Cookery Collection - Early Works
There is a substantial number of cookbooks here printed before
1800. The earliest is a 1541 Apicus presumed to be the world's
first cookbook author who lived in the first century B.C. Other
notable early cookbooks in the collection are Hannah Glasse's
The Art of Cookery (1798), the most famous English cookbook of
the 18th century; John Evelyn's Aceteria, A Discourse of
Sallets (1699), likely the first work in English devoted
exclusively to salads; a 1653 edition of Markham's The English
Housewife, "containing the inward and outward virtues which out
to be in a compleat woman..." and several 17th century works by
Hannah Woolley, the first female cookbook author. While most of
the early works are English from the 17th and 18th century, there
are facsimiles of medieval cookbooks, including The Forme of
Cury, a collection of 196 recipes compiled in 1390. A lengthy
and well preserved cookery manuscript written in 1716, by one
"Anne Western" is here, as well.
Special Collections Division
Michigan State University Libraries
.