By Florike Egmond

This brilliant learn explores the way eu wisdom of the flora and fauna used to be reworked in the course of the overdue 16th and early 17th centuries. in line with a wide choice of basic resource fabric - in most cases correspondence - Egmond investigates horticultural ideas, models within the choice of infrequent crops, botanical experimentation and strategies of clinical overview, in addition to monitoring the trade of information. important to this job is the determine of Carolus Clusius (1526-1609), the 1st actually clinical botanist. The transformation of people's daily event with vegetation is proven throughout the useful manifestations of this newly stumbled on fervour: the expansion of accumulating, backyard show and fascination with the infrequent and unique.

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Extra info for The World of Carolus Clusius: Natural History in the Making, 1550-1610 (Perspectives in Economic and Social History, 6)

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Passages like the one quoted above can thus be read both as purely descriptive statements and as reports on long-term experience with colour and propagation. Tulips were not the only flower to be experimented with. Boisot also remarked on the different colour patterns of irises, and had various types of anemone, of which he sent several to Clusius, carefully wrapped in paper marked to indicate the colour: ‘by sowing them, one daily obtains new colours’ ( J. 14 The quest for rare colour varieties was not confined to the garden.

The two brothers combined an interest in nature with a passion for antiquity. They acted as patrons to the artist, numismatic expert and printer Hubert Goltzius (1526–83), and Marc Laurin’s collection of antique coins was one of the best in Europe. Hubert Goltzius provides the link between the Bruges humanists and a circle of famous artists related by both family ties and artistic interests. His wife’s sister married Pieter Coecke van Aelst. Among the most famous of his creations are tapestries, verdures, which show birds, plants and beasts often based upon the woodcuts in contemporary scientific works on nature, and also demonstrate the widespread interest in exotic naturalia.

Only this method makes it possible to obtain new, unpredictable varieties, but it often takes five or more years before the new bulbs flower. It requires considerable expertise – for instance concerning the choice of which tulips to cross-fertilize, the Expert Gardeners 31 best temperatures, humidity and types of soil – while the duration of the whole process demands much patience and induces tulip growers to keep track of their yearly results and of colour changes from one generation of bulbs to the next, over long periods of time.

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