David Joris

  David Joris , Jan van Scorel (1495-1562), s.d., schilderij (tempera op paneel)89 x 68 cm, Kunstmuseum Basel (inv. 561)
[Licentie: Public domain Bijdragers: The Yorck Project:
10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei DVD-ROM, 2002. ISBN 3936122202]

"David Joris (of Jorisz., zoon van Joris)(º wellicht Brugge, 1501 – ✝ Bazel, 28 augustus 1556) was een Delftse glasschilder die bekend werd als wederdoper en ketter. Er wordt algemeen aangenomen dat zijn moeder uit een Delftse familie kwam, terwijl zijn vader een Vlaamse koopman en rederijker was. Joris werd glasschilder [in 1522 he painted windows for the church at Enkhuizen, North Holland (Kingsgarden)] [after completing his training as a glazier in Antwerp, the young David Joris joined a group of Flemish craftsmen who left the city for Calais - then an English territory - where they were commissioned by a member of the court of Henry VIII to produce stained glass windows for a chapel. Joris further claims to have accompanied his colleagues onwards to London in 1522, although there he fell ill and eventually decided to return to Antwerp in 1524. As a stained glass painter, Joris’s work is close to that of Dirick Vellert of Antwerp, who may have been one of his teachers, as well as Barend van Orley (with whom Joris is thought to have travelled to Calais and London) and Pieter Coecke van Aelst. (Stephen Ongpin)]

David Joris (attributed to), Charity, from the Niklaus Chapel, St. Peter, Basel, ca. 1545

Hij werd tevens rederijker [ zijn naam 'David', genaamd naar de Joodse koning, zou hem zijn gegeven nadat zijn vader die rol gespeeld had in de Redrijkerskamer. Als handelaar reisde hij vanuit Antwerpen naar Frankrijk en Engeland. (Gameo, dd. 01/12/2016)][...]
Hij trouwde in Delft, waar "hij sympathiseerde met de beweging der sacramentariërs, lieden die de praesentia realis van bloed en vlees van Christus in het brood en de wijn van de mis verwierpen. In 1528 werd hij voor het bespotten van het sacrament gearresteerd en gevonnist. Zijn tong werd doorboord en hij werd voor drie jaar verbannen uit Holland. Tijdens de omzwervingen gedurende zijn ballingschap kwam Joris in aanraking met de dopers, ook wel wederdopers of anabaptisten genoemd. Hij liet zich in 1534, toen het banvonnis reeds was verlopen, opnieuw dopen. [...]
Hij waagde het [...] kritiek te uiten op de gangbare opinie onder de dopers dat het geoorloofd was de broeders in het belegerde Münster gewapenderhand te hulp te komen. [...] Joris was tegen het gebruik van geweld [...] [Terug in Delft] kreeg hij in december 1536 in zijn atelier enkele visioenen, waaruit hij concludeerde dat God wilde dat hij een grote rol ging vervullen. Deze visioenen vormden de basis voor zijn latere opvattingen. [...] Zijn idee dat hij door God gezonden was om de mens de juiste interpretatie van de Schrift te geven was [...] in 1539 geheel gerijpt. [Ook zijn volgers hadden visioenen die zich rond zijn figuur afspeelden (Gameo, dd. 01/12/2016)]
Volgens Joris leefde men in een eindtijd en hij deed aanzienlijke pogingen om zijn ideeën alom ingang te doen vinden. Het belangrijkste element in zijn leer was het idee dat de mens wedergeboren diende te worden. Deze wedergeboorte werd voor hem een tweede kruisdood, die men, als eens Christus uitwendig, inwendig moest ondergaan.

Portret van David Jorisz, Reinier Vinkeles naar Jacobus Buys, 1788,
ets (RKD IB02012039)

Hiertoe diende men alle lusten, vooral de seksuele te doden. De methode hiervoor leidde in Davidjoristische kringen tot een voor die tijd bedenkelijke seksuele moraal, waarin naaktloperij, het aan elkaar opbiechten van geheime seksuele verlangens en in sommige gevallen polygamie samengingen. Het overwonnen hebben van de zinnelijke prikkels moest men bewijzen door met een naakte vrouw te slapen. Zoals het meer gaat met proeven, mislukte ook deze wel eens. [...]
Joris probeerde fanatiek zijn ideeën op de dopers over te brengen en werd door velen als een nieuwe profeet gezien. Joris geraakte hiervan in zulk een staat van opwinding, dat hij zich ging beschouwen als de derde David, aan wie de oudtestamentische koning en Christus-David waren voorgegaan. Zijn succes was niet onaanzienlijk. Vooral in het noorden van de Nederlanden verwierf hij aanhang. [...]

