24 THE NEW BIOLOGY 



In his preface Bock shows the importance of associa- 

 ting related or similar plants, and pours contempt on 

 the alphabetical arrangement. We must not however 

 read the modern meaning into his word affinity. 

 There is no reason to suppose that the notion of a 

 common descent for the pea and the bean, or for 

 rosemary and lavender, had ever crossed his mind.^ 



LEONHARD FUCHS 

 1501-1566 



De Historia Stirpium Commentarii insignes, maximis impensis et vigiliis 

 elaborati, adjectis earundem vivis plusquam quingentis imaginibus nunquam 

 antea ad naturae imitationem artificiosius effictis et expressis, Leonarto 

 Fuchsio medico hac nostra estate longe clarissimo autore, &c. Fol. Basil. 

 1542. 



Fuchs was born at Membdingen in Bavaria in 1501. 

 His original calling was that of schoolmaster, and his 

 favourite study ancient literature. At the university 

 of Ingolstadt, a stronghold of Catholicism, he made 

 acquaintance with the writings of Luther, and was 

 thereby led to adopt Protestantism. Having graduated 

 in arts, he studied medicine and took his doctor's degree 

 in that branch, becoming after a short interval professor 

 of medicine. He was next made physician to the mar- 

 quis of Brandenburg at Anspach, and became favourably 



^ " Und hab in gedachten biichern gemeinlich disen Process und Ordnung 

 gehalten, nemlich das ich alle Gewachs so einander verwandt und zugethon 

 oder sonst einander etwas anlich seind und verglichen zusammen doch under- 

 schiedlich sind. Und den vorigen alten Brauch oder Ordnung mit dem ABC 

 wie das inn den alten Kreutter buchern zu ersehen hindan gestelt. Dann die 

 Gewachs nach dem ABC in Schrifften zuhandeln gar ein grosse ungleichheit 

 und irrung geberen, &c." (Bock's Preface.) 



The word affinity or some synonym appears in Aristotle {De Partibus, IV, 

 6, 3), and in the natural history books of the sixteenth and seventeenth cen- 

 turies A.D., such as those of Fuchs, Dodoens, Gesner, Cesalpini, Caspar 

 Bauhin, Grew and Ray. Nowhere is a clear distinction drawn between 

 affinity and general similarity of structure or habit. 



