L’erbario di Ulisse Aldrovandi: attualità di una collezione rinascimentale di piante secche

Abstract

Drying plant specimens for the purposes of study, comparison, and exchange among scholars in the first half of the 16th century is a practice owed largely to the works of Luca Ghini, the founder of the botanical gardens in Pisa and Florence. Among the few Renaissance herbaria known today, that of Ulisse Aldrovandi is the most prominent in terms of quantity and variety of specimens. Indeed, it is within this work that one encounters one of the first mentions in continental Europe – if not the very first – of species currently used in Europe, introduced from the New World, as well as a variety of other species that are now protected due to their rarity or risk of extinction. The present contribution illustrates some of the species contained in this herbarium and highlights a number of the most notable in terms of their historical, geographic, and scientific importance.