Distillation and rheum

Use in the book

The central comparison is between bodily discharge and the settling of melancholy into habit. Borrowing Seneca’s example, Burton contrasts a single discharge that causes a cough with a continual, long-established one that causes consumption of the lungs. So repeated, neglected emotional disturbances can become disease. The analogy continues into differences of susceptibility: the humour’s intensity and the resistance of constitution or rational soul affect the outcome, and an affront negligible to one person may overwhelm another. It is the development from passing disturbance to established condition that matters.

Rheum later appears among sleepiness, spitting and muddy complexion in the relatively rare melancholy proceeding from phlegm. These patients are said to be more troubled by it than other melancholics; Saxonia’s sleepy Venetian widow is an individual reported case, not the entire class. Excessive sleep can itself be blamed for downward discharges, but that claim follows praise of moderate sleep and a distinction among constitutions. In explanations of disturbed perception, rheum can occasion ringing ears, while corrupt vapours are said to rise to the head and distil back into the eyes. These are bodily uses within the period’s explanatory models, distinct from drug manufacture.

The preparation sense is independently visible in the silver alembic of the reported Fuchs anecdote: abundant local herbs are distilled, perhaps because the locality supplies suitable remedies. Household distillations, displayed with preserves and confections, are products of work in Burton’s gendered account of occupations. Mattioli’s stronger claim makes skill in chemical distillation a condition of medical excellence, while a neighbouring marginal judgement resists excessive praise without rejecting its use. Distilled waters are one among several preparations of borage and bugloss; later they are mixed with syrups of corresponding nature. Distilled lemon juice belongs to proposed external applications for facial redness. These examples identify processes, products and uses without supplying a reconstructed recipe.

The vocabulary also works outside a treatment list. A perpetual catarrh contributes to Burton’s satire of the ageing lover; a rheumatic and gouty suitor can still prevail if he has wealth. In love poetry, drops from a still become tears drawn by Cupid’s fire, and Latin “ignis distillat in undas” makes fire flow into water. Nectar merely dripping on a white rose, in a myth about its red colour, shows the ordinary liquid-motion sense. Latin “stillicidia” names medicinal drip applications, but the related “stillicidiaque” names gutters through which lovers dangerously enter houses. The surrounding action determines whether the flow belongs to bodies, preparations, imagery or buildings.

