The culinary literature of the modern culture world
begins with the Renaissance in the fifteenth century. The
Italians transferred or extended their artistic striving to the
table ; the dishes were to be not only of good taste, but also
of artistic appearance ; and towards the attainment of this
object painters and sculptors contributed mostly themselves
by their elaborate artists’ dinners.! Jellies were decorated
with coloured heraldic designs by men of the brush, and
this led sometimes to indigestions and poisonings, such as
those which occurred to the ambassadors of Pius II. at
Siena. J The testhetical refinement of the older Italian
cookery migrated with the princesses of the house of Medici
to the Court of France. It was a part of the artistic taste of
the time, the transplantation of which succeeded, while that
of the Italico-Spanish poetry perished in vain imitations. The
* Piscina’. Cf. Plinius, ‘Hist. Nat.,’ lib. ix., cap. liv. to Ivi. The
acclimatization of the scarus (fish) on the coast of Campania is alluded to
in the same book (cap. xvii.). To the fish-reservoirs alludes Cicero ad Alt.:
‘ Qui ita sunt stulti, ut amissa republica piscinas suas fore salvas sperare
videantur.’
f Italian artists’ dinners were described in the ‘ Osservatore Fiorentino ’
(ex Rumohr, loc. cit. ).
t liegarding poisonous colours or jellies cf. ‘ Novelle Senesi ’ (ex
Rumohr, loc. cit.).
THE HISTORIC LITERATURE OF COOKERY 25
Italian art of cooking travelled early into Germany, Eumohr
supposes by way of France, but the importation was direct,
as is testified by the cookery-books which were published in
Germany in the second half of the sixteenth century. The
condition of Italian cookery is beautifully represented in
the work of a man who united learning with much fateful
experience and the epicurean principle of life, that there
might be pleasures which could be enjoyed with perfect
honesty or virtue — Bartholomeo Sacchi.* He was born in
1421 at Piadena, in the district of Cremona, and hence sur-
named with the Latinized Platina. After he had been a
soldier for some time he turned to the sciences, and, finding
a patron in Cardinal Bessarion, was appointed an abbre-
viator to Pope Pius II. Accused under the papacy of
Paul II. of participation in a conspiracy against this poten-
tate, he was thrown into prison, but, after long detention,
released by Sixtus IV. This Pope made Sacchi, in 1457,
Superintendent of the Vatican Library, in which office he
remained up to his death in 1480. Together with Pom-
ponius Laetus he founded a learned society.
Of works of this period published in Germany we have to
mention that of Hans Folzt ; further, the anonymous
treatise entitled ‘ Kiichenmeisterey,’ and a Netherlandish
work in the Dutch language. I
The end of the fifteenth century developed Baptista Fiera,
who lived at Mantua, and is best known in literature as a
* He is not rarely, but erroneously, quoted as Baptista S. As author he
bears the name of Bartholomseus Platina, and his book the title ‘ Liber de
honesta voluptate et valetudine, seu de arte coquinaria et cibariis libri
decern’; 1^75, and later editions. German translation of the
Latin original by Stephanus Vigilius, Augsburg, 1542. Graesse, loc. cit, v.,
p. 713, also alludes to a book of Platina, ‘ De Obsoniis,’ and refers to iii.,
p. 557, where, however, the title is not quoted.
Page 26
Presented as published in 1895. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
AI-modernized reading of the original text
The culinary literature of the modern culture world begins with the Renaissance in the fifteenth century. The Italians transferred or extended their artistic striving to the table ; the dishes were to be not only of good taste, but also of artistic appearance ; and towards the attainment of this object painters and sculptors contributed mostly themselves by their elaborate artists’ dinners.! Jellies were decorated with coloured heraldic designs by men of the brush, and this led sometimes to indigestions and poisonings, such as those which occurred to the ambassadors of Pius II. at Siena. J The aesthetical refinement of the older Italian cookery migrated with the princesses of the house of Medici to the Court of France. It was a part of the artistic taste of the time, the transplantation of which succeeded, while that of the Italico-Spanish poetry perished in vain imitations. The
* Piscina’. Cf. Plinius, ‘Hist. Nat.,’ lib. ix., cap. liv. to Ivi. The acclimatization of the scarus (fish) on the coast of Campania is alluded to in the same book (cap. xvii.). To the fish-reservoirs alludes Cicero ad Alt.:
‘ Qui ita sunt stulti, ut amissa republica piscinas suas fore salvas sperare videantur.’
f Italian artists’ dinners were described in the ‘ Osservatore Fiorentino ’ (ex Rumohr, loc. cit. ).
t liegarding poisonous colours or jellies cf. ‘ Novelle Senesi ’ (ex Rumohr, loc. cit.).
Italian art of cooking travelled early into Germany, Rumohr supposes by way of France, but the importation was direct, as is testified by the cookery-books which were published in Germany in the second half of the sixteenth century. The condition of Italian cookery is beautifully represented in the work of a man who united learning with much faithful experience and the epicurean principle of life, that there might be pleasures which could be enjoyed with perfect honesty or virtue — Bartholomeo Sacchi.* He was born in 1421 at Piadena, in the district of Cremona, and hence surnamed with the Latinized Platina. After he had been a soldier for some time he turned to the sciences, and, finding a patron in Cardinal Bessarion, was appointed an abbreviator to Pope Pius II. Accused under the papacy of Paul II. of participation in a conspiracy against this potentate, he was thrown into prison, but, after long detention, released by Sixtus IV. This Pope made Sacchi, in 1457, Superintendent of the Vatican Library, in which office he remained up to his death in 1480. Together with Pomponius Laetus he founded a learned society.
Of works of this period published in Germany we have to mention that of Hans Folzt ; further, the anonymous treatise entitled ‘ Kiichenmeisterey,’ and a Netherlandish work in the Dutch language. I
The end of the fifteenth century developed Baptista Fiera, who lived at Mantua, and is best known in literature as a
* He is not rarely, but erroneously, quoted as Baptista S. As author he bears the name of Bartholomaeus Platina, and his book the title ‘ Liber de honesta voluptate et valetudine, seu de arte coquinaria et cibariis libri decern’; 1^75, and later editions. German translation of the
Latin original by Stephanus Vigilius, Augsburg, 1542. Graesse, loc. cit, v., p. 713, also alludes to a book of Platina, ‘ De Obsoniis,’ and refers to iii., p. 557, where, however, the title is not quoted.