David Joris was in de periode 1535-1540 een invloedrijke doperse leider in de Nederlanden en Noordwest-Duitsland. [...] [Joritz participated in the Anabaptist project to build the New Jerusalem in the city of Zwolle and in the valley of the river IJssel. His mother, in 1537, suffered martyrdom as an Anabaptist. Soon after her death, he took up a role of his own, having visions and the gift of prophecy. (His writings, all in Dutch, flowed in a continual stream from 1524 and amounted to over 200 in number.) (Kingsgarden)][(In contrast to these visions is his) rationalist approach to the topic of the devil and supernatural evil. David Joris anticipated the views of Thomas Hobbes, John Epps and John Thomas in interpreting the devil as an allegory. (Alchetron)]

Frans Floris, De famille van Berchem, ca 1561

Jakob Le Roy, Château de Schilde, ca 1670

Vanaf 1538 werd de vervolging tegen David Joris en zijn aanhangers, de Davidjoristen, heviger. Volgens Joris’ schoonzoon Blesdijk kostten deze vervolgingen aan zeker honderd mensen het leven. Ook de moeder van David Joris werd tijdens deze vervolgingen door de autoriteiten onthoofd.
Joris zelf wist te ontsnappen en vestigde zich omstreeks 1539 eerst in Antwerpen ["Hij kreeg onderdak van Cornelis van Lier in zijn kasteel Hof ten Broecke in Schilde. Jorisz. oefent ook invloed uit op diverse leden van de familie Van Berchem. In Schilde schrijft hij aan zijn 'Wonderboeck', dat op kosten van Cornelis van Lier (heer van Berchem) gedrukt wordt in Deventer door Dirk van de Borne. (Jan Lampo)] "The transitionary period between 1539 and 1544 during his time in Antwerp under the patronage of Anna van Etten [vrouw van Johan van Berchem, heer van Schilde] and her son-in-law, Cornelius van Lier, during which he developed the idea of a ‘spiritual language’ only to be understood by the enlightened, might well have created fertile ground for later Niclaesianism and Hiëlism in Antwerp." (A certain measure of perfection, dd. 28/12/2016)

en vervolgens in Oost-Friesland. Spreken in het openbaar was echter niet meer mogelijk en zo verloor hij zijn invloed in de Nederlanden. Toen in 1544 ook Oost-Friesland geen veilige woonplaats meer bood, besloot Joris naar Bazel te verhuizen. Daar leefde hij onder de schuilnaam Jan van Brugge een vorstelijk leven. Hij werd daartoe in staat gesteld door de genereuze giften van zijn trouwe aanhang. In 1556 stierf hij, betreurd door zijn vrouw, zijn elf kinderen en zijn vele vrienden.
Sommige aanhangers van Joris sloten zich aan bij andere stromingen of hadden dat al gedaan. Vele anderen bleven echter trouw aan hun profeet. Daardoor bleven de Davidjoristen een redelijk omvangrijke groep in de Nederlanden en in Oost-Friesland in de gehele zestiende eeuw." (Wikipedia, dd. 01/12/2016)
"Three years later, Nicolas Blesdijk, who had married his eldest daughter Jannecke, became inhibriated one night and denounced the dead man to the authorities of Basel. He claimed later to have lost confidence in Jorisz before his death, to save his own life. An investigation was begun in March 1559, calling for Nicolas's testimony and resulted in a conviction for heresy. The exhumed body of Jorisz was burned, together with his portrait, on the I3th of May 1559." (Kingsgarden, dd. 27/12/2016)

David Joris, portret door Van Sieghem

De Bijbel beschouwen als de enige autoriteit, beschouwde Joris als 'dode letter' geloof. Niks kon definitief beslecht worden in religieuze disputen louter door de Schrift; het was nodig om rond te zoeken naar de Zoon, aan Hem alleen werd alles geopenbaard. En volgens Joris kwam die uit de Nederlanden. Waar de anabaptisten in het algemeen vast hielden aan de Schrift als principe, verwierp Joris dat en stelde de mystieke ervaring centraal. "To the mystic Joris historical revelation was merely a matter of the sense; his religious experience lay outside it." (Kühn)

