Lacnunga

Lacnunga is a collection of miscellaneous medical texts, mainly in Old English, included alongside other medical texts in the manuscript London, British Library Harley 585, probably copied in South-Western England around the first decade of the eleventh century. The collection contains many unique texts, including an unusual proportion of charms which provide rare glimpses into Anglo-Saxon popular religion and healing practices. Among these charms is that known as Wið færstice. Lacnunga is an Old English word meaning 'remedies', but although it is in Old English the name is not in the manuscript: it was given by the collection's first editor, Oswald Cockayne, in the nineteenth century, and has since stuck.

References

• Cockayne, Oswald (ed.). 1864–66. Leechdoms, Wortcunning and Starcraft of Early England, The Rolls Series, 35, 3 vols (London: Longman and others). First edition of the text.
• Doane, A. N. 1994b. Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts in Microfiche Facsimile: Volume 1, Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 136 (Binghamton, N.Y.: Medieval & Renaissance Texts and Studies). No. 265 is a facsimile of Harley 585; pp. 26-36 of the accompanying notes are the source for the dating of the manuscript given here.
• Grattan, J. H. C. and Charles Singer. 1952. Anglo-Saxon Magic and Medicine, Publications of the Wellcome Historical Medical Museum, new series 3 (London: Oxford University Press). Relatively recent edition and translation.