Related entries

Excrements

Habit and disposition

Water and springs

Defecate

Concoction

Places to read

1. Subsection 3. Classification of Diseases of the Head · paragraphs 13–15The historical division of head diseases locates catarrhs, rheums and discharges among the brain’s waste matter.
2. Subsection 5. Melancholy as a Passing State, Loosely So Called; the Different… · paragraphs 14–16Discharge becomes the analogy for neglected passions settling into habit, with different capacities for resistance.
3. Subsection 7 Sleeping and Waking as Causes · paragraphs 23–25Moderate sleep, constitutional exceptions, excess and unsuitable timing qualify the account of downward discharges.
4. Subsection 10. Discontents, Cares, Miseries and the Like as Causes · paragraphs 9–11Seneca’s bodily afflictions and Burton’s freer English summary exemplify the insecurity of every condition.
5. Subsection 3 Particular Symptoms From the Influence of Stars, Parts of The… · paragraphs 16–18Comparatively rare phlegmatic melancholy, rheum and the reported Venetian widow.
6. Member 3 Immediate Cause of the Preceding Symptoms · paragraphs 2–4Bodily conditions and occasions for altered imagination, including ringing ears associated with cold and rheum.
7. Member 3 Immediate Cause of the Preceding Symptoms · paragraphs 18–20Internal causes of apparent external images and vapours distilling from the head to the eyes.
8. Member 2. Retention and Evacuation Corrected · paragraphs 42–44Competing effects and restricted uses of baths; the Lucca margin applies hot-water streams to head and stomach.
9. Member 4 Exercise of Body and Mind Regulated · paragraphs 15–17Occupations against idleness and household distilled products displayed to guests.
10. Subsection 2 Simple Remedies Suited to Melancholy Against Imported Simples · paragraphs 34–36The conjectured local-remedy rationale of the silver-alembic anecdote and objections about northern plants.
11. Subsection 3 Alteratives Herbs and Other Plant Remedies · paragraphs 7–9Distilled waters among several preparations of borage and bugloss.
12. Subsection 4 Precious Stones Metals and Minerals as Alteratives · paragraph 43 through Subsection 5 Compound Alteratives Criticism of Compounds and Mixed Medicines · paragraph 1Mattioli’s praise of chemical distillation, tempered by the marginal criticism of overvaluation.
13. Subsection 5 Compound Alteratives Criticism of Compounds and Mixed Medicines · paragraphs 25–27Syrups used mainly as preparatives and mixed with corresponding distilled waters.
14. Subsection 6 Remedies for Accompanying Symptoms: To Bring Sleep, and Against… · paragraphs 47–49Historical means to procure sleep, including drip applications and distilled herbal waters.
15. Subsection 6 Remedies for Accompanying Symptoms: To Bring Sleep, and Against… · paragraphs 7–9External preparations for facial redness, with body and marginal differences retained.
16. Subsection 2 How Love Tyrannizes Over Human Beings. Love, or Heroical… · paragraphs 43–45Catarrh in the satirical portrayal of older lovers; the continuation’s Pliny attribution is qualified by the edition.
17. Artificial Attractions of Love and Incitements to Lust Gestures Clothes Dowry… · paragraphs 6–8The rheumatic suitor preferred on condition that he is rich.
18. Member 4 Subsection 1 Symptoms or Signs of Love Melancholy in Body and Mind… · paragraphs 30–35The still, enclosed fire and liquid drops form successive images for a lover’s tears.
19. Member 4 Subsection 1 Symptoms or Signs of Love Melancholy in Body and Mind… · paragraphs 12–14Gutters as a dangerous architectural route of clandestine lovers.
20. Member 4 Subsection 1 Symptoms or Signs of Love Melancholy in Body and Mind… · paragraphs 26–28Cupid’s dancing and the myth of nectar dripping onto the white rose.

In this edition

“one Distillation” → “a single catarrhal discharge” makes the bodily sense explicit; “rheume” → “rheum” retains a term explained by the local note. In Seneca’s marginal Latin, persistent and violent discharge contrasts with the body’s continual and inveterate, or long-established, discharge. The edition preserves Burton’s printed citation but identifies the underlying comparison as Seneca, Letter 75.12; that identification belongs to the supplied apparatus, not a fresh collation here.

Other checked renderings mark the changing senses: household “distillations” becomes “distilled preparations”, “Chymisticall distillations” becomes “chemical distillation”, and nectar “distilling upon the white Rose” becomes “dripped onto the white rose”. In the facial preparation, “the juyce of distil’d Lemmons” is compressed to “distilled lemon juice”; the Latin margin explicitly attaches distilled to the juice. The edition renders “cold & rheume” as “cold or rheum”, changing the conjunction while retaining both nouns. The Latin medical and architectural uses of stillicidium are separately explained rather than forced into a single technical gloss.

catarrh

Printed “Catarrhes” (English; lemma).

A catarrhal discharge or disorder involving the flow of bodily fluid.

Here: Catarrhs, rheums and distillations appear among conditions assigned to the waste matter of the brain.

Context: Burton’s historical classification, following the authorities named in the preceding division; its anatomical claims are not modern diagnoses.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: Catarrhes

Modern rendering: catarrhs

Word and construction: Catarrhes is the plural form corresponding to catarrhs.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

distil · distilling · local use 1

Printed “distilling” (English; lemma).

To flow or drip down.

Here: Corrupt vapours rise to the head and then pass down to the eyes, where their mixture with the ocular medium is said to colour appearances.

Context: Burton reports a historical optical explanation and then offers another, involving organs corrupted by imagination.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: distilling again from thence to the eyes

Modern rendering: distil from there back into the eyes

Word and construction: Distilling supplies distil; again/from thence/to the eyes supply back/from there/into the eyes. The participle becomes a finite verb.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

distil · distilled

Printed “distilled” (English; lemma).

To prepare or separate material by distillation in an apparatus.

Here: The reported Fuchs anecdote describes processing locally abundant herbs in a silver alembic.

