CHAPTER VII 



HIERONYMUS TRAGUS 1498-1554 



An original and even eccentric character, singularly gifted as a 

 botanist, was Hieronymus Bock, whose names in literature are 

 several; for his earliest publications were made in Latin, under the 

 name Hieronymus Herbarius. Brunfels in his first volume publishes 

 a number of paragraphs the manuscript of which had been furnished 

 by his friend Bock, and these are all credited to him as Hieronymus 

 Herbarius — Jerome Botanist, or Jerome Herbalist, as you like. 

 So again, in the Appendix to Brunfels' second volume, there is a 

 document of some length, entitled Apodixis Germanica} This is 

 in German, and is by Tragus, but still under the name Hieronymus 

 Herbarius. In the numerous German issues of his principal work 

 he figures as an author whose name is Hieronymus Bock. When 

 the great botanical merit of this work had been intimated abroad, 

 and a Latin edition of it was thereby called for, in this he appeared 

 under the Grasco-Latin name Hieronymus Tragus. By this name 

 therefore is he known in the botanical world in general. The 

 genus that was dedicated to him by Father Plumier therefore 

 necessarily took the form of Tragia. 



Life. No adequate biography of this interesting character 

 seems to be known. We trust that we have to a certainty the 

 year of his birth ; we have the date of his marriage, the maiden name 

 of the bride, the names of her parents, and even the number of 

 guests that were in attendance ; and all this out of Tragus' own diary. ^ 

 Neither is there any disputing the date of his death, the place of his 

 burial, or the name of the preacher who delivered the funeral pane- 

 gyric. But all these are matters which, in the biography of a 

 reputed scholar, a practicing physician, and the beneficiary of a 

 lucrative parochial endowment, are of subordinate interest. 

 What one most wishes to know are the names of the colleges and 

 universities at which the man studied, the schools whence he had his 



' Brunfels, Viv. Icon. vol. ii, pp. 183-199 (in my copy). 

 2 Melchior Adam, Vitcs Germanorutn Medicorum, p. 68. 



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