Skip to Main Content
NYBG Logo
  1. Mertz Library Homepage
  2. Research Guides
  3. Exhibitions
  4. The Renaissance herbal (2013)
  5. Home

The Renaissance herbal (2013): Home

May 18 - September 8, 2013


Books on display in glass cases in the gallery

With a beautiful array of rare, richly illustrated manuscripts and early printed works, The Renaissance Herbal in the Rondina and LoFaro Gallery of The New York Botanical Garden’s LuEsther T. Mertz Library told the story of how ancient and medieval knowledge about the medicinal qualities of plants survived into the Renaissance, when herbals flourished as a manifestation of that period’s intellectual curiosity and spirit of scientific inquiry.

Describing plants and their useful properties, herbals are among the oldest known written and printed works in both Western and Eastern civilizations and contain the earliest recorded descriptions of the plant kingdom. The Mertz Library, the world’s largest library devoted to botany and horticulture, has a particularly rich collection of herbals.

On display from May 18 through September 8, 2013, The Renaissance Herbal  featured more than 50 printed books and manuscripts, drawn almost exclusively from the Library’s collection. The most extensive exhibition of rare herbals to be shown in the United States in decades, The Renaissance Herbal is the Library component of Wild Medicine: Healing Plants Around the World, Featuring The Italian Renaissance Garden, the Botanical Garden’s multifaceted exploration of how medicinal plants have been used to cure and rejuvenate people since ancient times.

Lucia Tongiorgi Tomasi, curator of The Renaissance Herbal, is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Art History at the Universita di Pisa. A prolific writer, Dr. Tomasi focuses on the relationships among art, science, and nature. 

Digitized Titles in This Exhibition

  • Circa instans
    by Matthaeus Platearius (d. 1161)
    Salerno: ca. 1275

"" 

Look through selected rare books from The Renaissance Herbal by clicking on the titles below:
 
  • Nova plantarum, animalium et mineralium Mexicanorum historia, a Francisco Hernandez…
    by Francisco Hernández (1517–87)
    Rome: Sumptibus B. Deversini & Z. Masotti, typis V. Mascardi, 1651
  • Gulielmi Pisonis... De Indiæ utriusque re naturali et medica libri qvatvordecim...
    by Willem Piso (1611–78)
    Amsterdam: Lvgdvn. Batavorvm, Apud F. Hackium; Apud L. Elzevirium, 1648

Digitized Titles in This Exhibition through Biodiversity Heritage Library

  • Aromatum, et simplicium...
    by Garcia da Orta (ca. 1501–68)
Other editions of books shown in this exhibition can be found through the Biodiversity Heritage Library, to which the Mertz Library is a contributor.
 
Here is a sampling:
 
  • Crŭÿde boeck..
    by Rembert Dodoens (1517-1585)
  • De historia stirpium commentarii insignes...
    by Leonhart Fuchs (1501-1566)
  • Dell'historia natvrale di Ferrante Imperato napoletano libri XXVIII...
    by Ferrante Imperato (1550-1625)
  • [Gart der Gesundheit]
  • Kreüterbuch contrafayt vollkummen nach rechter warer beschreibung der alten leerer und ärtzt...
    by Otto Brunfels (1488-1534)
  • P. Dioscoridae pharmacorum simplicium reiq[ue] medicae libri VIII
    by Pedanius Dioscorides of Anazarbos (fl. 50–70)
  • The Herball, or, Generall historie of plantes
    by John Gerard (1545–1612)

Contact Us - Exhibitions

Exhibitions
e jgroarke@nybg.org
p 718-817-8845 

Library
e libref@nybg.org
p 718-817-8604
f 718-817-8956

Recommended Reading

Titles not found in the Mertz Library's catalog are linked to WorldCat.

