Pinakes | Πίνακες

Résumé :

The Breviarium medicaminum omnium is a trilingual (Greek-Latin- Arabic) lexicon of names of medicinal simples that Stephen of Antioch (12th century) included at the end of the Regalis dispositio, his Latin translation of al-Mağūsī’s Kitāb al-malakī. The article focuses on the author of the Breviarium and its context, the city of Antioch during the Latin rule. It argues that Stephanus made use of a very ancient Greek manuscript of Dioscorides (Paris, BNF, grec 2179, 8th-9th c.) which bears annotations in Arabic, and that these annotations were made by Stephanus’ collaborators, Arabic-speaking Christians who probably found the manuscript in a nearby monastery and who were not specialists of medicine. This is supported by observations on the multilingualism of Antioch at that time and on the history of the manuscript, which was produced in the Syro-Palestinian area and later transferred to southern Italy.