BOTANICAL ART & ARTISTS
  • Home
    • Site Index
  • NEWS
    • NEWS blog subscription
  • HISTORY
    • What is Botanical Art?
    • What is Botanical Illustration?
    • Botanical Art History Books >
      • The Art of Botanical Illustration (Blunt)
      • Book Review: Treasures of Botanical Art
    • Herbals
    • Florilegia and Flora
    • Patrons of Botanical Art >
      • About Leonhart Fuchs
      • About Basilius Besler
    • Past Masters - Botanical Art and Illustration >
      • About Maria Sibylla Merian
      • About Elizabeth Blackwell
      • About Georg Dionysius Ehret
      • About Franz Bauer
      • About Sydney Parkinson
      • About Pierre-Joseph Redouté
      • About Marianne North
    • Famous Asian Botanical Artists (600-1900)
    • 20th & 21st Century Botanical Artists >
      • About Arthur Harry Church
      • About Margaret Mee
      • About Mary Grierson
      • About Raymond Booth
      • About Rory McEwen
      • About Pandora Sellars
    • Botanical Photographers
    • Botanical and Herbal Art Online
  • ARTISTS
    • Botanical Artists in the UK
    • Botanical Artists in North America
    • Botanical Artists in Europe
    • Botanical Artists in Australia and New Zealand
    • Botanical Artists in Asia
    • Botanical Artists in Africa
    • Botanical Artists in Latin America
    • Botanical Printmakers, Photographers, Sculptors et al
    • The Jill Smythies Award
    • Botanical Artists on Facebook
    • Botanical Art Blogs
  • Exhibitions
    • Calls for Entries - OPEN exhibitions
    • RHS Botanical Art & Photography Shows >
      • ARCHIVE RHS Botanical Art Shows 2007-2025
      • Exhibit Titles at RHS Botanical Art Shows
      • RHS Portfolio Photography (Botanical / Horticultural)
    • The Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanical Art >
      • ARCHIVE: Shirley Sherwood Gallery Exhibitions
    • Hunt International Exhibition of Botanical Art & Illustration
    • Margaret Flockton Award
    • UK >
      • Permanent Collections (UK)
      • Botanical Art Exhibitions at Major UK Galleries & Museums >
        • ARCHIVE: Major Gallery Exhibitions
      • Botanical Art Exhibitions in England and Wales >
        • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in the UK
        • ARCHIVE: Reviews of Annual Exhibitions by the Society of Botanical Artists
      • Botanical Art Exhibitions in Scotland >
        • ARCHIVE: Scotland - Botanical Art Exhibitions
    • North America >
      • Permanent Collections (USA)
      • ARCHIVE Past ASBA Exhibitions in the USA
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in the USA
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in Canada
    • Europe >
      • Permanent Collections (Europe)
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in Europe
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Exhibitions in Germany
      • ARCHIVE: ​Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in Ireland
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Exhibitions in Russia
    • Australasia >
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in Australasia
    • Asia >
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in Asia
    • Africa
    • World Wide Exhibition of Botanical Art 2025 >
      • ARCHIVE: World Wide Exhibition of Botanical Art 2018
    • Online Exhibitions >
      • ARCHIVE: Online Botanical Art Exhibitions
  • Education
    • NEW BOOKS about Botanical Art and Illustration >
      • NEW in 2020: Books about Botanical Art & Illustration
      • NEW IN 2019: Books about Botanical Art & Illustration
      • NEW in 2018: Books about Botanical Art & Illustration
    • Best Botanical Art Instruction Books >
      • Best Instruction Books by Botanical Art Societies >
        • The Art of Botanical Painting - review
        • The Botanical Palette - review
        • Botanical Sketchbook - review
      • Best Instruction Books about Botanical Illustration >
        • Botanical Illustration - Books by Bobbi Angell
        • Botanical Illustration (Oxley) - review
      • Best Instruction Books by top Artists / Teachers >
        • Books By Billy Showell
        • Books - the Eden Project
      • Best Botanical Drawing Instruction Books (Pencils) >
        • Botanical Painting with Coloured Pencils - review
      • e-Booklets / digital guides
    • Tips and Techniques >
      • Tips from RHS Gold Medal Winners
      • Preparation and set-up
      • Botanical Sketching and Sketchbooks
      • Design and composition
      • Colour
      • Pen and Ink
      • How to draw and paint trees and leaves
    • Botanical Art Video Tips >
      • Video Tips: Watercolour Painting
      • Video Tips Coloured Pencils
      • Video Tips: Pencil drawing
      • Video Tips: Painting Flowers
      • Video Tips: Painting Leaves & Trees
    • Online Botanical Art Instruction >
      • CHECKLIST: FAQS about Online Learning
      • ONLINE TIMELINE
    • International Directory: Botanical Art Teachers
    • International Directory of Botanical Art Courses >
      • UK: Botanical Art Courses
      • North America: Botanical Art Courses
      • Europe: Botanical Art Courses & Holidays
      • Australasia: Botanical Art Courses
    • Artist Residencies, Scholarships, Grants and Bursaries
    • Diplomas and Certificates >
      • SBA Diploma Assignments
    • Distance Learning Courses
    • Talks, Lectures & Tours
    • Botanical Education on Facebook
  • Materials
    • Paper
    • Vellum
  • Groups
    • National & Regional Botanical Art Societies
    • Florilegium Societies & Other Groups
    • Finnis Scott Foundation: Botanical Art Prize
    • Botanical Art Groups on Facebook
  • Botany
    • Why botany matters to artists
    • Botany Books for artists >
      • Botany for the Artist (Simblet)
      • The Art of Plant Evolution
      • The Concise British Flora in Colour (1965)
    • Scientific botanical illustration
    • Plant Forms and Anatomy
    • Plant Evolution and Taxonomy
    • Plant Names and Botanical Latin
    • Botanical Dictionaries
    • How to Identify Plants
    • Recording a Plant / Sketchbooks >
      • Plant Pressing for your own Herbarium
    • Botanic Gardens & Herbaria >
      • Global and National Networks
      • Herbaria, Seed Banks and Fungaria
      • Old Botanic & Physic Gardens in London
      • Botanic Gardens in the UK
      • Botanic Gardens in Ireland
      • Botanic Gardens in Europe
      • Botanic Gardens in the USA
      • Botanic Gardens in Canada
      • Botanic Gardens in Asia
      • Botanic Gardens in Australia
    • Blogs about Plants and Flowers
  • Contact
    • About Katherine Tyrrell
    • About Reviews
    • Privacy Policy

Herbals


​A Herbal is a book about plants and their properties and preceded botanical art.
Some Herbals were illustrated - this page is about Illustrated Herbals

This page covers:
  • What is a Herbal
  • Images in Herbals
  • Herbals - General Resources
  • Herbals of the Ancient World - covering Ancient China, Greece and Rome
  • Herbals of the Early Middle Ages (6th - 11th centuries
  • Herbals of the Late Middle Ages (14th and 15th centuries)
  • Herbals of the Early Modern Era (16th and 17th centuries)
  • The Old English Herbals
  • American Herbals
  • Asian Herbals
Herbals provide some of the earliest records of drawings and paintings of plants - although not all Herbals included illustrations.  

