MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 69 
British Museum and much finer than the inferior reprinting 
of this work in the Morgan library. 
2. Macer Floridus, Paris, about 1490, Aemilius Macer is of 
course not the author of the book, only the advertising title 
of a rythmieal herbal of probably Salernitan origin supposed 
to date back to the tenth century. The virtues of seventy-seven 
plants are described in mediaeval Latin verse. The Morgan Li- 
brary and the Surgeon General’s library both contain muti- 
lated copies of this work, but the Garden copy is probably the 
only perfect one in this country. 
3. Hortus Sanitatis, Meinz, 1491, is probably derived from 
pre-existing so-called ‘‘herbariums.’’ It depicts the powers 
and virtues of 485 plants, together with other things com- 
monly found in apothecary shops including birds, fishes, and 
stones. It is rich in pictures, only about one-third of which 
are new, the rest copied on a reduced scale from a work which 
appeared in 1495. Some of the illustrations are of mythical 
animals, such as the unicorn, phoenix, man and the hydra, 
and the harpy with its claws in a man’s body. 
4. ‘‘Herbarium’”’ of Otto Brunfels, 1520. A new era in the 
history of herbals may be said to date from this year, when 
the first part of Brunfels’ work was published by Schott of 
Strasbourg. The book is notable for its beautiful and natural 
depiction of plants which are not represented in the eonven- 
tionalized aspect which had become traditional in the earlier 
herbals. To quote from the book itself: ‘‘Lively figures of 
plants drawn after nature with the utmost care and art, to- 
gether with their effects, in aid of the old and now reviving 
science of botanical medicine.’’ 
5. ‘‘Herbarium’’ of Hieronymus Bock, first edition, 1539, 
second edition, 1546. Contain many woodcuts drawn by a 
young self-taught artist, David Kandel. The woodcuts are 
notable for the humor displayed in introducing accessory 
figures of men and animals with the plants. Bock was ex- 
tremely free from the credulity which influenced the works of 
many of the earlier botanists and did not hesitate to express 
his scorn at the ‘‘monkey tricks and ceremonies associated with 
the use of plants collected for the purposes of magic rather 
than for medicine.”’ 
