382 Aster History: MATTHIOLI 
Hebrew, etc. The work is really a Natural History of all plants 
which Matthioli knew. 
Matthioli’s treatment of Aster, as of other plants, expanded 
greatly during successive editions. He, like Fuchs, identified Aster 
Atticus with the plant now known as Aster Amellus L. He also 
established its identification with Vergil’s Amellus. Later he ad- 
mitted a second Aster, his Aster Atticus alter, our Pallenis.* His 
Aster chapter as it appears in the Latin edition of 1560 (er hor. 
Bu.), the earliest accessible, begins, p. 572-573, with the caption 
“ Aster Atticus, Cap. cxv,” and follows with a Latin translation 
of Dioscorides, omitting the parts not confirmed by occurrence 
in Pliny. Matthioli renders the color-character ‘“‘ Purpureum 
luteumve,’ and continues again, “ Zradunt purpureum florem, si 
ex aqua bibatur, anginis...opitulari.” + 
* After his death a whole century, the Kénig edn. of Basle, 1674 (ex. “dr. Nou 
Bot. Garden) contained 4 Aster figures, pp. 817-819, instead of Matthioli’s two. 
The remainder forms a ee with marginal headings. I translate the 
more a parts, introducing the marginal headings in italics 
‘* Asteris Atticit consideratio. It is called ng becauses it occurred more fre- 
quently than elsewhere in the Atheniensian field; The plant is to-day known to not a 
few persons. It grows in rough places, wild lands ve valleys. Serapionis erratum. 
Serapio confused it with eryngium, deceived by the likeness of the flowers which in 
either plant present the figure of a star. In some codices of Dioscorides gsi state- 
ments are found ia the chapter on Aster which are believed by learned men to have 
been subsequent accretions ; therefor re we have omitted oe especially sistas Galen, 
Oribasius, Paulus and Serapio do not quote them. But in the little book concerning 
plants, of a certain Apulia, things are said of Aster poi which seem almost the 
same Un impossibility ].”’ 
tellarum radii noctibus collucent: quare qui naturam stirpis ignorant, inane 
simulacrum [‘‘ una fantasma’’ in his Italian, 1568] se videre putant. Re eritur a 
pastoribus pecudum.’’ <Amel/us Virgilii. Aster Atticus is celebrated in luculentissimis 
carminibus by Vergil as the Amellus, which he says is cate name for the flower among 
husbandmen. [Vergil’s lines are then quoted but with f evidence on which 
Matthioli had based this identification of Amellus, which he introd as if familiarized 
y some previous identifier to us unknown. ] 
‘* Aster Atticus, the fresh plant, says Cratevas, pounded up with old axle grease, 
is of use when placed on the bites of a mad dog. Swellings of the throat it reduces, 
and when burned it drives serpents a te 
** Asteris Attici vires ex Fee ne is believed to heal buboes, rubbed on or even 
merely suspended. It is of mixed faculty like the rose. So far Galen. 
** But since my Afica Stel/a recalls to mind the plant commonly called Stellaria by 
will not pass it over in silenc Stellariae historia, et vires. Stellaria, which some 
call Pes-/eonis, and others Achimilla, is a plant which occurs mostly in mountains, 
especially in meadows, with leaves very like those of Malva, but firmer and crisper, 
Cy SS re ay 
