Botany Illustrated: Introduction to Plants, Major Groups, Flowering Plant Families

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His many-splendored vision includes having the newfound manuscript on display at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C., where it could be seen by millions who traverse the nation’s capital. He also envisions the manuscript finally published as a book, with a foreword recounting how this lost work came to light. And he wants a Spanish translation, to make it more accessible to Cuban audiences. She was not finished,” Russell says. “It gives you goosebumps, you know, how close we came to losing it.” In 1828, Cuban exiles and human rights advocates Father Félix Varela and José Antonio Saco mentioned an American woman in Cuba drawing Cuban plants in their periodical El Mansajero Semanal. Almost a century later, in 1912, Cuban scholar and thinker Carlos M. Trelles cited the work, sight unseen. The citations said that New York Horticultural Society members had likened the work to that of respected naturalist Maria Sibylla Merian, whose legendary 1705 work Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium is considered seminal to the field of entomology. I said, Oh my God! This is that lady. This is what I’ve been looking for. This is what everybody has been looking for!” Cueto says. “It was covered by a series of unfortunate misspellings and access to catalogs.”

A jewel of botanical literature in Cuba,” is how Cuban botanist Miguel Esquivel describes the work, classifying it among the greatest discoveries of its kind in recent times. ( Also find out how historians rediscovered an alchemy manuscript by Isaac Newton.) Copy ( Command + C) and paste ( Command + V) the illustrations over to your new document and arrange them as needed in the artboard. Use the Align menu to align and distribute the illustrations. Find out the names of your plants. If someone eats a plant, Poison Control needs to know what it is!

That comparison triggered my belief that this was important,” Cueto says. “People exaggerate, but not that much.” Each entry features an illustration of a plant or animal; its name in various languages; descriptions of ailments it can be used to treat; and instructions for finding and preparing it. Remedies for poisonous bites were marked out with drawings of snakes and scorpions. For instance, a snake appears near the entry for sweet basil, called ‘snake plant’ ( naedderwyrt), because it was reported to grow where snakes were found and to be useful against injuries caused by snakes. Entries for chamomile and ‘hart clover’, from an illustrated Old English Herbal, England (? Christ Church Canterbury or Winchester), c. 1000–1025, Cotton MS Vitellius C III, f. 29v

Incorporating hand-drawn illustrations is a great way to bring in hints of personality and character to any composition. Custom graphics and illustrations often increase engagement by introducing a more playful approach to imagery. This drawing in Wollstonecraft's manuscript shows a flower from a member of Erythrina, a genus of trees sometimes called coral trees due to the many species that sport bright red blooms. Photograph by Robert Clark Word of mouth

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Mowry JB, Spyker DA, Cantilena LR Jr, Bailey JE, Ford M. 2012 Annual report of the American Association of Poison Control Centers’’ National Poison Data System (NPDS): 30 th annual report. Clinical Toxicology. 2013;51:949–1229.