Gilbertus Anglicus, a well known thirteenth-century physician, travelled to the Holy Land by sea in 1240. He drew on his maritime experience to give advice for those travelling by sea; that advice makes up part of a chapter in his Compendium Medicine, published in 1510. Because of its relevance to health on medieval ships, it has been transcribed and translated here, perhaps for the first time, using the text of a sixteenth-century printed copy of his manuscript. The health of the crew on a medieval ship is discussed in chapter 5.

Transcription

Book 7, folio ccclxij, recto, right-hand column, from line 23 to end

Abbreviations have been silently expanded; punctuation has been left unaltered; the letters b and h, printed identically, have been differentiated; the letters u and v have been changed as necessary to regularise the Latin and the letters i and j have been left as printed. Two compositor's errors have been corrected: para 1 line 2, inversion of et and rectificatione; and para 2 line 5, sedimen for sedinem.

De regimine transfretantium

Regimen transfretantium mare principaliter in quattuor consistit scilicet in prohibitione nausee et sedatione vomitus in rectificatione fetoris marini in sedatione sitis et rectificatione aque. Prohibitio nausee completur per usum fructuum acetosorum in ieiunio. ut citoniorum. malorum granatorum acetosorum et citrangulorum limonorum. et per potationem seminis apij. vel cerfolij. decoctionis in aqua que decoctio bibatur a ieiuno. Sedeat autem capite erecto et teneat firmiter ad trabem et non respiciat hac aut illac: et non moveatur caput nisi motu navis. Sugat autem dulcia aut comedat semina eructuativa.