  • Book CoverThe Renaissance Print, 1470-1550 by David Landau; Peter W. Parshall
    Call Number: NE441.5.R44 L35 1994
    ISBN: 0300068832
    Publication Date: New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994
  • Book CoverCarolus Clusius: Towards a Cultural History of a Renaissance Naturalist by Florike Egmond (Editor); Paul G. Hoftijzer (Editor); Robert P. W. Visser (Editor)
    Call Number: QH31.L4 C37 2007
    ISBN: 9789069845067
    Publication Date: Amsterdam: Koninklijke Nederlandse Akadenie van Wetenschappen, 2007
  • Book CoverHerbals - Their Origin and Evolution by Agnes Arber
    Call Number: QK14.5 .A73 1938
    ISBN: 1108016715
    Publication Date: Cambridge: at the University Press, 1938
  • Book CoverThe Old English Herbals by Eleanour Sinclair Rohde
    Call Number: QK21.G7 R6 1971
    ISBN: 0486211061
    Publication Date: New York, Dover, 1971
  • Book CoverThe Exotic World of Carolus Clusius, 1526-1609: Catalogue of an Exhibition on the Quatercentenary of Clusius' Death, 4 April 2009 by Kasper van Ommen ; with an introductory essay by Florike Egmond.
    Call Number: QK31.L4 E96 2009
    Publication Date: Leiden: Leiden University Library, 2009
  • Book CoverHandbook of Plant and Floral Ornament from Early Herbals by Richard G. Hatton
    Call Number: QK98 .H33 1960
    Publication Date: New York: Dover Publications, 1960
  • Book CoverMedieval Herbals: The Illustrative Traditions by Minta Collins
    Call Number: QK98.15 .C64 2000
    ISBN: 0712346384
    Publication Date: Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2000
  • Book CoverAn Illustrated History of the Herbals by Frank J. Anderson
    Call Number: QK 99 .A495
    ISBN: 0231040024
    Publication Date: 1977-12-01
    Former Honorary Curator of Rare Books, Frank J. Anderson, did invaluable research on the Mertz Library's collection and published this tome as a result.
  • Book CoverHerbals Through 1500. The Illustrated Bartsch, vol. 1 & 2 by Frank J. Anderson, Editor
    Call Number: QK 99 .H49
    Publication Date: New York: Abaris Books, 1983-84
  • Book CoverMajor Medicinal Plants: Botany, Culture, and Uses by Julia F. Morton
    Call Number: QK 99 .M659
    ISBN: 039803673X
    Publication Date: Springfield, Ill: Thomas, 1977
  • Book CoverThe Renaissance herbal by New York Botanical Garden
    Call Number: QK 99 .N47 2013
    ISBN: 9780893279813
    Publication Date: 2013
  • Book CoverBotany in the Low Countries (End of the 15th Century - ca. 1650): Plantin-Moretus Museum Exhibition
    Call Number: QK 296 .B37 1993
    Publication Date: Antwerp: Plantin-Moretus Museum, 1993
  • Book CoverThe Herbal in Antiquity and Its Transmission to Later Ages. From The Journal of Hellenic Studies by Charles Joseph Singer
    Call Number: R126.A1 S5 1927
    Publication Date: [s. l. : s. n., 1927]
  • Book CoverVisualizing Medieval Medicine and Natural History, 1200-1500 by Jean A. Givens; Karen M. Reeds; Alain Touwaide
    Call Number: R141 .V57 2006
    ISBN: 0754652963
    Publication Date: Aldershot, England: Ashgate, 2006
  • Book CoverHerbarium: Natural Remedies from a Medieval Manuscript by Emma Pirani and Adalberto Pazzini
    Call Number: RS79 .T4625 1980
    ISBN: 0847803058
    Publication Date: New York: Rizzoli, 1980
    Translated by Michael Langley
  • Book CoverThe Book in the Renaissance by Andrew Pettegree
    Call Number: Z291.3 .P48 2010
    ISBN: 9780300110098
    Publication Date: New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010
  • Book CoverBritish Botanical and Horticultural Literature Before 1800: Comprising a History and Bibilography of Botanical and Horticultural Books Printed in England, Scotland, and Ireland from the Earliest Times Until 1800. by Blanche Henrey
    Call Number: Z5352 .H45
    Publication Date: London: Oxford University Press, 1975
  • Book CoverThe Cleveland Herbal, Botanical, and Horticultural Collections by Stanley H. Johnston (Compiled by)
    Call Number: Z5352 .J64 1992
    ISBN: 0873384334
    Publication Date: Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1992
  • Book CoverAn Oak Spring Herbaria : herbs and herbals from the fourteenth to the nineteenth centuries: a selection of the rare books, manuscripts and works of art in the collection of Rachel Lambert Mellon by Lucia Tongiorgi Tomasi & Tony Willis
    Call Number: Z5354.B68 T663 2009
    ISBN: 9780965450812
    Publication Date: 2009
  • Book CoverThe Medieval Health Handbook--Tacuinum Sanitatis by Arano, Luisa Gogliati
    Publication Date: New York: G. Braziller, 1976
    Translated and adapted by Oscar Ratti and Adele Westbrook
  • Book CoverMedicinal Plants and Their History by Edith G. Wheelwright; Ethel M. Barlow (Illustrator)
    ISBN: 0486231038
    Publication Date: 1974
  • Last Updated: Apr 12, 2018 3:44 PM
  • URL: https://libguides.nybg.org/c.php?g=693417
  • Print Page
Librarian Login