T U R 



T U R 



tpere printed coUeftively at Strafturg, in 3 vols. fol. 1606. 

 Nouv. Dift. Hift. Huet de Interpret. Gen. Biog. 



TURNEFF Island, in Geography, an idand in the bay 

 of Honduras, about 20 miles long, and 10 broad, abound- 

 ing ill cocoa-nut trees, and much frequented by fifhermen. 

 N. lat. 17° 16'. W. long. 88' 20'. 



TURNEP, in Botany, &c. See Brassica and Turnip. 



TURNER, William, in Biography, one of the 

 fathers of Englifh botany as well as of the Englilh Pro- 

 teftant church, was born at Morpeth in Northumberland, 

 probably about the year 1520. He was educated at Pem- 

 broke college, Cambridge, under the patronage of fir 

 Thomas Wentworth, and about the year 1538 had already 

 diftiiiguiftied himfelf for fcience and learning, being juftly 

 difTatisfied with the little real information he could obtain 

 from thofe about him. Natural philofophy, medicine, and 

 botany, chiefly engaged his attention at this time, but 

 the great queftions involving the vital interefts of religious 

 truth and liberty, having been ftirred up, he devoted him- 

 felf alfo to their examination, and incurred the danger and 

 obloquy incident, more or lefs, in every age and country, 

 to the honed profecution of futh enquiries. Turner, like 

 many others in England, at this period, united the charac- 

 ters of a phyfician and a divine. He became an itinerant 

 preacher, of fo zealous a charafter that the infamous 

 bifhop Gardiner threw him into prifon ; from whence he 

 was, after a long time, releafed, %ve are not informed by 

 what means, and became a voluntary exile from his native 

 land. He refidcd on the continent with many other Eng- 

 hfh refugees, principally at Cologn, and Bade, till the 

 death of Henry VIII. During this interval. Turner tra- 

 velled into Switzerland and Italy, where he contracted a 

 friendfhip with many diftinguiflied botanifts and phyficians, 

 efpecially the great Conrad Gefner of Zurich, and profeffor 

 Ghini of Bologna, the founder of the phyfic-garden, and 

 of the botanical chair, in that univerfity, and the precep- 

 tor of Csefalpinus and Anguillara. At Ferrara Turner 

 received the degree of doftor of phyfic, which was con- 

 firmed to him at Oxford, when he returned to England on 

 the acceffion of Edward VI. He was made phyfician to 

 the Protcftor Somerfet, and his ecclefiaftical merits were 

 ftill more amply rewarded, by a prebend of York, a 

 canonry of Windfor, and the deanery of Wells. He had 

 deferved this preferment by feveral publications in defence 

 of Protcilantifm, which very caufe, however, obliged him 

 to fly from the perfecutions of the bloody Mary, during 

 whofe whole reign Dr. Turner remained abroad. The ac- 

 ccffion of Elizabeth reftored him to his liberty and native 

 foil, as well as to all his ecclefiaftical benefices. The reft 

 of his life was devoted to his clerical duties, and his bota- 

 nical amufements ; two purfuits which in many honeft and 

 good men have " gone very lovingly together," to their 

 mutual advantage and honour. He had a botanic garden 

 at Wells, and another at Kew, and appears to have divided 

 his time between his deanery, and his refidence in Crutched 

 Friars, London. Dr. Pulteney thinks, from Turner's 

 frequent mention of the plants of Purbeck, and Portland, 

 that he had fomc intimate connections in Dorfetfhire. This 

 worthy man died July 7, 1568, apparently at no very ad- 

 vanced age, leaving feveral children. " His ion Peter was 

 educated to phyfic, travelled, and took degrees abroad ; 

 was incorporated dodlor at Cambridge, and at Oxford, and 

 died, aged 72, in 1614, but docs not fecm to have inherited 

 his father's turn for botany." 



