Complete Record - Heirs of Hippocrates No. 31

DIOSCORIDES PEDANIUS, OF ANAZARBOS (fl. ca. 50 A.D.) De materia medica libri VII. Accedunt Nicandri et Eutecnii opuscula medica. Codex Constantinopolitanus saeculo X. exaratus et picturis illustratus olim Manuelis Eugenici, Caroli Rinuccini Florentini, Thomae Phillipps Angli, nunc inter thesauros Pierpont Morgan Bibliothecae asservatus. [n. publ.] 1935 385 ll. 48.3 cm.

For more information on this author or work, see number: 28

This great work of Dioscorides had no illustrations when it was first written. Illustrations, which aided greatly in identification, were probably added in revisions made during the third or fourth century. In addition to descriptions of the medical properties of six hundred plants, the book contains some important early material on chemistry as well as descriptions of chemical compounds. In his classification, Dioscorides recognized natural families of plants long before Caspar Bauhin (see No. 392) and Carl von Linné (see No. 877). The Codex Constantinopolitanus was created in the tenth century and this facsimile is from MS. 652 in the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York. Other manuscripts of equal interest are one from the ninth century in the Bibliothèque Nationale and sixth century Vienna and Neapolitan codices in the library of St. Mark's, Venice.

See Related Record(s): 392 877