Remedies for the Head of the Mamluk Chancery: Dating an Arabic Medical Treatise

The present study addresses the circumstances in which a little-known Arabic medical treatise, written for travellers and titled al-Isfār ʿan ḥikam al-asfār, was compiled. I first examine the three manuscripts of the treatise known today. Based on the data gathered from the manuscripts, I identify the author and the patron of the work: Muẓaffar ad-Dīn Maḥmūd al-ʿAntābī (or al-ʿAyntābī) al-Amšāṭī and Kamāl ad-Dīn Abū al-Maʿālī Muḥammad al-Bārizī. Even though some of the sources for the author’s life have yet to be analysed, the biographical accounts of the patron make it possible to establish a timeframe for the compilation of the treatise, securing its date around the year 850/1446‒7.