Herbals were originally used in relation to early attempts at medication and the need to identify a specific plant. They included descriptions and what medicinal use a plant has in terms of preparations, such as medicines and ointments, which can be made from it.

Some herbals included illustrations of what a plant looks like in order to aid identification.
the illustrated Herbal (is) one of the rare types of manuscript with an almost continuous line of descent from the time of the Ancient Greeks to the end of the middle ages
​
Picture
Frontispiece from Kreuterbuch of Adam Lonitzer (1577) 'From distilling or removing the water...'

What is a Herbal?
​

There have been various definitions of a Herbal which, in part, depend on the interests of those studying them. Below are some of the definitions by some of the more illustrious scholars.
What is a herbal?
According to the Oxford English Dictionary it is 'a book containing the names and descriptions of herbs, or of plants in general, with their properties and virtues'
Quoted in the introduction to The Illustrated Herbal by Wilfrid Blunt and Sandra Raphael
What’s a herbal?
A herbal is a book of plants, describing their appearance, their properties and how they may be used for preparing ointments and medicines.
British Library - A Curious Herbal
What is a herbal?
Antique and medieval Herbals were originally conceived of as books of simples, a simple being ' a medicine or medicament composed or concocted of only one constituent, especially of one herb or plant.
A typical chapter from a herbal treatise names the plant, gives a list of synonyms, describes it characteristics, its distribution and its habitat, reports what earlier authors said about it, its medical properties, how it should be gathered and prepared, lists recipes made from it, or lists the cures it is used for, and given any contra-indications. In the Illustrated Herbals....each chapter is preceded by an illustration of the plant..."
Introduction to 'Medieval herbals the Illustrative Traditions' by Minta Collins
What is a Herbal?
Medicinal plants could also be collected from the wild, a practice known in the 1600s and 1700s as ‘simpling’. The plants, known as ‘simples’, were gathered for use in herbal remedies including tonics, oils and ointments. Information on treatments can be found in botanical encyclopaedias, known as ‘herbals’. These detailed publications, written by botanists, herbalists and physicians, contained descriptions of plants and set out their many different uses. They were one of the earliest mass-produced texts, as new printing technologies were adopted across Europe during the 1400s and 1500s.
Healing Garden: A History of Medicinal Plants | RHS Libraries
Picture
Herbarum varias qui vis cognoscere vires (‘Various types of herbs that you want to know the powers of’) - see "A well-used book: marginalia and manuscript notes in an early 16th century herbal"
REFERENCE:
  •  A well-used book: marginalia and manuscript notes in an early 16th century herbal | Special Collections and Archives / Casgliadau Arbennig ac Archifau​ | Cardiff University

Images in Herbals
​

The earliest flower drawings were for the most part made to assist the searcher after herbs and simples. Realism was required and to a surprising degree achieved... the illuminations provided for herbals nearly two thousand years af]go were highly naturalistic
Wilfrid Blunt The Art of Botanical Illustration (Chapter 1)
The history of Herbals has seen attempts to make each being better than the last while all owe a huge debt, not to mention content, to those which have gone before.

This page focuses on those Herbals which include illustrations of note, while at the same time providing some context in terms of very notable Herbals which have limited or an unknown number of images.

It seems inconceivable now that Herbals would only include descriptions of plants in order to identify them - particularly in a world which had no agreed system for how plants should be described. However the scope for including illustrations was very limited in terms of reproduction.

Initially all images were painted and therefore unique. However they were sometimes copied

Block printing - using wood blocks - permitted limited reproduction of images.

As printing became established, painted images from earlier books were then drawn (or redrawn) onto wood to create woodcut prints.

Illustrated Herbals - ones with more than a few images - begin to emerge and become more significant after the invention of the printing press in the middle of the 15th century.  However the earliest printed Herbals were copies of manuscript texts which did not have images.
NOTES: 
1) This is a VERY BIG topic. Consequently this page will grow over time as more information about to Herbals is added to it. 
2) Listed under the different herbals are references to where you can see digitised versions of the Herbals Online. It's possible to download the versions available on Botanicus.
The Illustrated Herbal by Wilfred Blunt and Sandra Raphael
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED for those who want to learn more about the history of the illustrated Herbals.
It contains excellent images and impeccable credits and references.
The Illustrated Herbal is an attractive introduction both in text and illustrations to a range of little-known but historically important works from which both modern botany and modern pharmacology have evolved.
William Stearn - review in 
Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, Nov//Dec. 1980
Picture
This is my copy
The book provides in-depth coverage of the development of the herbal and includes excellent illustrations of a number of them and the plants considered to be of medicinal interest. 

It traces their development from early hand-decorated manuscripts and medieval woodcuts to the metal engravings and botanical prints of the early 18th and 19th centuries. ​

​
This guide has been revised and updated to take into account the latest discoveries and developments.
Hardcover: 191 pages
Publishers: 
  • ​W W Norton & Co Inc (1 Dec. 1979)
BUY THIS BOOK
The Illustrated Herbal from Amazon UK
The Illustrated Herbal (Manuscripts) - from Amazon.com

Herbals: General Resources
​

"botanical works were originally handmaidens to science, and monks drew herbals for medicinal purposes"
Portrait of a Plant, New York Times (1997)
  • Herbal - Wikipedia - A general account of the development of Herbals
  • "The Old English Herbals" by Eleanour Sinclair Rohdes - available to read online via Project Gutenberg which offers a variety of formats for reading and storage
  • A Giant List of Herbals - much of the information is said to be derived from Eleanour Sinclair Rohde's "The Old English Herbals" of 1922 
  • Herbals | The Virtual Field Herbarium
    Herbals and the evolution of plant field guides. The early printed herbals took advantage of earlier manuscripts, notably Dioscorides' (40-90 AD) De materia medica, the ultimate authority for over 1,500 years.
  • Botanicus has the text of a number of Herbals available as pdf files - also viewable online. It is a freely accessible, Web-based encyclopedia of digitized historic botanical literature from the Missouri Botanical Garden Library.

Exhibitions about Herbals

  • Healing Garden (10th  September to 14th December 2018) at the RHS Lindley Library, Vincent Square London SW1P 2PE
  • The above exhibition also has tours of the RHS Lindley Library Archive - to see copies of Herbals in the Archive (see image on the right)​

Online Exhibitions of Herbals

  • The University of Delaware: The Art of Botanical Illustration. Herbals
    On-line exhibition of The Art of Botanical Illustration
  • Healing Garden: A History of Medicinal Plants | RHS Libraries Online Exhibition

Articles about Herbals

  • Early Portrayal of Plants By Jutta Buck - Originally appeared in The Botanical Artist - Issue 15, Volume 1
​
Picture
The "Healing Garden" Exhibition at the RHS Lindley Library
Picture
Herbals in the Archive of the Royal Horticultural Society's Lindley Library in London

HERBALS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD
​

China

Shénnóng Běn Cǎo Jīng (神农本草经, Shennong's Materia Medica) c.2800 BC
​

Shénnóng Běn Cǎo Jīng (神农本草经, Shennong's Materia Medica) is considered as the oldest book on Chinese herbal medicine. This was produced by the mythical Emperor Shennong, the founder of Chinese herbal medicine who is thought to have lived around 2,800 BC.

