f17r

[-JKP-]

I have a multi-lingual take on this, which I developed after a glass of wine last night. Today I thought "I bet that f17r marginalia has been covered on the Ninja", and wasn't disappointed!



This looks like (if you squint hard enough): "malhar allar lut3 hest vitellum" ... with maybe some faint characters afterwards.  

1. malhar - (Portugese) meaning "strike" or "thresh"
   
   
2. allar - (Icelandic) meaning "all"
   
   
3. lut3 - (Latin) Luteum meaning "yellow". The short line above the "t3" is a macron, and scribes in medieval times usually used it to indicate an abbreviation, most commonly a missing "m" or "n". The "3" itself can mean a missing "ue". 
   
   
4. hest - (Latin) meaning "best"
   
   
5. vitellum - (Latin) meaning "yolk"
   

The obvious interpretation is as a puzzling multi-language instruction to "beat all your best yellow yolks" - perhaps in order to make a desert using the plant depicted on the same folio?

Some thoughts...

I don't think it's malhar. The writer doesn't write "h" that way on this page or on the last page. It always has a descender. I think it's mallier.

The third vowel is not an "a"—it's most probably an "e". The first one is probably a fractured "a".


I don't think it's allar (the second vowel is an "e"). You have to remember that many medieval writers did not put loops on their "e" and this writer does usually emphasize the stem on the "a" (which the third vowel doesn't have). However, even if it's aller, it might mean "all".

It's not lut3, it's luc3/lucz with "c". That's not how the writer writes the letter "t" (even though earlier 13th and 14th century scribes often wrote the "t" as a curve, this writer doesn't). I agree it's an abbreviation (it's indicated with the over-line) and that it could be lucrum or lucorum (both of which could be abbreviated this way).


The rest I'm not sure of. I've commented on them on my blog but they are very hard to discern.