Plan your visit. 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016.

Plan your visit. 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016.

Seeds of Knowledge: Early Modern Illustrated Herbals

October 6, 2023 through January 14, 2024

Seeds of Knowledge highlights the collection of 15th to 17th-century European printed herbals assembled by Dr. Peter Goop of Liechtenstein. Herbals were highly illustrated texts that included both the folklore of plants and their medicinal uses, and they served as references to both doctors and lay healthcare providers. The text and illustrations were repeatedly refined as the medicinal benefits of a plant’s use were more clearly understood, and the style of illustration tended towards higher degrees of naturalism. These books were working manuals and were frequently annotated by readers with notes on herbal remedies, medicines, or other uses not found in the printed text. Dr. Goop’s collection is one of the most extensive in private hands. Using the Morgan’s 10th-century manuscript of Dioscurides’ De materia medica (MS M.652) as a centerpiece, this Thaw Gallery exhibition will explore developments in the understanding of the healthful and healing properties of plants, as Europe moved away from medicinal folklore towards an increased understanding of the natural world.

Support for this exhibition is provided in part by the Rita Markus Fund for Exhibitions.

Basilius Besler (1561–1629)
Johann Leypold (act. 1607–1619) and others, engravers
Hortus Eystettensis (Garden of Eichstätt)
Altdorf: Konrad Bauer, 1613
Courtesy of Peter Goop Collection
Photography by Naomi Wenger

Selected Images

Basilius Besler (1561–1629)
Johann Leypold, (act. 1607–19), engraver
Hortus Eystettensis (Garden of Eichstätt)
Altdorf: Konrad Bauer, 1613
Peter Goop Collection. Photography by Naomi Wenger.

Konrad von Megenberg (13091374)
Buch der Natur (Book of nature)
Augsburg: Johann Bämler, August 19, 1478
Peter Goop Collection. Photograph by Naomi Wenger.

Herbarius Patavie (Herbal of Passau)
Passau: Johann Petri, 1485
Peter Goop Collection. Photography by Naomi Wenger.

Pietro Andrea Mattioli (1501–1577)
Giorgio Liberale (b. 1527), illustrator
Wolfgang Meyerpeck (ca. 1505–1578), blockcutter
Commentarii in sex libros Pedacii Dioscoridis Anazarbei de medica materia (Commentary on the six books of Dioscorides’s “On medical material”)
Venice: Vincenzo Valgrisi, 1565
Peter Goop Collection. Photography by Naomi Wenger.

Hieronymus Bock (1498–1554)
David Kandel (1520–1592), illustrator
Kreütterbuch (Herbal)
Strasbourg: Josias Rihel, 1577
Peter Goop Collection. Photography by Naomi Wenger.

Hortus sanitatis (Garden of health)
Strasbourg: Johann Prüss, before October 21, 1497
Peter Goop Collection. Photography by Naomi Wenger.

Otto Brunfels (1488–1534)
Hans Weiditz the Younger (ca. 1495–1536), illustrator
Herbarum vivae eicones (Living images of herbs)
Strasbourg: Johann Schott, 1531

Jacopo Ligozzi (1547–1626)
White Swallowwort (Vincetoxicum officinale), ca. 1577–87
The Morgan Library & Museum, Gift of Dr. Werner Muensterberger, 2010.184.

Joachim Camerarius the Younger (1534–1598)
Jost Amman (1539–1591), illustrator
Hortus medicus et philosophicus (Medical and philosophical garden)
Frankfurt am Main: printed by Johann Feyerabend for Sigmund Feyerabend, Heinrich Dack, and Peter Fischer, 1588
Peter Goop Collection. Photography by Naomi Wenger.

Johann Wonnecke von Kaub, (act. 1484–1503)
Gart der Gesundheit (Garden of health)
Augsburg: Johann Schönsperger, June 5, 1486
Peter Goop Collection. Photography by Naomi Wenger.

Odo of Meung [pseud. Macer Floridus], (eleventh century)
De viribus herbarum carmen (Poem on the powers of herbs)
Geneva: (Jean Belot?), ca. 1495
Geneva: (Jean Belot?), 1496–98
Peter Goop Collection. Photography by Naomi Wenger.

Giorgio Liberale (b. 1527), illustrator
Wolfgang Meyerpeck (ca. 1505–1578), blockcutter
Hazelwort (Asarum eurpaeum) woodblock
Prague, ca. 1562
The Morgan Library & Museum, purchased on the Harper Fund, 2001; PML 128764.

Gallery Images