CHAPTER IIl (Part 6)

the abuses which crept into his own party. A ban was put upon his writings in the reign of Henry VIII, and for a time he suffered imprisonment, but, when Edward VI came to the throne, his fortunes improved, and, after a long and tedious period of waiting for prefer- ment, he obtained the Deanery of Wells. Difficulty in ejecting the previous Dean caused much delay in obtaining possession of the house, and Turner lamented bitterly that, in the small and crowded temporary lodging, ‘‘i can not go to my booke for y* crying of childer & noyse y‘ is made in my chamber.” A clergyman’s life must have been full of unwelcome vicissitudes in those days, if Turner's career was at all typical. During Mary’s reign he was a fugitive, and the former Dean of Wells was reinstated. However, when Elizabeth ascended the throne, the position was reversed, and Turner came back to Wells, “the usurper,” as he calls his rival, being ejected. But his triumph was short-lived, for in 1564 he was suspended for nonconformity. His controversial methods were violent in the extreme, and he seems to have been a thorn in the flesh of his superiors. q : : ; ; | , 4 ; ut . IV] The Herbal in England 101 The Bishop of Bath and Wells wrote on one occasion that he was. “much encombred w" m" Doctor 7urner Deane of Welles, for his undiscrete behavior in the pulpitt: where he medleth w* all matters, and unsemelie speaketh of all estates, more than ys standinge withe discressyon.” Christian doctrine was by no means the only subject that occupied Turner’s attention. He had taken a medical degree either at Ferrara or Bologna, and, in the reign of Edward VI, he was physician to the Duke of Somerset, the Protector. He had travelled much in Italy, Switzerland, Holland and Germany, at the periods when his religious opinions excluded him from England. One of the great advantages, which he reaped from his wanderings, was the opportunity of studying botany at Bologna under Luca Ghini, who was also the teacher of Cesalpino. Another savant, with whom he became acquainted on the Continent, was Konrad Gesner, whom he visited at Zurich, and with whom he maintained a warm friendship. He also corre- sponded with Leonhard Fuchs. Turner’s earliest botanical work was the ‘Libellus de re herbaria novus’ (1538), which is the first book in which localities for many of our native British plants are placed on record. In 1548 this was followed by another little work, ‘The names of herbes in Greke, Latin, Englishe Duche and Frenche wyth the commune names that Herbaries and Apotecaries use.’ In the preface to this book, Turner tells us that he had projected a Latin herbal, and had indeed written it, but refrained from publishing it because, when he “axed the advise of Phisicianes in thys matter, their advise was that I shoulde cease from settynge out of this boke in latin tyll I had sene those places of Englande, wherein is moste plentie of herbes, that I might in my herbal declare to the greate honoure’ of our countre what numbre of sovereine and strang herbes were in Englande that were not in other. nations, whose counsell I have folowed deferryng to set out my herbal in latin, tyl that I have sene the west countrey, which I never sawe yet in al my lyfe, which countrey of all places of England, as I heare say is moste richely replenished wyth all kyndes of straunge and wonderfull workes and giftes of nature, as are stones, herbes, fishes and metalles.” 1 The n is inverted in the original, no doubt a misprint. 102 The Botanical Renaissance [cH. He explains that while waiting to complete his herbal, he has been advised to publish this little book in which he has set forth the names of plants. He adds, ‘and because men should not thynke that I write of that I never sawe, and that Poticaries shoulde be excuselesse when as the ryghte herbes are required of them, I have shewed in what places of Englande, Germany, and Italy the herbes growe and maye be had for laboure and money.” Turner's chef-d’euvre was his ‘ Herball,’ published in three instalments, the first in London in 1551, the first and second together at Cologne in 1562, during his exile in the reign of Mary, and the third part, together with the pre- ceding, in 1568. ‘The title of the first part runs as follows, ‘A new Herball, wherin are conteyned the names of Herbes...with the properties degrees and naturall places of the same, gathered and made by Wylliam Turner, Physicion unto the Duke of Somersettes Grace.’ The figures illustrating the herbal are, for the most part, the same as those in the octavo edition of Fuchs’ work, pub- lished in 1545. The dedication of the herbal, in its completed form, to Queen Elizabeth, throws some light on Turner’s life, and incidentally on that illustrious lady herself. The doctor recalls, with pardonable pride and perhaps a touch of blarney, an occasion on which the Princess Elizabeth, as she then was, had conversed with him in Latin. ‘As for your knowledge in the Latin tonge,” he writes, “xv1ir yeares ago or more, I had in the Duke of Somersettes house (beynge his Physition at that tyme) a good tryal thereof, when as it pleased your grace to speake Latin unto me: for although I have both in England, lowe and highe Germanye, and other places of my longe traveil and pelgrimage, never spake with any noble or gentle woman, that spake so wel and so much congrue fyne and pure Latin, as your grace did unto me so longe ago.” Turner defends himself against the insinuation that “a booke intreatinge onelye of trees, herbes and wedes, and shrubbes, is not a mete present for a prince,” and certainly, if we accept his account