8o 



The Botanical Renaissance 



[ch. 



plague in 1577. We realise something of the frightful 

 extent of this scourge, when we remember that it claimed as 

 victims no less than three of the small company of Renais- 

 sance botanists, Gesner, Mattioli and Zaluzian. Leonhard 

 Fuchs was brought into fame by his successful treatment of 

 one of these epidemics. It should also be recalled that, 



Text-fig. 40. Pierandrea Mattioli, 1501 — 1577 [Engraving by Philippe 

 Galle. Virorum Doctorum Effigies, Antwerp, 1572]. 



while Gaspard Bauhin, one of the best known of the later 

 herbalists, was practising as a physician at Basle, no less 

 than three of these terrible outbreaks occurred in the town. 

 Mattioli was the son of a doctor, and his early life was 

 passed in Venice, where his father was in practice. He was 