Context: Burton conjectures that local suitability was the reason, with belike; the precise anecdotal source and the Nuremberg association remain unresolved in the edition.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: those he distilled in a silver limbeck

Modern rendering: distilled those in a silver alembic

Word and construction: Distilled retains the processing verb; those is its object and in a silver limbeck supplies the vessel phrase. The original he is carried by the preceding modern clause rather than repeated in this selected span.

Alignment qualification: The selected modern span redistributes the original subject he to its preceding clause; the processing verb, object and vessel otherwise correspond.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

distil · distilling · local use 2

Printed “distilling” (English; lemma).

To drip or fall in drops.

Here: Nectar from Cupid’s overturned bowl drips on a white rose, which the story says thereby became red.

Context: Burton retells the myth cited under Constantine’s Agriculture; the ordinary motion of liquid serves an origin-story about the rose.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: distilling upon the white Rose

Modern rendering: dripped onto the white rose

Word and construction: The participle distilling becomes the finite dripped; the phrase about the rose supplies the destination.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “stillat” (Latin; lemma).

Citation key: stillo.

Here: Liquid dripping from enclosed heat supplies the still comparison that Burton applies to tears.

Context: An unattributed Latin fragment, followed by Burton’s Cupid explanation; the precise source remains untraced.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: ut occluso stillat ab igne liquor

Modern rendering: As liquid drips from a fire enclosed.

Word and construction: Stillat supplies drips; liquor is the subject liquid, ut supplies As, and ab igne with occluso supplies from a fire enclosed.

Sense relation: A further selected attestation of this sense, with its local argument separately qualified.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

distillation · Distillation

Printed “Distillation” (English; lemma).

A downward flow or discharge of bodily fluid, especially rheum.

Here: Seneca’s comparison moves from a single, not yet habitual discharge to one that is persistent and long-established, explaining how neglected emotional disturbances become settled disease.

Context: Burton borrows the comparison from Seneca; severity also depends on the humour and the resistance of bodily constitution or rational soul.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: one Distillation

Modern rendering: a single catarrhal discharge

Word and construction: Distillation supplies catarrhal discharge; one supplies single, with the English article made explicit.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “Distillatio” (Latin; lemma).

Citation key: distillatio.

Here: The marginal Latin gives persistent and violent discharge where Burton’s English says continual and inveterate.

Context: Seneca as quoted by Burton; the edition identifies Letter 75.12 while preserving the printed marginal numbering.

Source: original marginal quotation

Source wording and original alignment: Distillatio una

Modern rendering: One discharge of rheum

Alignment scope: equal-scope phrase in the original marginal quotation and its supplied note translation

Word and construction: Distillatio means discharge; una supplies one. Of rheum explicitly identifies the discharge in the supplied note translation.

Modern container: note

Sense relation: A further selected attestation of this sense, with its local argument separately qualified.

Further local use

Printed “distillations” (English; lemma).

Citation key: distillation.

Here: Excessive sleep is said to cause downward flows of fluid and rheums, within an account that first distinguishes beneficial moderate sleep and different constitutions.

Context: Burton’s account, with Fuchs cited; the claim is about too much sleep, not every instance of sleep.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: distillations

Modern rendering: downward flows of fluid

Word and construction: The indexed form supplies the stated discharge or preparation sense within this phrase.

Sense relation: A further selected attestation of this sense, with its local argument separately qualified.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “distillatio” (Latin; lemma).

Citation key: distillatio.

Here: The Latin names a discharge among changing bodily afflictions in an argument that no station is free from misery.

Context: Seneca’s catalogue as adapted by Burton; Burton’s following English summary is freer.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: nunc distillatio

Modern rendering: now a discharge

Word and construction: Nunc supplies now; distillatio supplies a discharge. Burton’s later now the Lungs is a separate, freer summary.

Sense relation: A further selected attestation of this sense, with its local argument separately qualified.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

distillation · distillations · local use 1

Printed “distillations” (English; lemma).

Preparations obtained by distilling.

Here: Distilled preparations occur beside confections and preserves among household productions displayed to guests.

Context: Burton assigns these occupations to women in his gendered account of work against idleness; the passage does not specify each preparation’s ingredients or use.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: distillations

Modern rendering: distilled preparations

Word and construction: The plural process-name here denotes products, made explicit by preparations.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

distillation · distillations · local use 2

Printed “distillations” (English; lemma).