​However facts are sparse, most of the information about how the book came about relates to myth and legend. It's possible the book is a compilation of oral traditions developed over time. It is also known as 
The Divine Farmer's Materia Medica

The book classifies 365 species of roots, grass, woods, furs, animals and stones into three volumes/categories of herbal medicine.  These are:
  • 120  "noble" or "upper herbs" (上品) providing drugs that are harmless to humans: These are said to provide stimulating properties. Examples include:  reishi, ginseng, jujube, the orange, Chinese cinnamon, Eucommia bark, cannabis, or the root of liquorice (Glycyrrhiza uralensis) . 
  • 120 "human," "commoner," or "middle herbs" (中品). which have therapeutic properties for the treatment of the sick. Some also have potentially toxic properties of varying degrees. Substances include: ginger, peonies and cucumber.
  • 125  "low herbs" which produce substances which are poisonous and/or have a strong action on physiological functions (eg a purgative). Examples include Rhubarb, different pitted fruits and peaches.
Picture
Shennong, the Farmer God, tasting herbs to discover their qualities (Source: Wikimedia)
It also introduced the notion that plant substances have five flavours: sour, sweet, salty, bitter and acrid; four conditions - cold, hot, warm and cook and are either toxic or non-toxic.

Images appear to have been added over time but are unlikely to have been associated with its original production.
REFERENCE:
  • Shénnóng Běncǎo Jīng | Wikipedia​​
  • Chinese Herbalism Ancient Roots | Abacus Chinese Medicine

Other First Herbals
​

The Egyptians, Arabs and the people of the Graeco-Roman empire all produced Herbals. 
The History of Herbalism | Wikipedia

Ancient Rome
​

Naturalis Historia (c. 77–79 CE)
​

Pliny's Naturalis Historia is written in Latin and is both:
  • a synthesis of information contained in a number of scrolls - it purports to cover the entire field of ancient knowledge based on the best available authorities at the time
  • a source of information quoted by Disocorides in De Materia Medica
It comprises 37 books and was completed c.77 AD

Botany is covered in Books XII to XVIII. One of the main sources is Theophrastus

Pliny the Elder
b. Gaius Plinius Secundus, AD 23 (Como) – AD 79 (Pompeii) was a Roman Author and a naval commander. He enjoyed investigating natural and geographic phenomena in the field.

Reference:
  • View a digital version of Pliny's Natural history. In thirty-seven books by Pliny, the Elder
  • View the Latin text in Naturalis Historia by Scriptor Gaius Plinius Secundus 77 - 78 p.Ch.n. on Wikisource
  • Natural History (Pliny) | Wikipedia
Picture
The title page of an edition of Pliny's Naturalis Historia printed in 1525

Ancient Greece
​

De Materia Medica of Dioscorides (c.50-70AD)
​

De Materia Medica by Dioscorides - Spain 12th 13th century
De Materia Medica by Dioscorides - Spain 12th 13th century (Source: Wikipedia Commons)
One of the earliest known Herbals is De Materia Medica by Dioscorides. 
​
​This book influenced very many of the herbals which came afterwards and was widely read for over 1,500 years. 

​About the author - Discorides

Pedanius Dioscorides c. 40 – 90 AD was a Greek physician, pharmacologist and botanist. He became became a surgeon to Emperor Nero's Roman Army and travelled with it across Western Europe Italy, France and Spain) and North Africa.

His travels afforded him the opportunity to
 study the features, distribution, and medicinal properties of many plants and minerals. ​He collected and researched plants that he found on his travels, looking in particular for their medicinal value. (One can only guess he used Roman soldiers as his guinea pigs!)
This pharmacopeia remained the standard medical text until the 17th century, undergoing many revisions and additions and greatly influencing both Western and Islamic cultures. It describes animal derivatives and minerals used therapeutically but is most important for the description of over 600 plants, including notes on their habitat and the methods of preparation and medicinal use of the drugs they contain.
Oxford Reference
The "Vienna Discorides"
The “Vienna Dioscorides” is considered to be the oldest manuscript version of the original book. Its correct name is the Juliana Anicia Codex (ca. 512 A.D.) and it can be found in the Austrian National Library in Vienna.​

It's not clear whether the original manuscript by Discorides (which has never been found) ever had any illustrations. However the Vienna Dioscorides does have illustrations and 383 out of the original 435 illustrations are full-page illustrations of plants

Translation to "De Materia Medica"
The original text written by Dioscorides was written in Greek.
De Materia Medica was a hugely influential book because of the Medieval translations that were made into Greek, Latin and Arabic and copies (by hand) that were made. 

The Dioscorides was originally written in five books which were published around the year 77 AD.  It deals with approximately 1,000 simple drugs.

In the 16th century, the text was translated into Italian, German, Spanish and French

Finally, in 1655, it was translated into English.
Images
Blunt indicates that there is a good copy of the illustrations in the Cambridge University Library dating back to c.1600.

A volume called "Botanicum antiquum" comprises a series of coloured drawings of plants and (at the end) a few reptiles and insects, with their names in Hebrew, Greek, Arabic, and, in some cases, Turkish. The versos of the pages are blank and there is no text, remarks or a commentary.
  • The document is listed in "A hand-list of the Muhammadan manuscripts, including all those written in the Arabic character, preserved in the library of the University of Cambridge"
  • The title-page bears the following inscription : " Botanicum antiquum Graecum- Hebrajum-Arabicum-Turcicum. Smyrna Asiae portabatur, anno MDCLXXXII." 
REFERENCE:
  • Pedanius Dioscorides (Ancient Greek: Πεδάνιος Διοσκουρίδης, Pedianos Dioskorides; c. 40 – 90 AD) | Wikipedia
  • De Materia Medica | Wikipedia
  • READ a digitised version of De Materia Medica by Pedanius Dioscorides (Tess Anne Osbaldeston, translator and editor) Not for resale or reproduction
  • An exhibition about herbs in July-August 1997 at the University of Virginia highlighted four herbals that are milestones of western herbal medicine. This webpage records details of these including the Vienna Dioscorides.
  • De Materia Medica | Wikipedia |This is an encyclopaedia and pharmacopoeia of herbs and the medicines that can be obtained from them. Its importance lies in the fact that it was translated into many languages and provided the foundation of many of the herbals which were developed in subsequent centuries in many different places.
  • Dioscorides Excerpts in Simon of Genoa’s Clavis sanctions (pdf)- an academic article about
Illustration of 'batos' (bramble - Rubus fruticosus) from the Vienna Dioscorides.
Illustration of 'batos' (bramble - Rubus fruticosus) from the Vienna Dioscorides.
De Materia Medica by Dioscorides - Byzantium 15th century
De Materia Medica by Dioscorides - Byzantium 15th century (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
This is a video by the Aboca Museum = in Italian with English subtitles

EUROPEAN HERBALS OF THE MEDIEVAL WORLD

Medieval is the term used to describe the Middle Ages. The Middle Ages are generally defined as the period in European history from about AD 600 to AD 1500 - or the period between the 7th and the 15th centuries (inclusive).​

EUROPEAN HERBALS OF THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES
​(6th - 10th centuries)

These Herbals cover the period between 500 and 1000AD.
​

The Herbal of Pseudo-Apuleius (Circa 550 – 625)

Pseudo-Apuleius Herbarius 11th century
Copy of the Pseudo-Apuleius Herbarius (11th century) - seen in the Bodleian Treasures exhibition in Oxford. The plants were drawn first and the text added afterwards. Dropwort is illustrated on the left and Narcissus poeticus on the right
the first illustrated book devoted to plants and flowers and their medicinal uses, and its illustrations were the first prints that reproduced ancient works of art. 
Willian J. Ivens
An ancient illuminated manuscript of a herbal was  discovered in the monastery at Monte Cassino.