Menno Simonsz, gravure van Jan ii van de Velde. Kunstsammlungen Veste Coburg

"In 1542, the year he published his principal work ''tWonderboeck', the difference between Joris and Menno Simons [de leidinggevende anabaptistische kerkhervormer die zijn naam schonk aan de Mennonieten ofte doopsgezinden] burst into a violent dispute. Menno had already in his Fundamentboek (1539) warned against the false prophet. Joris then attacked Menno in a fiery letter: "Gird on your sword, Menno Simons, . . arm yourself with the most powerful Scriptural weapon! . . Who advises you, Menno, to appear so boldly before the Lord, that you elevate yourself above all? Do say, dear man, what spirit or witness advises you to teach? Who has sent you? . . . I will show you (however firmly you may think you have it) that you do not know it, nor do you know what is truth and wisdom, except after the letter." Violently Joris attempted to make Menno recognize his divine mission; but Menno rejected "imaginations, rhetorical tricks, and other deceptions of the devil" which Joris substituted for the Gospel; he said Joris was correctly taken for the "anti-Christ, the man of sin, the son of perdition, a false prophet, murderer of souls, deceiver and falsifier of the divine truth and the commands of Christ." It was evidence of devilish pride and anti-Christian foolishness, that Joris "elevates his visions and dreams above the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, who has taught the apostles and prophets."
Without doubt Menno hit the crux of Joris' fateful error when he said, "Under the pretext of humility he promotes devilish defiance and under the name of perfection, chastity, and other virtues he promotes various vices and shameful deeds." Menno refused to carry the dispute any further."(Gameo, dd. 01/12/2016)

Anna Jansz en route naar haar executie op January 24, 1538 (uit de Martelaersspiegel, Thieleman J. van Braght, 1660)

Naast de visioenen die hij had, werd hij ook geïnspireerd door het fanatisme van Anneken Jansz.(Gameo, dd. 01/12/2016)] "Though she appears in the Martyrs’ Mirror as a model feminine sufferer, the “Trumpet Song” she composed has in at least some versions a distinctly apocalyptic tone. One historian called it the Marseillaise of Anabaptist hymns:

'Wash your feet in the godless blood'

This is shocking imagery, but it’s also far from clear that it’s actually what Anna herself wrote — or if its surface interpretation is what the author intended to convey. Anabaptism’s fast-evolving strains published different versions of the “Trumpet Song” in the 16th century, whose slight alterations dramatically shade its meaning — especially so in view of the possible scriptural allusions. Here’s a version of the same line in which the verb wash (wascht) is replaced with watch, or mind (wacht), and it now advises the true Christian to leave punishment of the persecutors to God:

'You true Christians be of good cheer
Mind dipping your feet in blood
Because this is the reward which those who
robbed us will receive'

[...] her image filtered through the texts of interlocutors like the great Anabaptist fugitive David Joris, rumored to have been Anna’s onetime lover. Joris published the version of the “Trumpet Song” excerpted just above — the cautious one.
In the end, a fixed conclusion as to whether Anna was a firebrand later softened for public consumption, or the reverse, or a more nuanced character entirely, is beyond the reach of posterity. In any guise, she was an exponent of the call to spiritual purity and anticipation of the Lord that fortified a proscribed faith in its wilderness sojourn. [...]
of the “original” versions of Anna’s famous song, either in Dutch or in translation, 'Profiles of 'Anabaptist Women: Sixteenth-Century Reforming Pioneers [C. Arnold Snyder, 1996]' gives the last three of its 13 stanzas thus:

At Borsa and Edom, so the author has read / The Lord is preparing a feast / From the flesh of kings and princes. / Come all you birds, / Gather quickly / I will feed you the flesh of princes. / As they have done, so shall be done to them. / You servants of the Lord, be of good cheer. / Wash your feet in the blood of the godless. / This shall be the reward for those who robbed us. / Be pleased therefore, rejoice and be glad. / Play a new song on your harps; / Delight in our God / All you who foresee vengeance. / The Lord comes to pay / And to revenge all our blood. / His wrath is beginning to descend. / We are awaiting the last bowl. / Oh bride, go to meet your Lord and King. / Arise, Jerusalem, prepare yourself. / Receive all your children alike. / You shall spread out your tents. / Receive your crown, receive your kingdom. / Your King comes to deliver. / He brings his reward before him. / You shall rejoice in it. / We shall see his glory in these times. / Rejoice, Zion, with pure Jerusalem.'" (Executed Today, dd. 01/12/2016)