The process or practice of distilling substances.

Here: Chemical distillation is a skill Mattioli treats as necessary for an excellent physician.

Context: Burton reports Mattioli’s strong approval; the adjacent marginal judgement says the use is overrated but should not be rejected. Chronic diseases are said to be scarcely, not absolutely impossibly, curable without mineral medicines.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: Chymisticall distillations

Modern rendering: chemical distillation

Word and construction: Chymisticall supplies chemical; the plural distillations becomes the collective singular distillation.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “distillatione” (Latin; lemma).

Citation key: distillatio.

Here: The marginal Latin repeats the skill requirement and additionally mentions cases of corrupted blood.

Context: Attributed medical judgement in Burton’s marginal quotation; vix marks difficulty, not absolute impossibility.

Source: original marginal quotation

Source wording and original alignment: distillatione chymica

Modern rendering: chemical distillation

Alignment scope: equal-scope phrase in the original marginal quotation and its supplied note translation

Word and construction: Distillatione supplies distillation and chymica supplies chemical; their order is reversed.

Modern container: note

Sense relation: A further selected attestation of this sense, with its local argument separately qualified.

distilled water

Printed “distilled waters” (English; phrase).

Liquid preparations obtained by distillation.

Here: Distilled waters are one of several forms in which borage and bugloss can be prepared.

Context: Burton’s catalogue of alteratives; the passage does not settle the botanical relationship of its two plant names or supply a complete recipe.

Source: original body

Source and modern wording: distilled waters

Word and construction: Both the participial modifier and plural noun are retained; the phrase names a prepared liquid product.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “distilled waters” (English; phrase).

Citation key: distilled water.

Here: The preceding syrups are mostly used as preparatives and may be mixed with distilled waters of corresponding nature.

Context: Burton’s classification of compounds; these refers back to syrups, so the preparative function is not predicated without qualification of all distilled waters.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: distilled waters of like nature

Modern rendering: distilled waters of the same nature

Word and construction: Distilled waters retains the product name; of like nature becomes of the same nature.

Sense relation: A further selected attestation of this sense, with its local argument separately qualified.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “distil’d” (English; lemma).

Citation key: distil.

Here: Distilled lemon juice appears among proposed applications for facial redness.

Context: Burton’s historical account of external preparations; no modern efficacy or safety is implied.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: the juyce of distil’d Lemmons

Modern rendering: distilled lemon juice

Word and construction: The English construction is compressed and the modifier is attached to lemon juice in the rendering; the Latin margin explicitly has distilled juice.

Alignment qualification: The source body grammatically attaches distil’d to Lemmons; the modern phrase attaches distilled to lemon juice. Margin the accompanying note supports the latter construction.

Sense relation: A further selected attestation of this sense, with its local argument separately qualified.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

distillo

Printed “distillat” (Latin; lemma).

To drip or flow out.

Here: Passion’s fire turns into the stream of tears on the lover’s face.

Context: Latin verse cited to an amatory emblem; it continues the metaphor, not a statement that fire is literally water. The exact emblem-book edition is unresolved.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: ignis distillat in undas

Modern rendering: Fire is distilled into water

Word and construction: Ignis supplies Fire and in undas the outcome into water; active distillat is recast as the passive is distilled in the modern rendering.

Alignment qualification: The active Latin verb is rendered by an English passive; the transformation remains metaphorical.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

rheum

Printed “rheume” (English; lemma).

Bodily discharge, especially mucus or catarrhal fluid.

Here: Rheum accompanies sleepiness, spitting and a muddy complexion in the description of melancholy proceeding from phlegm.

Context: Burton compares these patients with other melancholic people; the preceding passage calls this phlegmatic kind comparatively rare. Saxonia’s Venetian widow is a reported individual example.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: rheume

Modern rendering: rheum

Word and construction: The spelling rheume is modernized to rheum without replacing the historical bodily-fluid term.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “rheume” (English; lemma).

Citation key: rheum.

Here: Ringing ears attributed to cold and rheum illustrate bodily occasions for distorted imagination.

