Petre, D.: Medicinal and Cooking Recipe Book

Background

About the Book

This recipe book was published in England, in the year 1705. It was the collaborative effort of Petre D. and seemingly multiple other women. It contains early works into the 1800s. The book contains around 65 pages filled with culinary recipes and 150 pages of medicinal recipes . This manuscript is now held at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries, Kislak Center for Special Collections.

The book was made potentially around the 1700s. Its distinctive features lie less in the style or design of the book, but rather originate from what lies inside the book. The book although widely referred to as a cookbook with recipes, it contains traditional medicine recipes as well and in fact, these medicinal recipes comprise a larger portion of the book which distinguishes the book from its cookbook counterparts that solely include cooking recipes for food.

About the Author

Written on the front of the recipe book is Petre D. Although there was no definitive reference as to what the full name of the author was, in the recipe book a different handwriting after D, the phrase “oro” has been added, along with the year 1705 . From inference, the name has been concluded to possibly be “Dorothy” or “Dorothea” by many. Janet Theophano, a social historian at the University of Pennsylvania, in her catalog "Eat my words : reading women's lives through the cookbooks they wrote" has used the attribution Doro Petrie for this recipe book as well .

As for who Doro Petre is in pertinence to her background, little is known about her personal life and who she was as a person besides the fact that she was a woman living in Europe during the 16th century. Although the name of Doro Petre is written on the book, this book appears to have been a collaborative effort of multiple women along with Doro Petre. The book contains multiple handwritings, 6 to be exact, which contributed to all the recipes in the book. All handwritings are spotted multiple times in different recipes (both medicinal and cooking) throughout the book.

Considering the importance of food throughout history as a means of bringing people together and forming connections it makes sense that this was a collaborative effort. Cooking throughout history has often been a joint activity of women, producing shared love for food and improvement in recipes .

History Of Recipe Books

In modern day society, recipe books are known to be a conglomeration of multiple instructions geared towards the production of different foods. However recipe books were not always singularly focused on the making of food, but would include recipes for all sorts of things ranging from medicines, to clothing and of course foods. In modern day society, recipe books are a common commodity which can be found in all households from the poorest to the richest. However, in the past, recipe books were a luxury reserved solely for those from the elite upper class in society. Upper class women could afford the supposed luxury of being housewives and for this reason recipe books and cookbooks were mostly geared towards them as a prime audience that would appreciate such literature. As a means of better sales outlook and business strategy recipe books were also made readily available for middle class women, differing in that they contained far less recipes, and the recipes were more simple .

Provenance

This book was a gift of Esther Bradford Aresty in 1994. Esther B. Aresty is a well-known donor of materials to the University of Pennsylvania. She holds a collection called Esther B. Aresty Collection of Rare Books on the Culinary Arts in which lies multiple recipe books, and related manuscripts.

Textual Analysis

Content

This book is distinctive in that the list contains multiple different handwritings. This can possibly be understood in that while Doro Petre was the owner of the book, it was possibly being used by multiple people or women as a means of creating a shared cookbook or medicine book with recipes from many women possibly in the family or friends, which could then be shared and allowing information to be stored more efficiently. Culturally though this book today is quoted as a recipe book it contains not just food recipes but medicinal recipes. Recipe at the time was also another way to refer to a receipt, because recipe had a larger variety of meaning. For example page 29 contains information on a recipe written “For a Rupture” and page 28 a recipe for “convulsion fits”.

The book contains multiple handwritings in it, from observation it seems there are about 6 different handwritings which can be ascribed to 6 different contributors to the recipes in the book.

Additionally, within the book lies a loose leaf in the middle of it containing a recipe for “Artificial Asses milk” which is laid in the cooking section of the book's recipes.

Navigational features

Rope attatched to book for navigational purposes. May serve as bookmark.

A potential navigation mechanism of this book is that the book also has an old tattered rope attached to the front and back cover of it, which could have served as a bookmark or means of tying the book up for purposes of avoiding book contamination while cooking with cookbook or preventing the book from falling apart or loose leaves within the book from falling out.

Table of Contents

The book also contains an accurate and functional table of contents at the start of it, which helps with finding the page for exactly what recipe is needed on every occasion. This mechanism implies that a reader of the book is most likely not reading for leisure but has a purpose of finding a specific recipe or piece of information within the book which is why the page numbers are needed to bring clarity to which particular recipes are needed for the current situation.

Physical & Material Analysis

Binding

This book is a manuscript both English and European. It takes on a shape that would widely be considered normal book shape in modern day culture.

The substrate of the pages of this book are most likely paper. This is evident through the distinguishable chain lines on the pages of the book. These chain lines occur as a result of the linen rags soaked and fermented over a long period of time, and then these lines appear as imprints of screen form paper making.

Gold top edge of text block

The book possesses a rectangular shape and an original limp vellum binding (has not been rebound). The cover of the book is made from animal skin parchment as evident through the holes in the back cover of the book. This is also clear through the hair follicles which are visibly evident on the book's cover. The stiff nature of the book cover makes for it to be a reliable cover for these recipes as it becomes less likely to tear or fall apart.

The book contains a large circular indent on the front cover that seems to favor the shape of a mug. This implies that a mug may have possibly been resting on top of the recipe book for a while to leave such a lasting impression on the texture of the book. This also indicates practical use and location. Most likely this recipe book was located in the kitchen seeing it had a mug, a common kitchen utensil, on it. Likely it was placed there for easy access when cooking or producing things needed for medical concoctions.

Paratext

There lies no notable paratext in the book besides a small note written in the beginning of the book which says “Doro Petre (1705)” indicating the possession of this book by Doro Petre. The words seem to have originally said just D Petre, while the “oro is added in a different handwriting possibly in indication of the full name of the book’s owner, which could have been Dorothy or something along those lines.

Marginalia / Annotations

Seeing that the book as a whole is handwritten there aren’t any particular marginalia that stand out as most notes have been written in conjunction with the recipe and are likely not very distinguishable.

The book does contain pagination with modern foliation in pencil in the upper right recto. The book goes in reverse with mainly food recipes from the front having its own table of contents, followed by the recipes, blank pages and then the way the bookmark is being written in is reversed and another table of contents is present with recipes which seem to be more medicinal.

Asemic Marks

The book does contain some asemic marks with scribbling out of words and replacement of them with other words being seen possibly indicating mistakes made when writing the recipe and a few underlines here and there indicating possibly important parts of the recipe. These asemic marks indicate a more casual use of the book. The scribbles show constant mistakes that were made and the underlines show that there were parts of the recipe that the users or writers in this book found particularly important at the time.

Relevance

Considering the substrate and format of this book it infers practical use in the kitchen and in everyday cooking and treating of sicknesses. The book's cover page being made from animal skin makes it very practical in use and able to be used in cooking environments seeing it will not be easily soaked or damaged by heat. This makes sense seeing recipe books being used in kitchens may be exposed to the potential for staining and steam from cooking.