From an engraving by Christian Friedrich Fritzsch (1719–1774)

"In 1544 Joris left the Low Countries for Basel secretly after a violent dispute between the Jorists and John A Lasco (Jan Łaski) who was then superintendent of East Friesland’s established church. The persecution of his followers intensified. In Basel he was a voice for religious freedom, defending Servetus [zie Guus Kuijer, Het doden van een mens, over Castellio's reactie op de dood van Miguel Serveto, en o.a. ook over Joris ] and seemingly forging close links with both Castellion and Schwenckfeld – who may have influenced his theology during this period of his life. [...]

Engraving from Apocalypsis, or The revelation of certain notorious advancers of heresie. London, 1655.

In 1548, writing to Niclaes (the only evidence we have of contact between them) there were clearly worries about his leadership and some tensions with Niclaes. Niclaes may have gone from being a ‘threat to oneness’ in Joris’ Emden days to ‘a threat of fanaticism’ by Basel. Notably, the issue of sole divine inspiration was one that was to characterise Niclaesian Familism and was, later, to lead to the Hiëlist factional schism. [...]

embleem van de Family of Love / Huis der Liefde

The ‘Davidists’ (better, Jorists) were not formally expelled from East Frisia until 1544/45 and, up until that point, relations had been broadly tolerable. Niclaes seems to have arrived in 1541 and was accorded citizenship the following year. He probably formally founded his sect shortly after his arrival there and seemed to manage to live there for nearly two decades before his orthodoxy came under any serious question. It seems that he may have had the support of the influential Lord of Pewsum, Huycke Manninga and, perhaps, wider Manninga support generally – see A. Hamilton – ‘The Family of Love’ (Cambridge, 1981). The potential overlap between an embedded Jorist presence in Emden and the Family of Love’s foundation provides some fascinating possibilities – including the outside possibility that Niclaes’ true source of inspiration was actually gained on arrival in Emden." (A certain measure of perfection, dd. 28/12/2016)

Christoffel van Sichem (I), Portret van David Jorisz., naar Jan Cornelisz. van 't Woudt, 1677
gravure en ets, h 168mm × b 142mm (Rijksmuseum, RP-P-OB-15.618). Oorspronkelijk gemaakt
 voor:  'Historische beschrijvinge  ende affbeeldinge der voorneemste hooft ketteren', Amsterdam,
 C. van Sichem, 1608. Deze prent komt in deze staat voor in: C. van Sichem, 'Het tooneel der
hooft-ketteren, bestaande in verscheyde afbeeltsels...', Middelburg, Wilhelmus Goeree, 1677.

Portret van David Jorisz., aan een tafel, waarop een exemplaar van het door hem geschreven 'Wonderboeck' ligt. Hij laat zijn hand, waarin hij een anjer vasthoudt, rusten op het boek. In de andere hand heeft hij een handschoen. Boven zijn hoofd staat het jaartal 1554 en zijn leeftijd vermeld. (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, dd. 01/12/2016)

 Christoffel van Sichem (I), Portret van David Jorisz., naar Jan Cornelisz. van 't Woudt, 1606
gravure, ets en boekdruk, h 189mm × b 143mm (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, RP-P-1918-1735)

Onder het portret een drie-regelig onderschrift in het Latijn. Rondom de prent een Duitstalige levensbeschrijving in boekdruk.


Overige portretten van David Joris:

portret van David Joris, Romeyn de Hooghe (1645-1708)

David Joris, ets uit 'Apocalypsis, or The revelation of certain notorious advancers of heresie'.
London, 1655. (Gameo, Scan provided  by the Mennonite Archives of Ontario)

uit Leonhard Meister (1741-1811), Helvetiens Berühmte Männer in Bildnissen von Heinrich Pfenninger

Meer info over de Bazelse periode: altbasel


Overgeleverd artistiek werk van David Joris:

David Joris (attributed to), The Rising of Lazarus, pentekening, 219 mm diameter

David vermaant Joab en Abisai om Absalom te ontzien (2 Samuël 18:5), David Jorisz., 1554, tekening, 316 x 204 mm (coll. Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna , inv./cat.nr 7800; cat. Benesch 1928, nr. 110, afb.)

