equal him with the exception of a very wise matron."

This wise matron has been identified with Trotula, many of the details
of whose life have been brought to light by De Renzi, in his "Story of
the School of Salerno."[11] According to very old tradition, Trotula
belonged to the family of Ruggiero. This was a noble family of Salerno,
many of the members of which were distinguished in their native town at
least, but the name is not unusual in Italy, as readers of Dante and
Boccaccio are likely to know. It was, indeed, as common as our own
Rogers, of which it is the Italian equivalent.

De Renzi has made out a rather good case for the tradition that Trotula
was the wife of John Platearius I--so called because there were probably
three professors of that name. Trotula was, according to this, the
mother of the second Platearius, and the grandmother of the third, all
of them distinguished members of the faculty at Salerno.

Her reputation extended far beyond her native town, and even Italy
itself, and, in later centuries, her name was used to dignify any form
of treatment for women's diseases that was being exploited. Rutebeuf,
one of the _trouveres_, thirteenth-century French poets, has a
description of the scene in which one of the old herbalist doctors who
used to go round and collect a crowd by means of songs and music, and
then talk medicine to them--just as is done even yet in many of the
smaller towns of this country--is represented as saying to the crowd
when he wants to make them realize that he is no ordinary quacksalver,
that he is one of the disciples of the great Madame Trot of Salerno. The
old-fashioned speech runs somewhat as follows: "Charming people: I am
not one of these poor preachers, nor the poor herbalists, who carry
little boxes and sachets, and who spread out before them a carpet. I am
the disciple of a great lady, who bears the name of Madame Trot of
Salerno. And I would have you know that she is the wisest woman in all
the four quarters of the world."

Two books are attributed to Trotula; one bears the title, "De
Passionibus Mulierum," and the other has been called "Trotula Minor," or
"Summula Secundum Trotulam," and is a compendium of what she wrote. This
is probably due to some disciple, but seems to have existed almost in
her own time. Her most important work bears two sub-titles, "Trotula's
Unique Book for the Curing of Diseases of Women, Before, During, and
After Labor," and the other sub