Abstract
The origin of herbaria represented a revolution in the history of botany. An analysis of the earliest herbaria points to Bologna and Ferrara (Italy) as the cradle of this innovation. Ferrara, the seat of the Court of Este, was a hotspot of scientific humanism during the first half of the sixteenth century. Some evidence indicates that the physician and humanist Nicolò Leoniceno played a role in opening the way for this new science. Bologna was likewise a center of diffusion of the ars herbaria and Luca Ghini an undisputed leader. From there, the art of making herbaria spread rapidly in Italy and then throughout Europe. Three herbaria were certainly compiled before 1550, five more were completed or initiated in Italy before 1551, and by the end of the century, more than 20 herbaria had been compiled in Europe. In the earliest herbaria, plants were labeled with the names given by Dioscorides, as these were regarded as the ‘‘correct’’ ones. Starting from the middle of the century, however, several major botanical works were published, each one adopting a different nomenclature. This induced some authors to label their herbarium specimens with a rich synonymy. Herbaria offered an unprecedented opportunity for scientific communication: Dried plant specimens could be sent everywhere, so that any botanist could find out the meaning that colleagues abroad gave to a given plant name. Thus, for the first time in history, herbaria allowed a commonly accepted nomenclature to be established, a prerequisite for the development of a European scientific community.
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Notes
For centuries, the word “herbarium” had been used to refer to an herbal (hortus pictus), a book about medicinal plants or a book with illustrations of plants (Mägdefrau 1992; Thijsse 2023). The earliest herbals date back to the Roman time (Dioscorides 1988, 1998–1999), and the tradition continued until the sixteenth century (see, e.g., Arnaldo 1539). It was during the sixteenth century that herbals, the typical instrument of Medieval medicine, were superseded by herbaria (horti sicci),
“The Englishman John Falconer [ …] who explored several countries in order to identify plant species, and who glued many different ones with admirable technique onto a bound volume.”
“Magister Lucas believes that this plant, which people call Herba Santa Maria, is Ageraton majus.”
“Not coincidentally, the earliest botanical gardens (Pisa and Florence, founded by Luca Ghini, and Padua, founded by Francesco Bonafede and Luigi Anguillara) were conceived and established in the same years (1543–1545) as the earliest herbaria (Garbari 1992; Clauser and Pavone 2016) and paralleled the herbaria as instruments for the study of plant diversity and systematics (Offerhaus et al. 2023).
“I am sending you those plants that I suppose you are pleased to receive … but I have scarcely 300 species of dried herbs, while I could swear I had more than 600, but I don’t know where they have gone.”
“… Ferrara, a destination that I recommend to anybody who wants to acquire a correct knowledge of plants as well as of good medicine: indeed, people of Ferrara, favoured by some celestial influence, are erudite physicians and excellent experts of natural sciences.”
According to Thijsse (2023), the list of lost herbaria includes those of William Turner, Georg Foster, Joachim Camerarius, Conrad Gesner.
“It is also very useful, in order to keep them in mind, to glue the plants onto some cardboard sheets, which is how I keep many of them, precious and rare: with this expedient they preserve their form and colours for many years, as if they were embalmed.”
The authorship of this herbarium has been the object of a long controversy: some authors (Celani 1902; Celani and Penzig 1907) proposed Gerardo Cibo as the author, while Chiovenda (1908a, 1908b) and De Toni (1910) proposed Francesco Petrollini. A recent study by Stefanaki et al. (2019) seems to provide convincing elements in favour of the latter.
The so-called Bauhin at Bologna (Baldini et al. 2021) has been shown to be an assemblage of specimens of different origin and different authors; it includes plants collected from c.1550 onwards, but it was assembled in its present form after 1625 (Cristofolini 2023).
“Europe the Self-Tormentor, that is to say, she miserably torments herself and laments her own disgrace.”
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Acknowledgements
The author is very grateful to Dr. Mark Carine, The Natural History Museum, London, for valuable comments on a first draft of the manuscript. Many thanks are due to Prof. Stefania Biondi, Bologna, for linguistic revision, to Dr. Fabrizio Buldrini, Bologna, for useful suggestions, and to two anonymous referees for helpful criticism. The reproduction of herbarium pages was kindly permitted by: Biblioteca Universitaria and Sistema Museale di Ateneo, University of Bologna, Italy; Sistema Museale di Ateneo, University of Florence, Italy; and Naturalis Biodiversity Center, Leiden, the Netherlands.
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Cristofolini, G. Origin and evolution of herbaria in the sixteenth century. Rend. Fis. Acc. Lincei 35, 63–75 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12210-024-01232-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12210-024-01232-1