Context: Fracastorius’s explanation of false bodily conceptions; Laurentius’s following answer concerns the second question, imagined rank.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: cold & rheume

Modern rendering: cold or rheum

Word and construction: Rheume corresponds to rheum and cold to cold; the original coordination & becomes or in the supplied rendering.

Alignment qualification: The nouns align, but the conjunction changes from and to or; the rendering is not an exact logical equivalent of the printed coordination.

Sense relation: A further selected attestation of this sense, with its local argument separately qualified.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “rhume” (English; lemma).

Citation key: rheum.

Here: A perpetual discharge in the head belongs to a satirical catalogue of an ageing lover’s frailties.

Context: Burton’s derisive portrayal of older men still pursuing young women; this is not an individual clinical case.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: a perpetuall rhume in his head

Modern rendering: a perpetual catarrh in his head

Word and construction: Rhume is rendered catarrh; perpetuall, in his head and the article retain their corresponding scope.

Sense relation: A further selected attestation of this sense, with its local argument separately qualified.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

rheumatic

Printed “rheumatick” (English; lemma).

Affected by rheum or a rheumatic disorder in the period’s terminology.

Here: The adjective joins gouty and a hyperbolic catalogue of infirmities in the portrait of a wealthy suitor who is nevertheless preferred.

Context: Burton’s satire of wealth-driven courtship, conditional on the suitor having land or money; the term does not establish a precise modern rheumatological diagnosis.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: rheumatick and gouty

Modern rendering: Rheumatic and gouty

Word and construction: Rheumatick supplies Rheumatic; and gouty retains the coordinated, separate condition.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

still

Printed “still” (English; lemma).

A distilling apparatus.

Here: Drops issuing from a still supply the comparison for tears drawn out by Cupid’s inward fire.

Context: Burton introduces the apparatus image, followed by an unattributed Latin line and his explicit application to a lover’s tears.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: As drops from a still

Modern rendering: Like drops from a still

Word and construction: Still names the apparatus; drops and from express the product and source, while As becomes Like.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

stillicidium · stillicidia

Printed “stillicidia” (Latin; lemma).

Liquid applied by dripping; drip applications.

Here: Hercules de Saxonia’s applications are listed among means for procuring sleep; Burton also gives the English gloss droppings.

Context: Burton attributes this method to Saxonia; the following confidence is Laurentius’s qualified I think you may, within a list of historical treatments.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: stillicidia

Modern rendering: drip applications

Word and construction: The Latin plural is explicated as applications administered by dripping; Burton’s adjacent English droppings is retained separately in the modern body.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “stillicidiis” (Latin; lemma).

Citation key: stillicidium.

Here: The Lucca margin has hot water applied to both head and stomach, while the English body mentions only the head.

Context: Mercurialis’s counsel for a particular hypochondriacal patient; the surrounding discussion distinguishes heating, drying and cleansing effects and narrows indications.

Source: original marginal quotation

Source wording and original alignment: calidarum aquarum stillicidiis

Modern rendering: streams of hot water

Alignment scope: equal-scope phrase in the original marginal quotation and its supplied note translation

Word and construction: Stillicidiis supplies streams; aquarum supplies of water and calidarum supplies hot.

Modern container: note

Sense relation: A further selected attestation of this sense, with its local argument separately qualified.

stillicidium · stillicidiaque

Printed “stillicidiaque” (Latin; lemma).

A gutter or channel carrying runoff.

Here: The gutters are architectural routes used by clandestine lovers, not bodily discharges or medicinal applications.

Context: Haedus as quoted by Burton, in a warning about dangerous courtship and falls; the note’s later Latin syntax is awkward.

Source: original marginal quotation

Source wording and original alignment: qui in amicarum ædes per fenestras ingressi stillicidiaque

Modern rendering: those who enter their mistresses’ houses through windows and gutters

Alignment scope: equal-scope phrase in the original marginal quotation and its supplied note translation

Word and construction: Stillicidia supplies gutters and -que supplies and. Qui supplies those who, ingressi the entry, in amicarum ædes their mistresses’ houses, and per fenestras through windows; their is supplied from the relationship implied by the context.

Modern container: note

Grammar: Stillicidia is plural; enclitic -que adds and. Here the noun denotes architectural gutters.