1 Francisco Peña.*
2 Treatise for the Use of Inquisitors.
3 Francisco Peña.
4 Paris, 1290.
5 Otherwise known as ‘bastard hand’, it was used in the writing of deeds, letters, ledgers and any manuscript written in the vernacular.
6 Ballad by Marie de France.*
7 Chrétien de Troyes.
8 Although these men did not take vows of poverty, chastity or obedience they enjoyed the privileges of the order in exchange for working on the land as craftsmen or servants at the commandery.
9 A piece of land given to a tenant farmer by a lord in exchange for rent and/or labour.
10 Preceptor was the name given in Latin texts for the commander.
11 Bread was an indication of social status. As such a distinction was made between rich men’s bread, knights’ bread, equerries’ bread, menservants’ bread … poor men’s bread and famine bread.
12 Greetings O Queen, Mother of mercy; our life, our love and our hope.
13 A guild of wealthy merchants who sold fabric, clothing, objets and even gold work to the wealthy classes. They also dyed precious fabrics, like silk, which ordinary dyers did not deal in. Haberdasher became one of the most respected professions in the society of the time.
14 In 994, Raoul le Glabre described it as ‘an illness which attacks a limb and consumes it before separating it from the body’.
15 Due to lysergic acid diethylamide, or LSD.
16 This direct link was not generally acknowledged until the seventeenth century.
17 Ergotamine is still used to treat migraine and headaches related to vasomotor function.
18 Haemorrhages due to fibroids.
19 Root vegetables (carrots, turnips, celeriac, etc.) were the food of peasants; the nobility ate only leaf vegetables.
20 A galliass or galleass was a heavy low-built vessel with sails and oars, larger than a galley, from where the word originates.
21 Granted in 1256 by Alexander IV and confirmed by Urban IV in 1264.
22 Those sentenced by a tribunal to pay money which was then distributed among the poor.
23 Aconite is no longer used to treat these symptoms, except in homoeopathy, owing to its extreme toxicity.
24 Malefactor who broke seals in order to change the wording on deeds.
25 Parchment. Hide prepared in Pergame. It remained in use after paper became more widespread and was used by the nobility for title deeds and official deeds until the sixteenth century.
26 Foxglove.
27 Hemlock, used for thousands of years to treat neuralgia.
28 Yew. Extremely toxic and used from ancient times onwards to coat arrow heads.
29 Species of flowering plant Thymelaeaceae, once used as a purgative but which fell into disuse due to its toxicity.
30 It was equally used as an antiseptic and to bring on periods.
31 Latria: the worship given to God alone. Here it refers to the worship of the devil as though he were God.
32 Dulia: inferior type of veneration paid to saints. Here it refers to the act of praying to demons to intercede with the devil.
33 Poisoner.
34 Paris boasted approximately fifteen such establishments.
35 Winding frame.
36 Landlords employed criers to announce the price of the wine and sometimes the food they served in exchange for the right to drink there.
37 Listen to my prayer, O Lord, deliver my soul from fear of mine enemy.
38 The custom of ladies dressing their pet dogs to protect them from the cold began in the fourteenth century.
39 Plague. It is thought to have been rife, particularly in China, for three thousand years. In any case, the first known pandemic occurred in AD 540 on the shores of the Mediterranean where it also affected Gaul. The second pandemic, known as the black plague, lasted from 1346–1353. It started in India and killed 25 million people in Europe and probably as many in Asia.
40 Plants with antiseptic qualities that were used in the old days as well as lily, climbing ivy, bilberry and arnica.
41 Nuns or lay people in charge of opening and closing the doors to the enclosure or the buildings within the enclosure.
42 Wherein the word magnetism. The Greeks were familiar with magnets, which did not reach Europe until the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.