Al-Tuhfah al-Mubhijah (Al-Nuzhah al-mubhijah fi tashhidh al-adhhan wa-ta'dil al-amzijah).

4to (180 x 220 mm). 198 ff. Arabic manuscript on paper. Black maghribi script ruled in red and blue, with important words and phrases picked out in red or blue ink. Contemporary full red calf with fore-edge flap, ruled in blind with decorations in gilt, medallions in black morocco. A North African manuscript of this comprehensive introduction to medicine by Dawud Antaki (d. 1599 CE), often anglicized as David of Antioch, and in his time a chief physician and famous pharmacist in Antioch, Cairo, and Mecca. He is credited with introducing guidelines for the medical industry and its use of drugs: standardizing names of medications, specifying appropriate dosages based on the patient, noting interactions with other foods and drugs, explaining how to use of two or more medications at once, and even including such modern-seeming details like shelf life and substitutions in his works. - This text, his "al-Nuzhah al-mubhijah", offers a relatively swift overview of his treatments and philosophies for the practitioner who needed faster advice than might be had by consulting his monumental "Tadkhkirah" ("Memorandum Book", or "Tadhkirat uli al-albab wa-al-jami' lil-'ajab al-'ujab" in full), which boasts around 3,000 entries on foods and drugs. Less well known to scholarship, there are fewer manuscripts of "al-Nuzhah al-mubhijah" found in institutions; the British Library houses a later 19th century copy. - Altogether an important work by one of the great names of post-Golden Age medieval Arabic medicine. - Some wear and repairs to covers. Light dampstaining to margins. In good condition. - GAL II, 364.