An 11th century version of it is held by the Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford

​Eton College has a 12th century copy.


​REFERENCE:
  • The Herbal of Pseudo-Apuleius (Circa 550 – 625) | Jeremy Norma's History of Information
  • ​The Herbal of 'Pseudo-Apuleius' (PDF) - by William J. Ivens Jr. Curator of Prints | The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  • Pseudo-Apuleius | Wikipedia - the is the name given to the author of a 4th-century herbal ​
  • Ps.-Apuleius, Dioscorides, Herbals (extracts); De virtutibus bestiarum in arte medicinae, in Latin and English
    England, Bury St. Edmunds; 11th century, late - the edition in the Bodleian Library
  • The Herbal of Apuleius Barbarus from the early twelfth-century manuscript formerly in the Abbey of Bury St. Edmunds by R. W. T. Gunther (1925).  (MS. Bodley 130). Oxford (1934) - based on the 
Picture
Illustration from the Pseudo-Apuleius Herbarius
Picture
Herbs being dug up and made into medicines under the direction of a sage - from a copy of the Herbarium of Apuleius

EUROPEAN HERBALS OF THE LATE MIDDLE AGES
​(14th - 15th centuries)
​

This section covers the period from 1301 to 1500

Liber de simplicibus (First edition 1410)
​

Compiled by Benedetto Rinio an Italian Herbalist. It was written in Latin and first published in Venice in 1410. It contained 440 illustrations by a Venetian artist called Andrea Amadio about which very little is known.

The book discussed 450 domestic and 111 foreign varieties of herb, and included each plant's name in Latin, Greek, German, Arabic, several dialects of Italian, and Slavonic.

REFERENCE:
  • "Benedetto Rinio." Science and Its Times: Understanding the Social Significance of Scientific Discovery | Encyclopedia.com. 
  • The Illustrated Herbal Wilfrid Blunt and Sandra Raphael
...no corpus of illustrations of plants of comparable merit to the Codex Vindobonensis is found until Andrea Amadio made his exquisite drawings for Benedetto Rinon in 1419
The Illustrated Herbal p.20
Picture
Illustration by Andrea Amadio c.1450

Gart der Gesundheit (First edition 1484)
​

  • Der Gart der Gesundheit |Wikipedia | One of the first printed herbals and considered to be very influential.
  • VIEW: digital version of Gart der Gesundheit (Augsburg 1487) on Botanicus
  • The Grandes Heures of Anne of Brittany (Les Grandes Heures d'Anne de Bretagne in French) includes
Picture
Apium emoroidarum and Aristolochia rotunda (smearwort) in Johannes de Cuba: 'Herbarius. Der Herbari oder Kreuterbuch' also called the 'Gart der Gesundheit' From a 1515 edition. First edition in 1484.

The Hortus Sanitatis (First edition 1491)
​

The Hortus Sanitatis, sometimes known as the Ortus Sanitatis (the origin of health) is in the tradition of the medieval herbals. It's thought to be stem from Der Gart der Gesundheit (Garden of Health). Apparently many of the entries are 'fantastical' and the plants do not exist. Many editions were produced in the 15th and 16th centuries and it was also translated into It was translated, in its entirety or in part, into French, English, German and Dutch.
  • Hortus Sanitatis at Kings College London - This copy was first printed in 1491 in Mainz by Jacob Meydenbach who some think also compiled it.  This link provides a great deal of detail about its origins and a commentary on its contents.
  • Hortus Sanitatis Minor/Ein Gart der Gesundheit | Cincinnati History Library and Archives Visit this site to see large images of woodcuts included in this book
Picture
Hortus Sanitatis: camomile.

HERBALS OF THE EARLY MODERN ERA
​

This period relates to Herbals produced in the 16th and 17th centuries

Pharmaceutical science improved markedly in the 16th and 17th centuries. In 1546 the first pharmacopoeia, or collected list of drugs and medicinal chemicals with directions for making pharmaceutical preparations, appeared in Nürnberg, Germany.
Pharmaceutical industry | Encyclopedia Britannica

Picture
'Spring' (1565) by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Pen and brown ink, framing lines in grey, contours indented for transfer

The Herbal in Germany
​

The German Fathers of Botany

The Three German fathers of Botany are: Otto Brunfels (c. 1489-1534), Hieronymus Bock (1498-1554) and Leonhart Fuchs (1501-1566). You can see the three Herbals they are associated with in the middle column.
  • Hieronymus Bock | Wikipedia | Hieronymus Bock , also seen as "Boch", (1498 - February 21, 1554) was a German botanist, physician, and Lutheran minister 
  • Otto Brunfels | Wikipedia |(1488 – 1534) a German theologian and botanist
  • Leonhart Fuchs - 1501-1566 |Wikipedia | (17 January 1501 - 10 May 1566) was a German physician.
  • Rhagor | Early Herbals - The German fathers of botany
    Amgueddfa Cymru has a number of pre-1701 books in the Museum's Library, including a number of 16th- and 17th-century 'herbals'
Picture
Woodcut Images: a page of Gillofers (gillyflowers - carnations and pinks) from Henry Lyte's A niewe Herball of 1578 (Source: Wikimedia Commons)

Herbarum vivae eicones

Otto Brunfels is the author of Herbarum vivae eicones, written in Latin and printed by Johann Schott, Strassburg, 1530. This Herbal about medicinal plants and herbs is important for two reasons: 
  • Brunfels documented his own observations and relied upon these much more than observations by ancient authors. His descriptions of plants were his own. 
  • This book changed the nature and quality of botanical illustration. It contains 135 original (i.e. not copied) detailed woodcuts of plants where the image has been taken directly from nature. The illustrations were executed by Hans Weitz.
References:
  • VIEW Herbarum vivae eicones ad naturae imitationem in digitised format in the National Biodiversity Library. This version makes it particularly easy to see the illustrations as these are highlighted.
  • READ a digital version of Herbarum Vivae Eicones (1531) on Botanicus. 
Picture
Field Larkspur, in "Herbarum vivae eicones" - illustration by hans Weitz

Kreütterbuch darin unterscheidt Nammen und Würckung der Kreütter (Herbal)

Bock's herbal of 1539 was not illustrated but later editions were.
  • Images from Kreütterbuch (1587) - Smithsonian 
Picture
Kreuter Buch

De historia stirpium commentarii insignes

De historia stirpium commentarii insignes by Leonhart Fuchs was published in Basel in 1542. The Herbal was illustrated - using woodcuts in 1552. Unusually for the time, full recognition was given to the three artists involved in producing the work. Such was their importance that their group portrait is included at the end of the book. Fuchs employed three professional artists to help him by producing illustrations. 
  • Albrecht Meyer drew the plants from life;
  • Heinrich Füllmaurer created the woodblocks from line drawings and
  • Vitus Rudolph Speckle "by far the best engraver in Strasbourg" cut the woodblocks in order to print the woodcut illustrations. 

