CH. II] The ' Herbarium ' of Apuleius 1 1 



includes some theoretical considerations about plants, on 

 Aristotelian lines. An English translation, which was 

 printed by Wynkyn de Worde before the end of the 

 fifteenth century, is interesting as containing the very primi- 

 tive botanical wood-cut reproduced in Text-fig. 19. 



' Das puch der natur ' is slightly later as regards the 

 date of publication, having been printed by Hanns Bamler 

 at Augsburg in 1475. It seems to have been very popular, 

 for it passed through six or seven editions before the end 

 of the fifteenth century. A very large number of manu- 

 scripts of ' The Book of Nature ' exist, as many as eighteen 

 being preserved in the Vienna Library and seventeen at 

 Munich. The text is a compilation from old Latin writings, 

 and is said to have been translated into German as early as 

 1349. The portion dealing with plants consists of an 

 account of the virtues of eighty-nine herbs with their Latin 

 and German names. The chief interest of the work, from 

 our present point of view, lies in the fact that it contains 

 the earliest known botanical wood engraving (Plate III). 

 We shall return to this subject in Chapter VII. 



2. The Herbarium of Apuleius Platonicus. 



Another very early book based on classical writings, 

 especially those of Dioscorides and Pliny, was the ' Her- 

 barium ' of Apuleius Platonicus. This little Latin work is 

 among the earliest to which the term " Herbal " is generally 

 applied. A herbal has been defined as a book containing 

 the names and descriptions of herbs, or of plants in general, 

 with their properties and virtues. The word is believed to 

 have been derived from a mediaeval Latin adjective " her- 

 balis," the substantive "liber" being understood. It is 

 thus exactly comparable in origin with the word " manual " 

 in the sense of a hand-book. 



Four early printed editions of the Herbal of Apuleius 

 Platonicus are known, all of which appear to have been 

 based on different manuscripts. The earliest was published 

 in Rome late in the fifteenth century, from a manuscript 

 discovered by Joh. Philippus de Lignamine, physician to 

 Pope Sixtus IV. Nothing is definitely known concerning 

 the author, but it is conjectured that he was a native of 



