MISCELLANY  , a

term applied to a single book containing articles, treatises or other writings dealing with a variety of different subjects . It is a common title in the literature of the 17th and 18th centuries . The word is an adaptation of Lat. miscellanea (from miscellaneus, mixed, miscere, to mix), used in this sense by Tertullian, Miscellanea Ptolemaei (Tert. adv . Val . 12); the ordinary use of the word in Latin was for a dish of broken meats, applied by Juvenal (xi . 20) to the coarse food of gladiators . The Lat. miscellaneus has affected the form of a word which is now usually spelled " maslin," applied to a mixture of various kinds of grain, especially rye and wheat . This, however, is really from the O . Fr. mesteillon; Late Lat. mistilio, formed from mistus, past participle of miscere, to mix, mingle .