Carefully observed, the illustrations are largely true to nature and allow for plant identifcation. According to Meyer, the illustrations ‘command universal recognition and praise for their simple elegance and naturalness of form, traits that place this herbal among the landmarks of the history of botanical iconography’.
Picture
Title page of De Historia Stir - Image courtesy of the History of Science Collections, University of Oklahoma Libraries; copyright the Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma
Picture
Nettles in De Stirpium Historia - this is the copy in the archives of the Royal Horticultural Society

The Herbal in Italy, Portugal and Spain
​

Discorsi ("Commentaries") on the Materia Medica of Dioscorides - Herbár and New Kreuterbeuch
​

Pietro Andrea Mattioli provided an Italian commentary of the Materia Medica of Dioscorides and also provided details of new plants. 

Its title was Di Pedacio Dioscoride Anazarbeo Libri cinque Della historia, et materia medicinale tradotti in lingua volgare italiana da M. Pietro Andrea Matthiolo Sanese Medico, con amplissimi discorsi, et comenti, et dottissime annotationi, et censure del medesimo interprete, also known as Discorsi. It was published in Venice in 1544
Picture
Kreutterbuch 1586 (2nd edition) by Pietro Andreae Matthioli. This is the standard book used by European Physicians in the second half of the 16th century. As seen in the 'Healing Garden' exhibition at the RHS Lindley Library.
Picture
1 woodblock : pear wood ; 22 x 16 x 3 cm. Note One of a series of woodblocks designed by Giorgio Liberale and cut by Wolfgang Meyerpeck for Pietro Andrea Mattioli's Herbár and New Kreuterbeuch (Prague, 1562, 1563) and Commentarii in sex libros Pedacii Dioscoridis Anarzabei de Medica materia (Venice, 1565 and later editions). Woodblock shows Ambrosia altera, also known as Artemisia maritima or Sea wormwood
​​He is said to have described he described 100 new plants and coordinated the medical botany  of his time in his Discorsi ("Commentaries") on the Materia Medica of Dioscorides.

The first folio edition with large woodcut illustrations (and Czech text) was published in Prague in 1562. There were various translations into German (1563), Latin (1564) and Italian and 45 editions/prints in all.  Many of his comments on the text of Discorides are extremely lengthy.

The artists used for the woodcuts were:
  • Italian - Giorgio Liberale of Udine; and 
  • German - Wolfgang Meyerpeck (1505-1578) - Book printer, copper engraver, first mentioned as a printer in 1525
It is from the Latin edition that we know that Meyerpeck, along with Giorgio Liberale, were responsible for the images.

It's thought that Liberale was the draughtsman and Meyerpeck the engraver. The latter used wood blocks for engraving made out of pear wood. 

These are large illustrations and Blunt notes that shading is extensively employed. Some of the early copies of the book were also coloured (see above image). Blunt considers that the book works better in black and white.

The illustrations confine themselves to the rectangular wood block which sometimes makes the portrayal of the plant equally rectangular.

REFERENCE:
  • A new acquisition | Wellcome Library blog - about the purchase of one of the Mattioli pearwood blocks 
  • The Mattioli woodblocks (Catalogue)
  • The Mattioli woodblocks (historical essay and portfolio of 9 plates printed from the original blocks)
  • ​Mattioli’s herbal : a short account of its illustrations, with a print from an original woodblock (Morgan Library, New York)
  • Hand coloured copy of 1568 Italian edition in the Wellcome Library
  • The Art of Botanical Illustration Part 3 – Decline of the Woodcut | Alan Olee Book Report - focuses on the woodcuts by Meyerpeck
Picture
Pietro Andrea Mattioli (1533) by Moretto da Brescia
Picture
Coronopus (Mattioli 2, 256 1554) Coronopus is a synonym for the accepted genus name Lepidium. (Common name: swinecress or wartcress.)

THE OLD ENGLISH HERBALS
​

RECOMMENDED READ: The Old English Herbals by Eleonor Sinclair Rohde as a digitised book on Project Gutenberg. 
In the UK, regulations relating to medicinal products were introduced in the reign of King Henry VIII (1491–1547).​ The London Pharmacopoeia  was published in 1618 and was the first list of approved drugs, with information on how they should be prepared. 

English Medieval Herbals
​

 Rycharde Banckes Herbal (1525)
​

The first Herbal printed in England was a Herbal printed by Richard Banks in London in 1525. ​It had no illustrations.
Here begynneth a newe mater, the whiche sheweth and treateth of ye vertues and proprytes of herbes, the whiche is called an Herball.
...Imprynted by me Rycharde Banckes, dwellynge in London, a lytel fro ye Stockes in ye Pultry.

The Grete Herball (1529)
​

Picture
The Grete Herbal - this is the copy owned by the Royal Horticultural Society
The grete herball : whiche gyueth parfyt knowlege and vnderstandyng of all maner of herbes [and] theyr gracyous vertues whiche god hath ordeyned for our prosperous welfare and helth, for they hele [and] cure all maner of dyseases and sekenesses that fall or mysfortune to all maner of creatures of god created practysed by many expert and wyse maysters, as Auicenna [and] other. [et]c. Also it gyueth parfyte vnderstandynge of the booke lately prynted by me (Peter treueris) named the noble experie[n]ce of vertuous handwarke of surgery.
The Grete Herball is a very rare book and the very first illustrated Herbal in English. It is a single printed volume which is an illustrated encyclopaedia of the properties of plants.  

​It contains 477 woodcuts. As with many herbals the content is borrowed from other books.
  • the preface and the treatise on urines is derived from the Gart der Gesundheit
  • The Grete Herball is considered the only known translation from French of Le Grant Herbier or Arbolayre (1498)
  • The woodcuts, are copies of the cuts in 16th-century Dutch vernacular editions of the Herbarius (Den herbarius in dijetsche, Antwerp 1511, Den groten herbarius, Antwerp 1514, and later editions), which derive from the German Gart der Gesundheit woodcut lineage
  • the woodcut images are also taken from Le Grant Herbier, which in turn were copied from a series of woodcuts which first appeared in the German Herbarius zu Teutsch (also known as Der Gart)​
In terms of format, it comprises a double column of black printed text on each page interspersed with small woodcut images depicting plants, animals, people, and garden scenes.

It is a very rare book. Only three complete and perfect copies of the first edition are known, in addition to several incomplete copies and fragments.

First Edition (1526): There are three complete copies in the USA. The Yale Medical Library and the Marshall Collection have incomplete copies. The Metropolitan Museum of Art has a made-up copy - assembled from different sources.
​
Second Edition (1529): Cambridge University has a copy of very rare second edition of the Grete Herball in its Special Plant Science Collection of Books. The book was printed in Southwark by Peter Treveris on 17 March 1529

According to Christies, only one complete copy (sold Sotheby's New York 11 December 2008) has sold at auction in the past 30 years.
The Grete Herball, showing herb-garden
The Grete Herball, showing herb-garden
title page grete herbal
Woodcut of peasants in a herb garden - from the title page of "The Grete Herbal"
REFERENCES:
  • The Grete Herball | Wikipedia
  • Peter Treveris’ Grete herball of 1529 | Cambridge University Library Special Collections
  • 1526: The Grete Herball: a tendril of ancient herbal traditions reaching into 16th century England | Wild Arum
  • Photos of the Grete Herball on Flickr | OU History of Science Collection

The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes. London, 1633 by John Gerard (1545-1612)
​

John Gerard (b. 1545 at Nantwich, Cheshire) was a botanist and herbalist who lived in Holborn, London in the 16th century. He had a garden which contained over a 1,000 plants in what is now Fetter Lane.

