Details

Subjects:

Materia medica -- Early works to 1800.
Materia medica.
Botany, Medical -- Early works to 1800.
Botany, Medical.
Botany -- Pictorial works -- Early works to 1800.
Botany.

Form/Genre:

Codices (bound manuscripts)
Herbals (reference sources)
Manuscripts, Renaissance.
Pictorial works.
Illustrated works.

Language:

Italian and Latin.

Summary:

Illustrated herbal with three styles of illustration: one group of illustrations following medieval conventions, sometimes with fantastic elements such as human faces, on recto pages through most of the manuscript; another, rougher but more generally somewhat more naturalistic group in ink outline, on verso pages or added alongside earlier color illustrations; and a third group of naturalistic color illustrations of plants including roots, leaves, flowers and fruit on verso pages. Approximately a quarter of the illustrations are accompanied by notes on medicinal properties and preparations of the plants, written in the same ink as the ink outline illustrations, mostly in Italian (the Italian usage suggests the text was written in the Veneto), but occasionally in Latin or a mix of both languages; the notes are written around and sometimes over the illustrations.

Notes:

Ms. codex.
Title from upper cover.
Collation: Paper, 100; 1¹ 2¹⁰(-1) 3-10⁸ 11³ 12⁸(-1) 13-14⁸; [i], 1-99, foliation in ink, upper right recto.
Script: Written in humanistic cursive script.
Decoration: 192 botanical illustrations, most in color, but some in ink outline.
Binding: Contemporary (15th-century) limp parchment; remnants of ties on 3 sides; Erbario in ink on upper cover.
Origin: Written in northern Italy in the 15th century.

Local notes:

Lawrence J. Schoenberg & Barbara Brizdle Manuscript Initiative.

Penn Provenance:

Formerly owned by Rafael Gomes (signature on bottom band pasted to f. 1r).
Formerly owned by Leo S. Olschki; sold at auction as part of his collection at William S. Kündig (Geneva), sale 95 (23 June 1948), lot 42.
Formerly owned by Carleton R. Richmond, president of the Boston Athenaeum and the American Antiquarian Society; sold at auction as part of his collection at Sotheby Parke Bernet (New York), 30 Oct. 1981, lot 68.
Formerly owned by Henri Schiller (Paris).
Sold by Sam Fogg to Lawrence J. Schoenberg, June 2001.
Deposit by Lawrence J. Schoenberg and Barbara Brizdle, 2012.
Gift of Barbara Brizdle Schoenberg, 2019.

Cited in:

Described in Transformation of knowledge: early manuscripts from the collection of Lawrence J. Schoenberg (London: Paul Holberton, 2006), p. 103-105 (LJS 419).

Publications about:

Reeds, Karen M. "Leonardo da Vinci and botanical illustration: drawing, nature printing, and printing circa 1500." In Visualizing medieval medicine and natural history, 1200-1550, p. 205-237. Edited by Jean A. Givens, Karen M. Reeds, Alain Touwaide. AVISTA Studies in the History of Medieval Technology, Science and Art (Ashgate, 2006).
Herman, Nicholas. Making the Renaissance Manuscript: Discoveries from Philadelphia Libraries (exh. cat.). Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Libraries, 2020. 270-73 (cat. 82).

Cited as:

Oversize UPenn LJS 419.

Contributor:

Gomes, Rafael, former owner.
Olschki, Leo S. (Leo Samuel), 1861-1940, former owner.
Richmond, Carleton R. (Carleton Rubira), former owner.
Schiller, Henri, former owner.
Lawrence J. Schoenberg Collection (University of Pennsylvania)

OCLC:

803521756

Web link:

The Lawrence J. Schoenberg and Barbara Brizdle Manuscript Initiative Fund Home Page