER
Sharma and Dash, Caraka Samhitd, p. 471-73.
Sharma and Dash, Caraka Samhitd, p. 476.
Cf. Sharma and Dash, Caraka Samhita, p. 396.
Manfred Ullmann, DieMedizin im Islam (Leiden and Cologne: E. J. Brill, 1970),p. 103.
Ullmann, Medizin im Islam, p. 104f.; as to the classification of the Hindu works,
see K. R. Srikanta Murthy, trans., SWgadhar-Samhitd ( A Treatise on iiyurveda) by
Sdrngadhara (Varanasi and Delhi: Chaukhambha Orientalia, 1984),p. 1.
45 Ullmann, Medizin im Islam, p. 122.
46 Weisser, Zeugung, Vererbung und prdnatale Entwicklung, p. 16.
47 Wolfram Schmitt, "Theorie der Gesundheit und 'Regimen sanitatis' im Mittelalter"
(Habilitationsschrift Heidelberg 1973).
48 See Garrison, Histoy of Medicine, p. 120; the edition used is Muhammad Rhazes, Liber
ad Almansorem (Venice: Bonetus Locatellus for Octavianus Scotus, 1497), fol. 2ra-60vb,
and the pregnancy-regimen is on fol. 21rb.
49 Perhaps the latinized form of the Arabic word for citta?
50 See Garrison, Histo y of Medicine, p. 120; I use the pregnancy-regimen of the Liber pantegni in Cod. M. p. med. f. 3, Universitatsbibliothek Wtirzburg, fol. 74va-vb (late thirteenth century).
51 As to the structure of the Regimen sanitatis in the Liber pantegni, see Schmitt, "Theorie
der Gesundheit," p. 88-95.
52 The edition used is Avicenna, Liber Canonis (Venice 1507; Hildesheim: O h s , reprint,
1966); the pregnancy-regimens are on fol. 365vb-366rb.
53 A kind of wheat decoction, also mentioned in Ibn Butlan's Tacuinum sanitatis ("sauich, id est pultes tritici"), see Franz Unterkircher, ed. and trans., Das Hausbuch der Cerruti: Nach der Handschrift der Osterreichischen Nationalbibliothek (Dortmund:Harenberg
Kommunikation, 1979), p. 84.
54 "Et sint in secundis mensis earum passe [sic] et cydonia dulcia et pira et excitanta appetitum et mala mum [sic] et granata muza [sic]" (Avicenna, Liber Canonis, fol. 366ra);
a French rendition of this Avicenna-passage lists "poires, et puns de gemate, et puns
aigres" (see Louis Landouzy and Roger Pepin, eds., Aldebrant [MaBre Aldebrandin de
Siennel. Le Rtgime du Corps [Paris: Librairie Ancienne Honore Champion, 1911;
Geneva: Slatkine, reprint, 19781, p. 72).
55 It appears as diamargariton in Thornas de Cantimpre, cf. Christ. Ferckel, Die Gyniikologie des Thomas von Brabant (Munich: C. Kuhn, 1912), p. 21,32; according to Ferckel
(p. 74) it was used "als Emmenagogum und zur Stlrkung der Gebarenden resp.
WBcherin. Plat[earius] empfiehlt Perlen mit Rosenzucker geg. Schwachezusttinde;
den starkenden Einfluss schreibt er der constringierendenWirkung der Perlen zu."
56 According to John F. Benton, only the Practica secundum Trotam is genuine Trota (see
his "Trotula, Women's Problems, and the Professionalization of Medicine in the
Middle Ages," Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 59 [1985]: 30-53). The edition used is
Trotvla, "De Mulierum Passionibus, ante, in, & post partum, cum reliquis partim
item inseruientibus Liber experimentalis mirificus," in Experimentarivs medicinz (Argent: Ioannis Schottus, 1544),p. 437; the pregnancy-regimen is on p. 13. Since the real
author/compiler of the regimen is unknown, I will refer to him/her as Trotula.
57 Blumenfeld-Kosinski, Caesarean Birth, p. 31-34; the edition used is Lilium medicinae a
Bernardo Gordonio Professore olim rnontispessulano Ordinatio praeclarissimo (Frankfvrti:
Petrvs Uffenbachius, 1617),p. 798-803.
58 Lilium medicinae, p. 802.
59 The edition used is Maynus Mayneriis, Regimen sanitatis (Lyon: Franqois Fradin,
1505),fol. lr-71r; the pregnancy-regimen is on fol. 23-v.
60 Landouzy and Pepin, Rtgime du Corps, p. 71-73.
61 "Capitulum primum primi libri, in quo determinabitur de consewatione sanitatis a
die conceptionis usque ad ultimum vite senij" of Saliceto's Svmma is edited in Wolfram Schmitt, "Bartholomaus Scherrenmiillers Gesundheitsregimen (1493) fur Graf
Eberhard im Bart" (diss. Heidelberg 1970),p. 105-46.
40
41
42
43
44

Medieval Women's Guides to Food during Pregnancy

62 Schmitt, "Theorie des Gesundheit," p. 26.
63 Schmitt, "Scherrenmullers Gesundheitsregimen," p. 106.
64 Chapter 19 ("De muliere qui est gravida") in James Follan, Das Anneibuch Ortolfs von
Baierland nach der iiltesten Handschrift (14. fit) Stadtarchiv K6ln W4'24' (Stuttgart:
Wissenschaftliche Verlagsgesellschaft m.b.H., 1963), p. 88f. Documents revealed that
Ortolf von Baierland lived in Wiirzburg before 1339 (see Giinter Kallinich and Karin
Figala, " 'Ortolf von Baierland': Ein Beweis seiner Existenz," Sudhoffs Archiv, 51
[1967]: 184-87).
65 In England especially, Dominican friars acted as translators of Latin medical literature (see Faye Marie Getz, "Charity, Translation, and the Language of Medical Leaming in Medieval England," Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 64 [1990]: 1-17).
66 Heinz H. Menge, Das "Regimen" Heinrich Laufenbergs: Textologische Untersuchung und
Edition (GBppingen: Kurnmerle, 1976),p. 361-70.
67 Melitta Weiss-Amer, "Dietetics of Pregnancy: A Fifteenth-Century Perspective,"
Fifleenth-Century Studies, 19 (1992): 301-18.
68 Menge, "Regimen" Heinrich Laufenbergs, p. 366f.
69 Menge, "Regimen" Heinrich Laufenbergs, p. 368.
70 Menge, "Regimen" Heinrich Laufenbergs, p. 370.
71 Menge, "Regimen" Heinrich Laufenbergs, p. 368f.
72 Michele Savonarola, Ad mulieresferrarienses de regimine pregnantium et noviter natorum
usque ad septennium, edited by Luigi Belloni (Milan: Societa Italiana di Ostetricia e
Ginecologia, 1952),p. 65-87.
73 Savonarola, Ad mulieresferrarienses, p. 88-100.
74 At least 23 editions of the Laufenberg-regimen appeared between 1508 and 1700 in
German and Dutch (see Menge, "Regimen" Heinrich Laufenbergs, p. 10f.).