See Old Botanic Gardens in London in the Gardens section

His claim to fame in the history of botanical art is as follows"
  • he published the first complete catalogue of plants in a garden in 1596; with a second edition in 1599)
  • that he published a lavishly illustrated Herball in 1597
  • he was the first person to catalogue the potato, 'solanum tuberosum'
  • images from his Herball are supposed to have inspired William Morris's flower designs.
​
In 1596 Gerard published a catalogue of twenty-four pages of the plants in this garden—the first complete catalogue of the plants in any garden, public or private.
Eleanor Sinclair Rohde in The Old English Herbals (Chapter 4)

​Gerard's Herbal is not unique. It's very largely an English translation of Rembert Dodoens's Herbal of 1554 with the addition of plants from Gerard's own garden. It contains some 1800 illustrations, most of them taken from the same wood-blocks that Tabernæmontanus (Bergzabern) used for his Eicones(1590).  There were major rows associated with its publication and linked to accusations of plagiarism. It seems clear that Gerard wanted the Herball to be thought of as a new book when clearly it wasn't as such.

Formerly it was generally supposed that Gerard’s garden was on the northern side of Holborn, but this is unlikely, for during the latter part of Elizabeth’s reign the part which is now known as Ely Place and Hatton Garden was an estate of forty acres belonging to the Bishopric of Ely. Holborn was almost a village then, and Gerard tells us in his Herball that in Gray’s Inn Lane he gathered mallow, shepherd’s purse, sweet woodruff, bugle and Paul’s betony, and in the meadows near red-flowered clary, white saxifrage, the sad-coloured rocket, yarrow, lesser hawkweed and the curious strawberry-headed trefoil. Wallflower and golden stonecrop grew on the houses.
Eleanor Sinclair Rohde in The Old English Herbals (Footnote in Chapter 4)
Picture
Title Page of "The Herball" by John Gerard. The identity of the people who feature on the front page are said to be encoded in the plants that surround than - and one is supposed to be Shakespeare who was a neighbour of Gerard.
READ: 
  • Chapter 4 - Gerard's Herball - of The Old English Herbals by Eleonor Sinclair Rohde

REFERENCE:
  • John Gerard | Wikipedia
  • John Gerard | Encyclopedia Britannica
  • A catalogue of plants cultivated in the garden of John Gerard, in the years 1596-1599 /edited with notes, references to Gerard's Herball, the addition of modern names, and a life of the author, by Benjamin Daydon Jackson
  • ​John Gerard Bibliography | Natwich Walled Garden
  • John Gerard - The Nantwich botanist, the first person to catalogue the potato | Cheshire Life
  • Why the fourth man can't be anybody but Shakespeare | Country Life - in relation to the people featured on the title page

Theatrum Botanicum (the Theatre of Plants or An Universal and Compleat Herball) 1640 by John Parkinson
​

Theatricum Botanicum was the most complete and beautifully presented English treatise on plants of its time.

It was created by John Parkinson (1567-1650) , who has been variously described as:
  • apothecary to King James I,
  • given the title ‘Botanicus Regius Primarius’ by Charles I
  • founding member of the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries in December 1617
  • member of the the committee that published Pharmacopœia Londinensis (London Pharmacopœia) in 1618
  • the last of the great English herbalists and
  • one of the first of the great English botanists.
He lived in Ludgate Hill, but his botanical garden was in suburban Long Acre in Covent Garden.

He published 
the monumental Theatrum Botanicum (The Botanical Theatre or Theatre of Plants) age 73 in 1640. It measures 34.5 x 10.5 cm x ?cm.

It includes
  • 28 species previously unrecorded in Britain. 
  • describes 3,800 plants
  • focused more on medicinal plants
  • divided into seventeen 'tribes', based partly on their medicinal qualities and partly on habitat.
  • more than 2,700 woodcuts of botanical species illustrating the text about plants
It's a large and heavy book that is almost always found ravaged and defective from heavy use. 

REFERENCE:
  • Royal Collection | Theatrum Botanicum : the theater of plants. Or, a herball of a large extent... / distributed into sundry classes... by Dr. Lobel, Dr. Bonham... collected by John Parkinson, Apothecary of London and the Kings Herbarist 1640
  • Abe Books | Theatricum Botanicum by John Parkinson
ONLINE VERSIONS:
  • Online books by John Parkinson
Picture
Engraving of English herbalist and botanist John Parkinson (1567–1650).
Picture
Herbs for troubled bellies in the The Theatre of Plants by John Parkinson (this copy in the RHS Lindley Library Archives)

The English Physician by Nichola Culpepper a.k.a as Culpeper's Complete Herbal
​

Picture
Culpeper's English Physicial and Compete Herbal (copy owned by the Royal Horticultural Society)
The English Physician was first published in 1652. It was deliberately written in vernacular English and sold cheaply to make it accessible to the masses. It was later titled "The Complete Herbal" and is now referred to as Culpeper's Complete Herbal. Over forty editions of Culpeper’s The English Physician have been printed since its original publication.

The book had to wait until 1789 before it acquired illustrations. Dr Ebenezer Sibley (1751-1800) added engravings of plants.

In 1789, the book was enlarged in size and first described as a "complete herball".

An underlying story relates to his disputes with and challenges to the College of Surgeons

His book A Physical Directory, or a Translation of the London Directory (1649) was a translation of the Pharmacopoeia Londonesis of the Royal College of Physicians
Nicholas Culpeper’s "A Physicall Directory" (1649), which was a pseudoscientific pharmacopoeia
Herbal | Encyclopedia Britannica 
Picture
A page of illustrations of plants from Culpeper's Complete Herbal
REFERENCE:
  • The English Physician by Nicholas Culpeper, 1652 | University of Virginia Online Exhibits
  •  List of plants in The English Physitian (1652 book) | Wikipedia 
  • Culpeper's complete herbal : consisting of a comprehensive description of nearly all herbs with their medicinal properties and directions for compounding the medicines extracted from them | Internet Archive
  • Culpeper's Complete Herbal - an online version

A Curious Herbal (1737) by Elizabeth Blackwell
​

Picture
Dandelion in Elizabeth Blackwell's 'A Curious Herbal' (1737). This is the copy owned by the Royal Horticultural Society
About Elizabeth Blackwell on this website relates her life and the development of her Herbal.
The story of Elizabeth Blackwell's 'A Curious Herbal' is unique. She was the first British woman to produce a herbal and the first woman to engrave as well as draw plants. She also created it between 1737-1739 to raise enough funds to release her husband from debtors' prison.  The original Herbal was issued in weekly parts - containing four plates and associated text.
A curious herbal, containing five hundred cuts, of the most useful plants, which are now used in the practice of physick : engraved on folio copper plates, after drawings taken from the life.
The full name of 'A Curious Herbal'
Picture
Title Page of Elizabeth Blackwell's 'A Curious Herbal' (originally published 1737; this RHS copy published 1739 )
​READ:
  • Read a complete digitised and large version of A Curious Herbal - containing 500 cutsl on Botanicus. (The original source was contributed by Missouri Botanical Garden)
REFERENCE:
  • View the British Library's Virtual Book of Elizabeth Blackwell's 'A Curious Herbal' . This has 42 plates on view and includes image and commentary by the British Library. The original source belonged to King George III and is now looked after by the British Library,
  • Images from A Curious Herbal | Wikimedia Commons