Het voeden van de hongerigen, een van de werken van Barmhartigheid, David Jorisz., tekening, 250 x 141 mm (coll. Stiftung Weimarer Klassik und Kunstsammlungen, Weimar (Thüringen) , inv./cat.nr 144)

Christus overhandigt Petrus de sleutels (Mattheus 16:19), David Jorisz., tekening, 237 x 191 mm (coll. Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit (Michigan) , inv./cat.nr 1934.97)

Bread of Dreams - Digest: '5. 'They Rotted in Their Own Dung''

Giulio Cesare Luigi Canali (1690-1765), parish piest of Sant' Isaia (Bologna), "knew from close range the drama of the 'stomach of the poor': of their flesh, pierced by the chill and hollowed out by ringworm and lice [...]"

"This curate, who lived in such painfully close contact with mendicity, also serves as a precious guide [...], shining the ray of his lantern's light on the most secret aspects of the beggars' lives. He also illuminates the insomnia of the poor, the recurrent and almost obsessive theme of stench, fetor, rags and lurid scarred flesh ('with foul sores, seething throughout the body') [...] and the subject of dirty underpants: [...] who could exaggerate the discomforts of the rubbish, the stench, the emaciation and the squalor whilst these paupers are forced to wear the same underpants for months and months? What Capuchin's most hirsute sackcloth, what penitent's roughest hairshirt, in comparison to these underpants, should not rather be considered the finest linen and delicate sea-silk, particularly given the insufferable troubles that this causes, sordidness which, so to speak, generates rotten flesh. [...] The images which the implacable eye of the Bolognese curate forces us to smell more than observe, are those of the hell of the poor: a putrefied inferno, foul with bodily waste, stagnant faeces and decomposing urine. [...]

Whether in the gloomy interiors of their tumble-down hovels ('the shacks, hay-lofts, caves, dungeons, muddy pools, the semi-infernos of the paupers. Oh, spectacles of compassion and horror!' exclaims Canali, 'How many times I nearly fainted for the intolerable stench and fetor! '), or in the total inferno of the prisons, perceived, carnally and viscerally, as the 'universal punishment of all the senses', where the nauseating perception of stench and fetor which impregnates everything dominated obsessively, yet again.
That filth and those faeces, in which it is their need to swim and remain immersed, so that the prison nearly becomes a sewer! What tongue and what ink would suffice to describe the pain that they bear above all, that they would sooner lie on thorns or burning coals than on that rubbish? And yet they are seen reduced to such intolerable extremes of misery, that they could fit almost to the
letter the words of Joel: 'the beasts of burden rotted in their own dung'.
The descent into the depths could not fail to pass through the 'dismal, frightening spectacle' of the hospital: 'theatre of horror', 'residence of tears', 'home of spasms', 'dark region of death: in regione umbrae mortis'. They stagnate in gloomy corridors, where the 'miserable diseased incurables
... the helpless poor', lie amidst the 'stench and horror of their own disgusting sores'.

Stench and fetors assault the sense of smell, screams and laments the hearing, squalid and deformed faces under one's eyes. Some, because of burning fevers, rave and throw whatever is handy; others, also because of fevers, but of opposite type, shiver and clatter their teeth. Some have their heads split by unbearable headaches, others have their ribs broken and guts pierced by acute pleurisy. One who is about to be suffocated by excessive catarrh, and another who thinks a thousand times he is about to die from the incessant attacks of bad asthma, but never dies. There, as a result of a most bitter thirst, one suffering from dropsy struggles impatiently, and here, because of intestinal inflammation, a consumptive is heard to come to his end [...] There are the convulsions and the contractions of the nerves, [...]; there are aqueous hernias, false catarrhs, fistulated sores, tumours of such large size that there is no medicine other than iron and fire (...) so that, doing the necessary both with iron and with fire, in a metamorphosis that is too difficult but otherwise inevitable, the infirmaries become Calvaries, the beds gallows, the doctors ... executioners."
(Camporesi 1996, '5. 'They Rotted in Their Own Dung'', pp. 68 - 70)

"Strange priests wandered among the pallets of the dying, the attendant fathers of the sick, called fathers 'of Good Death': '[...] Sinister. black as crows, disliked by the sick, they tried to convince them that since diseases were none other than 'a royal road to show us the way to heaven so as to rejoice
in the Divine Essence, they should not decline our attention nor regret it, but should accept and endure with holy will. Better dead but saved than vagabond and sinner, was their logic. In many the 'holy will' was late in showing itself, and this was a shame, because in fact the diseases could
'take away the opportunity of falling into some very grave sin' [Marcello Mansi in the Consigli per aiutare al ben morire (1625)]."
(Camporesi 1996, '5. 'They Rotted in Their Own Dung'', p. 70)

