The Wusla That Was a Wasf

Abstract

The author recounts a recent trip to  Turkey, to inspect a manuscript of the cookbook Kita ?b al-Wus.la ila al-H. ab? ?b which Maxime Rodinson had reported in ‘Studies in Arabic Manuscripts Related to Cookery’ (reprinted in Medieval Arab Cookery, Prospect Books, 2001). He made several interesting discoveries, starting with the fact that since 1948, when Rodinson wrote, the Hüseyin Çelebi manuscript collection has been in-corporated into the Ministry of Culture’s Manuscript and Old Printed Book Library (Yazma ve Eski Basma Kütüphanesi), located in the former Incebey school near the Great Mosque (Ulu Cami). The manuscript Rodinson mentioned is now listed in Manuscript Catalogue I (El Yazma Dem. Defteri I; page 188) as #840, rather than under its old shelf num-ber, Tip 32. The manuscript itself turns out to be a compilation of three separate books, bound together with some 55 pages of miscellaneous recipes written in a variety of hands.