HERBALS OF THE NEW WORLD
​

These are herbals connected to the colonisation of the Americas by the Spaniards, Portuguese and English either in terms of:
  • documents discovered by the colonisers
  • documents created to record plants and herbal remedies that were discovered​
REFERENCE:
World Trade in Medicinal Plants from Spanish America, 1717–1815
Stefanie Gänger | US National Library of Medicine

Libellus de Medicinalibus Indorum Herbis 1552​
​(a.k.a. "the Aztec Herbal"; ​the Badianus Manuscript or the Codex Barberini (de la Cruz 2000),

Badianus Codex (facsimile)
Badianus Codex (facsimile), written in N huatl by the Aztec physician Martinus de la Cruz, translated by Juannes Badianus (latin), presented to the son of the first Viceroy of New Spain in 1552. Book open on fols. 27v and 28r.
This is the oldest known herbal which originated from the Americas - but is of unknown age. The "Little Book of the Medicinal Herbs of the Indians" is an Aztec herbal manuscript.

The indigenous populations of the Americas had already developed very considerable botanical and medical knowledge by the time they were 'discovered' by Europeans.  The gardens of the Aztec Emperor Montezuma also had "many varieties of flowers and sweet-scented trees” and included a special section for herbs.

The Herbal was translated - in 1552 - into Latin for the son of the the Viceroy of "New Spain" (which covered Mexico, Central America, much of the Southwestern and Central United States, the Spanish West Indies and Spanish Florida). 

The Maya Society of Baltimore, Maryland published a colour version of the herbal in 1939.
REFERENCE:
  • Libellus de Medicinalibus Indorum Herbis | Wikipedia
  • Badianus Manuscript: An Aztec Herbal, 1552 | University of Virginia
  • Four Hundred Flowers: The Aztec Herbal Pharmacopoeia, Part 1. Yauhtli and Cempoalxochitl | Aztecs

Historia medicinal de las cosas que se traen de nuestras Indias Occidentales 
​("Medical study of the products imported from our West Indian possessions")
​

 Historia medicinal de las cosas que se traen de nuestras Indias Occidentales was published in three parts under varying titles (in 1565, 1569 and completed in 1574; unchanged reprint in 1580).  

This is a survey by Nicolás Monardes (1493–1588) of plants and medicines brought from the West Indies to Spain. Monardes was a Spanish physician and botanist.

In 1577 a version of the book translated into English by John Frampton was published titled Ioyfull newes out of the newe founde worlde, wherein is declared the rare and singular vertues of diuerse and sundrie hearbes, trees, oyles, plantes, and stones, with their applications, as well for phisicke as chirurgerie. John Frampton was a 16th-century English merchant from the West Country, who settled in Spain, was imprisoned and tortured by the Inquisition, and escaped from Cádiz in 1567. He became a translator from Spanish.

The book is notable for:
  • discussion of the tobacco plant
  • the first time some plants had ever been illustrated in a publication.
​
Probably the first illustration of Sassafras albidum
Probably the first ever illustration of Sassafras albidum - in Historia medicinal (1574)
REFERENCE
  • Nicolás Monardes | Wikipedia
  • Historia medicinal de las cosas que se traen de nuestras Indias Occidentales  | Wikipedia
  • Joyfull news out of the Newe Founde Worlde : London, 1577 [Translated into English by John Frampton]
  • Two pioneers of tropical medicine: Garcia d'Orta and Nicolás Monardes by Boxer, C. R. (1963),  London: Wellcome Historical Medical Library
IMAGES:
  • Media in category "Ioyfullnewes out of the new-found uuorlde" | Wikimedia Commons

ASIAN HERBALS
​

Herbals in India
​

Hortus Malabaricus (meaning "Garden of Malabar") 1678-1693
​

This book covers the medicinal properties of plants in Kerala in India.

The project took nearly 30 years to complete. It was published in Amsterdam between 1678 and 1693.

​It has 12 volumes covering 742 plants. Each of the volumes contains about 200 pages. Altogether there are 794 copper plate engravings. 
Picture
Bala (in Malayalam), probably a dessert cultivar of Musa paradisiaca ; second ot three plates (1678), vol. 1, plate 13 of Hortus Indicus Malabaricus
Picture
Hortus Indicus Malabaricus (Fig. 9) - (Carim-pana (in Malayalam), the female Borassus flabellifer (1678)

Herbals in Japan
​

REFERENCE:
  • Japanese herbal, 17th century | Wikimedia Commons - from the Wellcome Collection
Picture
Japanese Herbal - Contains various drawings of European plants with names/text in Old Dutch, Chinese, Japanese & Latin. Illustration 76. (Wellcome Collection)

Back to HISTORY
Back to BOTANICAL ART AND ARTISTS
NEXT: 
  • What is Botanical Art?
  • The Best Books about Botanical Artists & Illustrators
  • ​Florilegia 
  • Botanical and Herbal Art Online - galleries of collections of botanical art from the past
MORE:
Past Masters - plus individual pages for leading botanical artists of the past (see below)
  • Leonart Fuchs (1501-1566) 
  • Basilus Besler (1561-1629)
  • Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717)
  • Elizabeth Blackwell (1707 - 1758)
  • Georg Dionysius Ehret (1708-1770)
  • Sydney Parkinson (1745 - 1771)
  • Franz Bauer (1758-1840)
  • Pierre-Joseph Redouté (1759 - 1840)
  • Marianne North (1830-1890)
  • Arthur Harry Church (1865-1937)
  • Margaret Mee (1909-1988)
  • Rory McEwen (1932-1982)
Resources about  Botanical Art and For Botanical Artists
ABOUT: About the Author | Contact | Testimonials | Privacy Policy                  COPYRIGHT 2015-22: Katherine Tyrrell  all rights reserved.
NEWS 
News Blog about artists, awards, exhibitions etc.
HISTORY
- Best Books about Botanical Art History
- History of Botanical Art 
- Herbals
- Florilegia
- Patrons
​
- Past Masters - Botanical Art and Illustration
​- Famous Asian Past Masters (600-1900
- 20th & 21st Century Botanical Artists
- Botanical Art Online
CONTEMPORARY ARTISTS
- Botanical Artists around the world 

EXHIBITIONS
-
Calls for Entries
- Exhibitions around the world
- Online Exhibitions
- RHS Exhibitions
- Hunt Exhibitions
​
ORGANISATIONS
- Botanical Art Societies - national / regional / local
- 
Florilegium & Groups
- Botanical Art Groups on Facebook

EDUCATION
- Tips and Techniques
- Best Botanical Art Instruction Books
- Directory of Teachers
- Directory of Courses
- Online Botanical Art Courses
- Diplomas and Certificates
​
- Talks, Lectures and Tours

ART MATERIALS (Paper / Vellum)

BOTANY FOR ARTISTS
-
 Scientific Botanical Illustration
- Best Botany Books for Artists
- Plant Names & Botanical Latin

BOTANIC GARDENS & Herbaria
​​​FEEDBACK 
Please send me . 
- news to share
- info. about exhibitions
- any suggestions for what you'd like to see on this website 

ADVERTISE
Contact me if you'd like to promote workshops and courses on this site.

