Product Description: A compilation from a number of sources by an anonymous author who, according to editors Best and Brightman, probably was one of Albertus Magnus' followers. A collector's item, it has a more colloquial voice than the writing of the true Albertus Magnus and provides an accurate portrayal of the magical culture that predominated in the 16th century...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Markham reveals the "pretty and curious secrets" of preparing everything from simple foods to such elaborate meals as a "humble feast" - an undertaking which entails preparing "no less than two and thirty dishes, which is as much as can stand on one table." He instructs the housewife on brewing beer and caring for wine, growing flax and hemp for thread, and spinning and dyeing. As a housewife was also responsible for the health and "soundness of body" of her family, he includes advice on the prevention of everything from the plague to baldness and bad breath. No other source from this period provides the same richness of information in such a readable style. Michael Best's introduction and his abundant notes make The English Housewife readily accessible to the contemporary reader.

Product Description: This compilation contains seventeen papers presented at the 1976 Symposium on Learning Mechanisms in Food Selection at Baylor University, as well as five additional submissions.