"The 'poveretti' emerge from the silence of nothingness thanks to the mediation of story-tellers such as Giulio Cesare Croce, Vincenzo Citaredo of Urbino, author, among other works, of the Speranza de' poveri (1588), and Giacomo Cieco Veronese [Lamento nuovo sopra la andata di Tofalo zafo Sbirro de poveri mendichi casa bella e ridicolosa (1593)], and many others, often anonymous.Among the latter there is the author of the Opera nuova. Dove si contiene il lamento della Poverta, sopra la carestia dell'anno 1592, in which the anxiety about bread that 'is in size / like a bird's egg', the feeling of being 'poor creatures' in the hands of monopolizers and usurers, powerless and wretched [...], is moderated by the acceptance of the unavoidable fatality of famine sent to those with 'evil phalluses', and in homage to the established powers. [...] The entire poem is punctuated by this obsessive call to patience and forbearance, the exhortation to be suspicious of false prophets and professional troublemakers, the shuddering call to the great journey to Kingdom of Shadows, the appearance of old late-medieval motifs and the re-emergence of death's lugubrious triumphs."
(Camporesi 1996, '5. 'They Rotted in Their Own Dung'', p. 71)

"The opinion that famine and plague were signs of divine wrath, caused by the corrupt and wicked habits of men was widespread. Many held that famine was brought  about by natural causes like the 'irregularity of the weather and the altered seasons' , but most, uninfluenced even by the political side of the unequal distribution of resources, believed that it was divine anger which punished excesses, 'debauchery, discord and lust'.A good portion of the population swore that it was not the 'corruption' of the air, 'the putrefied inferior elements', the eating of 'rotten fish', the action of 'wicked ministers' in the service of the Turk, or the coming and going of 'merchandise', but the angel of the angered God which generated the scourge.

The Bolognese druggist Pastarino was firmly convinced of of this. In his Preparamento ... per medicarsi in questi sospettosi tempi di peste [1577], while he noted the frequent outbreak of the plague in the 'two most mercantile cities of Italy', he swore that the 'many iniquities ... that are performed in transactions, dealings and trading moves God to send some of his terrible scourges and, in particular, pestilence'.
Both herb vendor and preacher, he exhorted his fellow-citizens to dry out 'this our body full of grease and humidity'. This is in accordance with Galen's precept, 'It is proper to dry up the body in this way, and keep it dry', and reinforced by the authority of Avicenna, according to whom 'The best treatment of them [those ill with... pestilential fevers] is desiccation, and it is best that their foods be dried.' Preacher of sobriety and abstinence ('one lives better with little), this singular and ambiguous spice merchant - citing Galen ('it is proper to open up the blocked pores') - called for the opening up of the soul before the body.
'And what are these blocked pores if not our own ears, deaf to sermons, and our mouths, closed to confessions? These should be opened, because by doing so the infirmities are discovered, the bad
humours are revealed, we recognize our worst qualities and, better, they are more easily restored to health ... Having done this, it is necessary to conclude with a good evacuation and make every effort
to evacuate all the superfluities that are within us. Thus we have the rule given to us by Galen that 'convenit corpus superfluitatibus plenum evacuare'. And Avicenna as well ... used these words: 'Purging and loosening is very useful as is the evacuation of the stomach in treating the plague'.
Let us now accept as a principle, my fellow-citizens, to evacuate from this our body every superfluity that is found here. Superfluous are the evil thoughts, dishonest reasoning and wicked designs that
occupy the mind. Superfluous are the lascivious glances, malicious signs and curiosities that dominate the eyes. Superfluous are vain things ... superfluous swearing . . . Superfluous are the things of others that we wrongly keep. And superfluous is still all that with which we could help the poor but do not ... Let us therefore protect ourselves from divine anger, and with this complete evacuation of the body . . . let us prepare to treat ourselves. '
It is not easy to say how much the voice of this Bolognese druggist was heard, seemingly bizarre in the play of extravagant comparisons between apothecary culture and pastoral ideology."
(Camporesi 1996, '5. 'They Rotted in Their Own Dung'', pp. 72-73)

"The elettuario de sanguinibus ('blood electuary') was a speciality of Pastarino's shop, to which the Senate of Bologna had conceded the privilege of publicly preparing, on the second day of August, the antidotes with which the city,[...] prepared for the 'defence' of its citizens as if for soldiers 'enclosed in a strong and well-fortified castle', in order to resist the attack of diseases.