​AFFILIATION 
This website is free to you but not for me! (See Affiliate Income below)

Cookies, Personal Data & Privacy tells you how this site relates to and impacts on you and your privacy - and your choices.
​

Product & company names may be trademarks of their respective owners
About Affiliate Income: This website has been created to share information not to make a profit. I am an Amazon Associate and earn from qualifying purchases (e.g. books from Amazon) which helps offset costs associated with maintaining this very large website.​
  • Home
    • Site Index
  • NEWS
    • NEWS blog subscription
  • HISTORY
    • What is Botanical Art?
    • What is Botanical Illustration?
    • Botanical Art History Books >
      • The Art of Botanical Illustration (Blunt)
      • Book Review: Treasures of Botanical Art
    • Herbals
    • Florilegia and Flora
    • Patrons of Botanical Art >
      • About Leonhart Fuchs
      • About Basilius Besler
    • Past Masters - Botanical Art and Illustration >
      • About Maria Sibylla Merian
      • About Elizabeth Blackwell
      • About Georg Dionysius Ehret
      • About Franz Bauer
      • About Sydney Parkinson
      • About Pierre-Joseph Redouté
      • About Marianne North
    • Famous Asian Botanical Artists (600-1900)
    • 20th & 21st Century Botanical Artists >
      • About Arthur Harry Church
      • About Margaret Mee
      • About Mary Grierson
      • About Raymond Booth
      • About Rory McEwen
      • About Pandora Sellars
    • Botanical Photographers
    • Botanical and Herbal Art Online
  • ARTISTS
    • Botanical Artists in the UK
    • Botanical Artists in North America
    • Botanical Artists in Europe
    • Botanical Artists in Australia and New Zealand
    • Botanical Artists in Asia
    • Botanical Artists in Africa
    • Botanical Artists in Latin America
    • Botanical Printmakers, Photographers, Sculptors et al
    • The Jill Smythies Award
    • Botanical Artists on Facebook
    • Botanical Art Blogs
  • Exhibitions
    • Calls for Entries - OPEN exhibitions
    • RHS Botanical Art & Photography Shows >
      • ARCHIVE RHS Botanical Art Shows 2007-2025
      • Exhibit Titles at RHS Botanical Art Shows
      • RHS Portfolio Photography (Botanical / Horticultural)
    • The Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanical Art >
      • ARCHIVE: Shirley Sherwood Gallery Exhibitions
    • Hunt International Exhibition of Botanical Art & Illustration
    • Margaret Flockton Award
    • UK >
      • Permanent Collections (UK)
      • Botanical Art Exhibitions at Major UK Galleries & Museums >
        • ARCHIVE: Major Gallery Exhibitions
      • Botanical Art Exhibitions in England and Wales >
        • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in the UK
        • ARCHIVE: Reviews of Annual Exhibitions by the Society of Botanical Artists
      • Botanical Art Exhibitions in Scotland >
        • ARCHIVE: Scotland - Botanical Art Exhibitions
    • North America >
      • Permanent Collections (USA)
      • ARCHIVE Past ASBA Exhibitions in the USA
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in the USA
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in Canada
    • Europe >
      • Permanent Collections (Europe)
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in Europe
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Exhibitions in Germany
      • ARCHIVE: ​Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in Ireland
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Exhibitions in Russia
    • Australasia >
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in Australasia
    • Asia >
      • ARCHIVE: Past Botanical Art Exhibitions in Asia
    • Africa
    • World Wide Exhibition of Botanical Art 2025 >
      • ARCHIVE: World Wide Exhibition of Botanical Art 2018
    • Online Exhibitions >
      • ARCHIVE: Online Botanical Art Exhibitions
  • Education
    • NEW BOOKS about Botanical Art and Illustration >
      • NEW in 2020: Books about Botanical Art & Illustration
      • NEW IN 2019: Books about Botanical Art & Illustration
      • NEW in 2018: Books about Botanical Art & Illustration
    • Best Botanical Art Instruction Books >
      • Best Instruction Books by Botanical Art Societies >
        • The Art of Botanical Painting - review
        • The Botanical Palette - review
        • Botanical Sketchbook - review
      • Best Instruction Books about Botanical Illustration >
        • Botanical Illustration - Books by Bobbi Angell
        • Botanical Illustration (Oxley) - review
      • Best Instruction Books by top Artists / Teachers >
        • Books By Billy Showell
        • Books - the Eden Project
      • Best Botanical Drawing Instruction Books (Pencils) >
        • Botanical Painting with Coloured Pencils - review
      • e-Booklets / digital guides
    • Tips and Techniques >
      • Tips from RHS Gold Medal Winners
      • Preparation and set-up
      • Botanical Sketching and Sketchbooks
      • Design and composition
      • Colour
      • Pen and Ink
      • How to draw and paint trees and leaves
    • Botanical Art Video Tips >
      • Video Tips: Watercolour Painting
      • Video Tips Coloured Pencils
      • Video Tips: Pencil drawing
      • Video Tips: Painting Flowers
      • Video Tips: Painting Leaves & Trees
    • Online Botanical Art Instruction >
      • CHECKLIST: FAQS about Online Learning
      • ONLINE TIMELINE
    • International Directory: Botanical Art Teachers
    • International Directory of Botanical Art Courses >
      • UK: Botanical Art Courses
      • North America: Botanical Art Courses
      • Europe: Botanical Art Courses & Holidays
      • Australasia: Botanical Art Courses
    • Artist Residencies, Scholarships, Grants and Bursaries
    • Diplomas and Certificates >
      • SBA Diploma Assignments
    • Distance Learning Courses
    • Talks, Lectures & Tours
    • Botanical Education on Facebook
  • Materials
    • Paper
    • Vellum
  • Groups
    • National & Regional Botanical Art Societies
    • Florilegium Societies & Other Groups
    • Finnis Scott Foundation: Botanical Art Prize
    • Botanical Art Groups on Facebook
  • Botany
    • Why botany matters to artists
    • Botany Books for artists >
      • Botany for the Artist (Simblet)
      • The Art of Plant Evolution
      • The Concise British Flora in Colour (1965)
    • Scientific botanical illustration
    • Plant Forms and Anatomy
    • Plant Evolution and Taxonomy
    • Plant Names and Botanical Latin
    • Botanical Dictionaries
    • How to Identify Plants
    • Recording a Plant / Sketchbooks >
      • Plant Pressing for your own Herbarium
    • Botanic Gardens & Herbaria >
      • Global and National Networks
      • Herbaria, Seed Banks and Fungaria
      • Old Botanic & Physic Gardens in London
      • Botanic Gardens in the UK
      • Botanic Gardens in Ireland
      • Botanic Gardens in Europe
      • Botanic Gardens in the USA
      • Botanic Gardens in Canada
      • Botanic Gardens in Asia
      • Botanic Gardens in Australia
    • Blogs about Plants and Flowers
  • Contact
    • About Katherine Tyrrell
    • About Reviews
    • Privacy Policy