Turner's earllcft botanical work is faid to have been 

 printed at Cologn in 1544, in oftavo, under the title of 

 Hijhr'ia dc naturis herlarum, Jcholus et not'u vallate. But 



this is mentioned by Bumaldus, or rather Ovidius Mon- 

 talbanus, only, in his Bibliotheca Botanica, Seguier's edition, 

 p. 18, without notice of any other publication of our au- 

 thor ; nor does it appear to be known to Englifh colledtora, 

 any more than the following. " Names of Herbes in 

 Greek, Latin, Enghfh, Dutch, and French," printed«dt 

 London, 1548, in i2mo., by the fame writer. 



The chief publication of Dr. Turner is his well-known 

 Herbal, in fmall folio, black letter, with wooden cuts, of 

 which the firft part was originally printed at London in 

 1 55 1, and is now, on account of its rarity, much valued 

 by coUeftors. The fecond part appeared at Cologn i« 

 1562, accompanied by a reimprefTion of the firft. In 

 1568 thefe firft and fecond parts were republiftied at the 

 fame place, with a new title page, a dedication to queen 

 Elizabeth, from which many of the above particulars of 

 the author's life are taken, and the addition of a third 

 part of the fame work. To the whole are fubjoined " A 

 booke of the natures and properties as well of the bafhes 

 in England as of other bathes in Germanye and Italye, 

 very neceffarye for all fycke perfones that can not be 

 healed without the helpe of natural bathes :" and " A 

 moft excellent and perfefte homifti apothecarye or homely 

 phyfick booke, for all the grefes and difeafes of the bodye, 

 tranflated out of the Almaine fpeche into Englifti, by Jhon 

 Hollybufch." For this laft fapient produftion 'I\irner 

 is, perhaps, not refponfible. The Herbal is arranged 

 alphabetically, and is more original and praftical, than the 

 more popular and celebrated publications of Lyte, Gerardc, 

 or even Parkinfon. The objedt of the author was to deter- 

 mine the plants of the ancients, and to record their reputed 

 virtues. But this is accompliftied with more caution and dii- 

 cretion than arc common to moft of his contemporaries, and 

 with far lefs dogmatical confidence than Fabius Columna 

 fubfequently alTumed. The third part, dedicated to the 

 company of furgeons, profeftes more efpecially to treat of 

 medical plants not known to the ancients. The author 

 apologizes in thefe terms for its imperfeftions. " For furcly 

 beyng fo much vexed with ficknes, and occupyed with 

 preaching and the ftudy of divinitye and exercife of dif- 

 ciphne, I have had but fmall leafure to write Herballes." 

 This dedication is dated " at Welles 1564." The wooden 

 cuts of all the three parts of Turner's Herbal are taken from 

 thofe of Fuchfius, and at firft fight appear to be the very 

 fame blocks as thofe ufed in the oftavo edition of the latter 

 author, printed at Lyons, in 1595. A careful infpcftion 

 however will cafily deteft minute differences ; and we efpe- 

 cially obferve flight damages in Turner's figures, not occur- 

 ring in this later inipreftion, which decifively prove it to 

 have been printed from more recent cuts. Haller gives our 

 author credit for having firft figured the true MeJuj, and 

 the Rhus Colinus ; fee part 2d, 52 and 115. Under the 

 former he defcribcs various fpecies of Aledicago, diftinguilh- 

 ing their different feed-vclfcls ; and of the latter exhibits a 

 fufficiently cxpreffive dchneation, with a correft, though 

 brief, hiltory. 



Turner ranks moreover aniongft our earlicft Britifli zoolo- 

 gifts. He publifticd at Cologn, in 1544, an oiSavo of ten 

 pages, entitled Avium priscipuarum, quarum apud Plinium et 

 Ar'iflotclem mentio ejl, h'ljloria. Conrad Gefner, to whofe 

 mufeum he repeatedly contributed, after his fettlement in 

 England, fpeaks of him as eminently deferving of praife in 

 the department of ornithology ; and Merret in his P'wax 

 mentions the above little book, as great in authority, though 

 iniall in bulk. Gefner has prefixed to the third volume 

 of his own ponderous Hijlor'ia Av'tmalium, a letter of Dr. Tur- 

 ner's, dated Wiffenburg, Nov. 1557, in which the various 

 3 K 2 kinds 



