Herbaria, collections of preserved plant specimens, were first created in the early modern period in the 1530s. They were indicative of a greater interest in careful observation and correct identification of plants beyond written descriptions usually based on ancient writings, particularly on the first-century CE herbal of Dioscorides. As botany developed, the first printed herbals with accurate images of plants appeared in the 1530s and along with herbaria, provided a means for botanists to document information about plants more accurately than did the texts of the time. This paper will examine a herbarium that the German apothecary, Johannes Harder, created around 1595. In an effort to provide as much visual information as possible, Harder filled in missing parts such as petals, roots, leaves, and even entire flowers. I will argue that this blending of art and science is an example of one of several experiments in visual presentation developed at the time to depict plants accurately. I will draw on the work of Florike Egmond on early modern collections of watercolors and recent studies of nature printing at that time, as well as on Omar Nasim’s exploration of how drawing can be fundamental to the formation of scientific ideas.
