epistle) and his three fellow-citizens above mentioned (only Ausonius is mentioned later in
the work, in reference to a remedy exposed in 25.21), and also “rural and popular remedies
checked by experience” (pr.2).
Content: The work comprises 36 chapters, in which the remedies (about 2,500) are
offered for the body part to be cured, according to the a capite ad calcem order (“from head to
foot”). As a rule, each chapter deals with all the diseases affecting single body parts or organs
(8 eyes; 9 ears; 12 teeth; 14 throat and trachea; 20 stomach; 22 liver; 26 kidneys and bladder
etc.); sometimes the material is arranged according to the typology of disease (1 headaches;
2 hemicranias; 3 vertigo; 4 dermatological diseases and head parasites; 5 alo ̄pekia and hair
problems; 16 coughs and blood expectorations; 28 diseases caused by intestinal parasites; 36
podagra and chiragra, etc.); some chapters deal with not specifically medical subjects: 7 on hair
dye and treatment; 12 on toothpastes. Compared with Scribonius Largus’ Compositiones and
with the Medicina Plinii, Marcellus uses in a more rigid way the a capite ad calcem pattern: the
fact that he does not reproduce certain parts from these sources seems to be due to his
difficulty in inserting them in that scheme (this is true for most of Book III of Medicina Plinii,
and also for diseases treated by Scribonius such as epilepsy or dropsy). Sometimes, however,
Marcellus omits topics that had been treated by Scribonius but were not significant in his own
socio-cultural milieu: e.g. the section on antidotes and the treatment of poisonous snake bites,
a topic more important in an African or Mediterranean area. Marcellus mostly limits himself
to indicating the trouble or the disease; single symptoms are mentioned in reference to pro-
posed remedies that are specifically intended for those same symptoms; he does not make any
suggestions about the causes of diseases or to theoretical or doctrinal problems. Among
therapies he proposes both simple, mainly vegetable, remedies, and compound recipes.
Marcellus’ treatise is accompanied by a bilingual handbook (Greek and Latin) about the
weights and measures used in the recipes. Knowledge of Greek on Marcellus’ part (not
surprising, if we consider the office he held under Theodosius) is confirmed by the presence
of about 40 Greek words (and of many other transliterated terms).
Besides the remedies taken from Scribonius and other medical sources, we find 266
magical remedies (this is one of the features connecting Marcellus to the tradition of Cato the
Censor, Pliny, and Q S): precepts about gestures to be made (1.54), formulas
to be recited while administering medicines, also of the Ephesia grammata kind (e.g. 18.30
against paronychia: touch a wall and say “pu pu pu”), and actual incantations (e.g. 21.2–3).
The treatise is closed by a poem (carmen de speciebus) in dactylic hexameters (78 lines): after
a brief outline of the history of medicine, extending from mythical physicians Chiron and
Machaon to Hippokrate ̄s, Marcellus dwells on the ingredients used in the preparation of
their remedies. There are similarities, but no direct relationship, with Quintus Serenus’ Liber
medicinalis.
Transmission. The De medicamentis is used in the Liber medicinae ex animalibus of S
P P. The three known MSS attest a limited knowledge of it in the
Middle Ages. It entered modern culture with the editio princeps in 1536.
Ed.: M. Niedermann and E. Liechtenhan, CML 5 (1968^2 ; with German translation); Concordantiae ed.
S. Sconocchia (1996).
R. Heim, Incantamenta magica Graeca Latina = JCPh S.19 (1893), 463–576; RE 14.2 (1930) 498–503 (#58),
F.E. Kind; KP 3.993–994 (#14), F. Kudlien; J.F. Matthews, “Gallic supporters of Theodosius,”
Latomus 30 (1971) 1073–1099 at 1083–1087; PLRE 1 (1971) 551–552; C. Opsomer and R. Halleux,
“La lettre d’Hippocrate à Mécène et la lettre d’Hippocrate à Antiochus,” in Mazzini and Fusco
(1985) 339–364; Eidem, “Marcellus ou le mythe empirique,” in Mudry and Pigeaud (1991) 159–178;
MARCELLUS OF BORDEAUX, “EMPIRICUS”