tuchie (tutty)

Ingredients

tuchie (tutty), ceruse, cathmie, gummi arabike, dragagantum

Preparation Steps

Original Recipe Text

The material is part of a recipe for a 'colliry' (eye medicine) used during the 'waxing of þe sekenes' to alleviate pain ('do awei þe ache'). It involves the combination of ceruse, cathmie, tutty, gum Arabic, and tragacanth (p. 246).

Evidence

"tutty, made from zinc oxide, is a fairly common ingredient in medical recipes: ‘A colliry in þe waxing of þe sekenes to do awei þe ache: Take [...] ceruse [...] cathmie, tuchie (tutty), gummi arabike, dragagantum....’"

Remarks

Tutty is explicitly identified as zinc oxide. The text notes that it closely resembles 'soot of the howse' because it can be made from the char inside chimneys, yet it was classified as an exotic spice (p. 246). According to the Florentine merchant Francesco Pegolotti, tutty was imported to the West from Alexandria in Egypt, imbuing it with a 'marvellous' and 'exotic' quality despite its physical similarity to domestic soot (p. 246). Binders like gum Arabic and tragacanth are listed as co-ingredients.