How to Cure Melancholy, 1587
Of the Passion of the Splene. This impediment doth come by thought, anger or care, or sorow…
16th century
How to Exercise, 1560
Since there are various sorts of exercise, it should be considered which one is most suited…
How to Make Spiced Wine, 1559
Cinnamon, an ounce and a half. Ginger, iii drams.
How to Care for a Toddler, 1577
It very often happens in early walking that the infant falls…
How to Freshen Your Face, 1565
Take a bean, and having chewed it well, spit it on a cloth…
How to Cure Your Cough, 1558
A most beautiful and pleasant secret for curing a cough…
How to Interpret Forehead Wrinkles, 1562
Well-positioned and advantageous lines…
How to Eat a Pumpkin, 1597
The pulpe of the Pompion is never eaten raw…
How to Survive a Mermaid Attack, 1527
The mermayde is a dedely beste that bringeth a man gladly to dethe…
How to Eat Bread, 1567
Nobles, who are bilious by nature, have both crusts removed…
How to Watch an Eclipse Safely, 1579 and 1658
Whosoever desyres to see the Sun eclipsed without hurting their eyes…
How to Improve Your Memory, 1562
Margarita Philosophica Nova (1508), Wellcome Library
How to Swim, 1587
The times which the temperature of this our climate affords as good to swimme…
How to Use Asparagus, 1568
Asparagus cooked with wine alleviates pain of the loins and kidneys, provokes urine…
How to Converse Politely, 1595
It is also a fowle and unseemely thing for thee to make faces…
How to Stop Bleeding, 1596
A very good Medicine to staunch bloud… Take a peece of Salt Biefe…
How to Improve Your Brain, 1596
A Rule to knowe what thinges are good and holosome for the Braine…
How to Avoid Melons, 1565
When you consider the small size of the root, and the great size of the stalk…
How to Choose Drinking Water, 1528
Thou ought to knowe that clere rennynge Waters that ben nyghe to cytees in pure grounde…
How to Read Eyebrows, 1562
The eyebrowes that be very heary declare folyshnes of maners and mischiefe…
How to Prepare for Spring, 1528
Walters Art Museum MS W.195, f. 4r
How to Cure a Nosebleed, 1561
Beat egges shales to pouder and syft them through a linnen cloth and blewe them into his nose…
How to Behave in School, 1595
Be it far from thee to go unto the Schoole with as ill a will as wicked dooers…
How to Carry Objects While Swimming, 1595
To carrie any thing drie over the water in his hands. This is onely done by swimming upon his backe…
How to Dress, 1530
Naturally good or bad taste does exist…
How to Fart, 1530
Some teach that boys should keep in the gas of their bellies by compressing their buttocks…
How to Replace a Nose, 1587
An incision is made in the skin of either arm, left or right, down to the flesh…
How to Talk About Your Kids, 1558
Those who are constantly talking about their children, their wives or their nursemaids, are equally at fault…
How to Groom Your Eyebrows, 1563
Take the galle of a hee Gote or of a she Gote, but the hee Goate is better…
How to Make White-Out, 1563
For to make a water that will take out incontinent letters from the Paper…
How to Succeed on a Business Trip, 1528
Cosimo de’ Medici spoke to a friend of his who was very rich but not very learned…
How to Improve Your Memory, 1563
To make one have a good memorie. Take a Tooth or the lefte legge of a Badgre…
How to Cure Head Congestion, 1596
A Medicine for the stopping of the nose and head, which commeth by reason of colde…
How to Keep Your Hands Warm, 1579
Whosoever annoynts his feete or hands, with the grease of a Woolfe…
How to Survive Your Studies, 1576
We see many great and painfull Studentes, still sitting at their Bookes…
How to Avoid the Plague, 1595
Whosoever eateth two Walnuts, two Figs, twenty leaves of Rew, and one graine of Salt…
How to Grow an All-Purpose Herb, 1586
To make an hearb to growe which shall have many savours and tastes…
How to Cure Smelly Feet, 1590
Whosoever have their feete smell strongly, if they put the scales of Iron in their shoes…
How to Negotiate, 1597
It is better dealing with men in appetite then with those which are where they would be…
How to Interpret Italian Gestures, 1562
The Lomberd… is scorneful of his speche. He wyl geve an aunswer with wrieng his hed…
How to Cure Ear Problems, 1590
Earth Wormes fried with Goose greace, then straind…
How to Get Rich, 1556
Of all ways whereby great wealth is acquired by good and honest means, none is more advantageous than mining…
How to Tell Jokes, 1558
Where your pleasantries are not rewarded with the laughter of listeners, cease and desist from telling jokes…
How to Slim Down in Fourteen Days, 1595
An excellent and approved thing to make them slender, that are grosse…
How to Save Your Soul at a Dance, 1530
Never doze during the ball, please, my good companion…
How to Defend Yourself From Basil, 1595
An Italian, through the oft smelling of an hearb called Basil…
How to Make Your Own Lip Balm, 1595
If one use to rub chapped or rough lippes with the sweate behind their eares…
How to Party Like a Scholar, 1558
It is not fitting to be melancholy or distracted in the company of others…
How to Impress Girls at a Dance, 1530
Furthermore never fart when you are dancing; grit your teeth and compel your arse to hold back the fart..
How to Cure Laryngitis, 1579
Laye a thynne peece of rawe Beefe, to the forehead of them that have lost theyr voyce…
How to Dress for Dancing, 1530
In case of dance emergency, pull cord. Cesare Negri, Nuove inventioni di balli, 1604
How to Grow a Beard, 1539
To make hair and beard grow. Take honeybees in quantity and dry them in a basket by the fire…