Cf. Digby 190, f. 29 (sec. xiv ineuntis). De principiis naturae; beginning illegible.
Paris:—Bibl. Mazarine 3576; olim 1271, f. 1-90 (sec. xiv). ‘Incipit liber primus Communium naturalium Fratris Rogeri Bacon, habens quatuor partes principales, quarum prima habet distinctiones quatuor. Prima distinctio est de communibus ad omnia naturalia et habet capitula quatuor. Capitulum primum de ordine scientiae naturalis ad alias. (Inc.) Postquam tradidi grammaticam secundum linguas diversas.’
Extracts printed by Charles, pp. 369-391.
Libri ii, iii, iv. The special natural sciences, according to the Royal MS. just quoted, were treated in three books. They were seven[1353] in number, as Bacon enumerates them in the second chapter of the first part of the Communia Naturalium.
‘Praeter scientiam communem naturalibus, sunt septem speciales, videlicet perspectiva, astronomia judiciaria et operativa, scientia ponderum de gravibus et levibus, alkimia, agricultura, medicina, scientia experimentalis.’
Liber ii. (1) Optics or Perspective (a version of the De multiplicatione specierum). Inc. ‘Ostensum quippe in principio hujus Compendii Philosophiae.’
MSS. Brit. Mus: Royal 7 F vii. p. 221 (sec. xiii), fragment, called ‘Quinta pars Compendii theologiae’; and Addit. 8786, fol. 2 (fragment).
[Cf. Bodl. Digby 183, fol. 49 (sec. xiv)?]
See the references under Tract. de multiplicatione specierum.
(2) Astronomy, or, De coelo et mundo.