Ms. nº 93 of the Collection of Spanish and Portuguese Codices of the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris (Morel, 1892: 32-33)
Catalan Translation / Miscellaneous

According to A. Morel-Fatio1, this miscellaneous Catalan manuscript was written in the 16th century and contains three parts:
  1. 82 chapters dedicated to grafting, the planting of trees, the preservation of fruits, etc. (fols. 1-30v).
  2. ‘Concerning Paladio’s agriculture’, consisting of 5 books (fols. 1-30v).2
  3. ‘Concerning high agriculture’, a treatise about tree planting, animal breeding and the preparation of remedies (fols. 62r to 130r).
W. Mettmann revised this manuscript a century later and considered that it was written in the 14th or beginning of the 15th century and that the third part entitled ‘Of High Agriculture’ contained two different works: the agricultural treatise of Ibn Wāfid (fols. 62r-111r) and a book on dietetics entitled De la remenbrança deles viandes, (fols. 111r-130r), by an unknown author3. Years later, E. García Sánchez would prove that the work on nutrition was the Kitāb al-agdiya of Avenzoar [Ibn Zuhr] and that codex 93 was dated to the end of the 15th or beginning of the 16th century, even though it descended from translations made during the reigns of James II of Aragon (1291-1327) and Pedro IV, ‘The Ceremonious’ (1336-1387)4.

In a later study (already noted) we confirmed that the first writing of this Catalan version dated from Pedro VI’s time and that the author of the translated work was the Toledan Ibn Wāfid, well known and respected by the translators of the Crown of Aragon who, as well as his agricultural work, translated his Kitāb al-adwiya al-mufrada into Catalan 5. Accordingly, this Catalan version reaffirms the authorship of Ibn Wāfid with respect to those codices which have at times been attributed to Al-Nahrāwī and at others to Ibn Hajjāj (when in fact it is the text of Ibn Wāfid followed by excerpts from that Sevillan agronomist), or sometimes left anonymous.

(translated  from Carabaza Bravo, J. M.  & García Sánchez, E. (1998). ‘Códices Misceláneos de Agronomía Andalusí’. Al‑Qantara 19, pp. 408-09)


Notes


1 Morel-Fatio, A. 1892. Catalogue des manuscrits espagnols et portugais de la Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, pp. 32-33.
2 According to A. Morel this is not a translation of the agricultural work of the [4th C. Roman] Paladio but a kind of continuation of the first part of the codex; however there is evidence that this Latin author’s treatise was translated into Catalan and, most probably, this version is that found in the manuscript before us. Cf. García Sánchez, E., 1995. ‘La traducción catalana medieval del Kitāb al-Agdiya (Tratado de los alimentos) de Avenzoar’. Actes del Ier Colloqui d’Història de l’Alimentació a la Corona d’Aragó Etat Mitjana, Lleida, pp. 363-86.
3 Mettmann, W., 1980. ‘Eine Übersetsung des ‘Kompendiums’ von Ibn Wāfid und andere altkatalanische Texte über die Landwirtschaft’. Romanische Forschungen 92 Bd., pp. 350-53.
4 García Sánchez, E., 1995. ‘La traducción catalana...’, pp. 365-66.
5 Ibn Wāfid, 1943. ‘Libre de les medicines particulars, versión catalana trescentista del texto árabe del tratado de los medicamentos simples’. Ed. Faraudo de Saint-Germain, Barcelona.