Osvaldus Crollius, Basilica Chymica, Chemical Heritage Foundation, Public Domain

Ludovico Locatelli, Theatro d'Arcani, 1644 edition

The turnover of cash around the druggists' shops was considerable. It is known that two pharmacopoeias existed, one for the rich - full of expensive rarities like 'ambergris', 'bezoar-stone', 'unicorn stone', rubies and gold - and one for the poor, much more modest, almost entirely vegetable. The Fabrica de gli spetiali by Prospero Borgarucci (1566), Valerio Cordo's Dispensarium (1554), Johann Schroeder [1600-1664]'s Thesaurus pharmacologicus, Osvaldus Crollius [1563 - 1609]' Basilica chymica and Ludovico Locatelli's Theatro d'arcani [1644], presupposed buyers with unlimited available finances."
(Camporesi 1996, '5. 'They Rotted in Their Own Dung'', p. 73)

Ambergris

[Ambergris: "a solid, waxy, flammable substance of a dull grey or blackish colour produced in the digestive system of sperm whales. [...] Ambergris has been mostly known for its use in creating perfume and fragrance much like musk. Perfumes can still be found with ambergris around the world. It is collected from remains found at sea and on beaches [...] During the Black Death in Europe, people believed that carrying a ball of ambergris could help prevent them from getting the plague. This was because the fragrance covered the smell of the air which was believed to be a cause of plague. This substance has also been used historically as a flavoring for food and is considered an aphrodisiac in some cultures. During the Middle Ages, Europeans used ambergris as a medication for headaches, colds, epilepsy, and other ailments." (Wikipedia, dd. 26/02/2016)]

Elephant bezoar

Unknown, Goat bezoar, 16th century, Wien, Kunsthistoriches Museum (Kunstkammer)

[Bezoar: " a mass found trapped in the gastrointestinal system (usually in the stomach); Bezoars were sought because they were believed to have the power of a universal antidote against any poison. [...] In 1575, the surgeon Ambroise Paré described an experiment to test the properties of the bezoar stone. At the time, the bezoar stone was deemed to be able to cure the effects of any poison, but Paré believed this was impossible. It happened that a cook at King's court was caught stealing fine silver cutlery and was sentenced to death by hanging. The cook agreed to be poisoned instead. Ambroise Paré then used the bezoar stone to no great avail, as the cook died in agony seven hours later. Paré had proved that the bezoar stone could not cure all poisons as was commonly believed at the time. 
Modern examinations of the properties of bezoars by Gustaf Arrhenius and Andrew A. Benson of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography have shown that they could, when immersed in an arsenic-laced solution, remove the poison. The toxic compounds in arsenic are arsenate and arsenite. Each is acted upon differently, but effectively, by bezoar stones. Arsenate is removed by being exchanged for phosphate in the mineral brushite, a crystalline structure found in the stones. Arsenite is found to bond to sulfur compounds in the protein of degraded hair, which is a key component in bezoars." (Wikipedia, dd. 26/02/2016)]

Unicorn Horn / Narwhal tooth

[Unicorn stone: probably "'unicorn horn' [also known as an alicorn], is a legendary object, [...] many healing powers and antidote's virtues were attributed to the horn of the unicorn. These properties, assumed real since the 13th century, made it one of the most expensive and most reputable remedies during the Renaissance, and justified its use in royal courts. Beliefs related to the "unicorn horn" influenced alchemy through spagyric medicine. The horn's purification properties were eventually put to the test in, for example, the book of Ambroise Paré, Discourse on unicorn [...] Seen as one of the most valuable assets that a king could possess, unicorn horns were exchanged and could be purchased at apothecaries as universal antidotes until the 18th century. [...] The legendary unicorn was never captured, but its symbolic association with virginity made it the symbol of the incarnation of God's Word, innocence and divine power. Belief in the power of the unicorn's horn and its origins persisted from the Middle Ages to the 18th century, when the true source, the narwhal, was discovered. This marine mammal is the true bearer of the "unicorn horn", actually an extended tooth found in the mouth of males and some females." (Wikipedia, dd. 26/02/2016)]