This paper explores how the role of illustrations in medieval European herbals changed over time and in various contexts. The negative view of plant illustrations held by Pliny the Elder in antiquity was persisted well into the Middle Ages, resulting in the general lack of illustrations in medieval herbals. The paper examines such exceptions as the beautifully illustrated Vienna Dioscurides manuscript from the sixth-century Byzantium; an eleventh-century Old English translation of Pseudo-Apuleius’s Herbarius, which is accompanied by schematic illustrations; the Tractatus de Herbis of ca. 1300 from the circle of the Salernitan medical school with life-like depictions of plants; and the ‘Carrara Herbal’, a sort of artistic plant album created ca. 1390 in the Paduan court. The paper demonstrates how, in differing contexts, herbal illustrations could convey political messages, enhance the usability of the book, reflect scientific or academic interests of the compiler or the commissioner, or be presented as a token of wealth, power, and intellect.
The advent of movable-type printing in the mid-fifteenth century enabled illustrated herbals to be widely distributed, thereby contributing to the democratization of knowledge. We also witness a change in attitude towards plant illustrations from those of Pliny; as demonstrated in the Gart der Gesundheit, published in Mainz in 1485, realistic depictions of plants were finally considered a virtue in which the publisher took pride.
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