[MR] British Library: Sugar in Medieval Medical Texts

[Garth Groff and Sally Sanford]

Noble Friends,

My friend Lady Sophia introduced me to the the British Library's Medieval
Manuscript Blog with this interesting discussion of how sugar came to
western Europe:
https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2018/11/a-spoonful-of-sugar.html .

The author's argument is that sugar was introduced to Europe via
translations of Arabic medicinal texts around the end of the 11th century.
Mention of sugar as an ingredient occurs in a text associated with the
monastery at Bury St. Edmunds about this time, and may have been brought
from France by Abbot Baldwin (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baldwin_(abbot_of_Bury_St_Edmunds) ). Other
mentions of sugar are found in the works of the Carthaginian monk
Constantine the African, who was at Monte Cassino in the late 11th century
( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constantine_the_African ).

There's much to learn about sugar and Arabic medicine reaching Europe from
this blog entry.

Yours Aye,

Mungo Napier, Laird of Mallard Lodge  🦆