of the state of knowledge at the time, the need for such a book must have been most urgent. He explains that, while he was still at Pembroke IV] The Herbal in England 103 Hall, Cambridge, he endeavoured to learn the names of plants, but, “suche was the ignorance in simples at that tyme,” that he could get no information on the subject, even from physicians. He claims that his herbal has con- siderable originality—a claim which seems well founded. In his own words—‘they that have red the first part of my Herbal, and have compared my writinges of plantes with those thinges that Matthiolus, Fuchsius, Tragus, and Dodoneus wrote in y® firste editiones of their Herballes, maye easily perceyve that I taught the truthe of certeyne plantes, which these above named writers either knew not at al, or ellis erred in them greatlye.... So yt as I learned something of them, so they ether might or did learne som- thinge of me agayne, as their second editions maye testifye. And because I would not be lyke unto a cryer y' cryeth a loste horse in the marketh, and telleth all the markes and tokens that he hath, and yet never sawe the horse, nether coulde knowe the horse if he sawe him: I wente into Italye and into diverse partes of Germany, to knowe and se the herbes my selfe.” This herbal contains many evidences of Turner’s inde- pendence of thought. He fought against what he regarded as superstition in science with the same ardour with which he entered upon religious polemics. The legend of the human form of the Mandrake receives scant mercy at his hands. As he points out, ‘‘The rootes which are conter- fited and made like litle puppettes and mammettes, which come to be sold in England in boxes, with heir, and such forme as a man hath, are nothyng elles but folishe feined trifles, and not naturall. For they are so trymmed of crafty theves to mocke the poore people with all, and to rob them both of theyr wit and theyr money. I have in my tyme at diverse tymes taken up the rootes of Mandrag out of the grounde, but I never saw any such thyng upon or in them, as are in and upon the pedlers rootes that are comenly to be solde in boxes.” Turner was, however, by no means the first to dispute the Mandrake superstition; in the Grete Herball of 1526 it is definitely refuted, and it is ignored in some works that are of even earlier date. The hoax was long-lived, for we find Gerard also exposing it in 1597- 104 The Botanical Renaissance [CH. Turner had a fine scorn for any superstitious notions he detected in the writings of his contemporaries, and seems to have been particularly pleased if he could show that in any disputed matter they were wrong, while the ancients, for whom he had a great reverence, were right. For instance he has a great deal to say about a theory, held by Mattioli, in opposition to the opinions of Theophrastus and Dioscorides, that the Broomrape (Ovodbanche) could kill other plants merely by its baneful presence, without any physical contact. He declares that this view is against reason, authority and experience, and points out that the figure which Mattioli gives is faulty, in omitting to show the roots, which are the real instruments of destruction. He triumphantly concludes, ‘‘And as touchynge experience, I know that the freshe and yong Orobanche hath commyng out of the great roote, many lytle strynges...wherewith it taketh holde of the rootes of the herbes that grow next unto it. Wherefore Matthiolus ought not so lyghtly to have defaced the autorite of Theophrast so ancient and substantiall autor.” Turner’s work is largely occupied with the opinions of early writers, especially Dioscorides, and his respect for their authority is a somewhat curious trait in a character which seems, in other directions, to have been so unorthodox. He did not however treat their books as the last word on the subject, and the third part of his herbal is occupied with plants ‘‘ whereof is no mention made nether of y° old Grecianes nor Latines.” Turner’s herbal is arranged alphabetically, and does not show evidence of any interest in the relationships of the plants. It is as individuals, and essentially as “simples,” that he regarded them. His descriptions of them were often vividly expressed, though not markedly original. It must be remembered that botany was not the only science which he studied. He wrote about birds, and also contributed information about English fishes to Gesner’s ‘Historia Animalium.’ Before discussing the next herbal which appeared in this country, we may refer in passing to a botanical book which hardly comes under this heading, but which is of interest in relation to the history of the time. Nicolas Monardes, a Spanish physician, had published, in 1569 | Iv] Lhe ferbal in England 105 and 1571, some account of the plants which had lately been brought to Europe from the recently discovered West Indies, and this work was translated into English by John Frampton in 1577, under the title of ‘Joyfull newes out of the newe founde worlde.’ This book contains a good figure of the Tobacco plant (Text-fig. 52), perhaps the first 1S b le OO a pS Ray) : SA lu a ry <- > D/L y SMUT pew Goalies 3 Text-fig. 52. “Tabaco”=JVicottana, Tobacco [Monardes, Joyfull newes out of the newe founde worlde, 2nd ed. 1580]. ever published, and also a long account of its virtues. The reader is told that the Negroes and Indians after inhaling tobacco smoke ‘doe remaine lightened, without any weari- nesse, for to laboure again: and thei dooe this with so greate pleasure, that although thei bee not wearie, yet thei 106 The Botanical Renaissance [cH. are very desirous for to dooe it: and the thyng is come to so muche effecte, that their maisters doeth chasten theim for it, and doe burne the Zadaco, because thei should not use it.” Twenty-seven years after the appearance of the first part of Turner's herbal, a translation of Dodoens’ work, made by Henry Lyte, appeared in England. Lyte was born about 1529, and, towards the end of the reign of Henry VIII, he became a student at Oxford. He was a man of means, addicted to travel, and his temperament seems to have been much milder and less revolutionary than that of his predecessor Turner. He did not perhaps add very greatly to the knowledge of English botany, but he did a valuable service in introducing Dodoens’ herbal into this country. His book, which was published in 1578, was professedly a translation of the French version of Dodoens’ Critydeboeck of 1554, which had been made by de I Ecluse in 1557. Lyte’s copy of this work, with copious manuscript notes, and, on the title-page, the quaint endorsement, “ Henry Lyte taught me to speake Englishe,” is preserved in the British Museum. This copy proves that Lyte was no mere mechanical translator, for the work is annotated and corrected with great care, references to de l’Obel and Turner being introduced. The title of Lyte’s book is as follows: ‘A Niewe Herball or Historie of Plantes: wherin is contayned the whole discourse and perfect description of all sortes of Herbes and Plantes: their divers and sundry kindes : their straunge Figures, Fashions, and Shapes: their Names, Natures, Operations, and Vertues: and that not onely of those which are here growyng in this our Countrie of Englande, but of all others also of forrayne Realmes, commonly used in Physicke. First set foorth in the Doutche or Almaigne tongue, by that learned D. Rembert Dodoens, Physition to the Emperour: And nowe first translated out of French into English, by Henry Lyte Esquyer. The illustrations used in the book were the same as those which had appeared in the translation by de |’Ecluse, and were for the most part copies of those in the octavo edition of Fuchs’ herbal, with some additional blocks, which had been cut specially for Dodoens. The (ee an ee ee a a TOOT Tees IV] The Herbal in England 107 result is that many of the same figures occur both in Turner and in Lyte. There are said to be 870 figures in Lyte’s herbal, of which about thirty are new. Of the latter Centaurea rhaponticum is an example (Text-fig. 53). Rha. BReub arbe, UW UY Gia ~~ fe We PRR LG ' f) 1) y 7 ov ¥ @ J a" 2a, es << = 2OSSSS ~— = Text-fig. 53. “Reubarbe”=Centaurea rhaponticum L. [Lyte, A Niewe Herball, 1578]. _ Lyte occasionally adds a criticism of his own in a different type from that used in the main body of the text. At the beginning of the book, there is a long set of doggerel verses “in commendation of this worke,” which imply that 108 The Botanical Renaissance (CH. Rembert Dodoens himself made additions to the English translation. The most important stanza is the following :— “Great was his toyle, whiche first this worke dyd frame. And so was his, whiche ventred to translate it, For when he had full finisht all the same, He minded not to adde, nor to abate it. But what he founde, he ment whole to relate it. Till Rembert he, did sende additions store. For to augment Ly/es travell past before.” We now come to John Gerard’ (Plate XII), the best known of all the English herbalists, but who, it must be confessed, scarcely deserves the fame which has fallen to his share. Gerard, a native of Cheshire, was a ‘‘ Master in Chirurgerie,” but was better known as a remarkably successful gardener. For twenty years he supervised the gardens belonging to Lord Burleigh in the Strand, and at Theobalds in Hertfordshire, besides having himself a famous garden in Holborn, then the most fashionable district of London. In 1596 he published a list of the plants which he cultivated in Holborn, which is interesting as being the first complete catalogue ever published of the contents of a single garden. Gerard’s reputation rests however on a much Jarger work, ‘The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes,’ printed by John Norton in 1597, but the manner in which this book originated does the author little credit. It seems that Norton, the publisher, had commissioned a certain Dr Priest to translate Dodoens’ final work, the ‘Pemptades’ of 1583, into English, but Priest died before the work was finished. Gerard simply adopted Priest’s translation, completed it, and published it as his own, merely altering the arrange- ment from that of Dodoens to that of de l’Obel. He adds insult to injury by gratuitously remarking, in an address to the reader at the beginning of the herbal, that “Doctor Prvest, one of our London Colledge, hath (as I heard) trans- lated the last edition of Dodoneus, which meant to publish the same; but being prevented by death, his translation likewise perished.” After the manner of the period, the herbal is embellished with a number of prefatory letters, 1 The spelling “‘Gerarde” on the title-page of ‘The Herball’ is believed to be an error. See ‘A Catalogue of Plants cultivated in the garden of John Gerard,’ edited by B. D. Jackson, London, 1876. LGM DOLL epappetose Seesenk LXE EOORRTE NSS 6: rox aea 3 SeKanneecs JOHN GERARD (i545— 1607). [The Herball, 1636.] | , Iv] The Herbal tn England 109 in one of which, written by Stephen Bredwell, a statement occurs which is so inconsistent with Gerard’s own remarks that he certainly committed an oversight in allowing it to stand! In Bredwell’s words—‘ D. Przest for his trans- lation of so much as Dodoneus, hath hereby left a tombe for his honorable sepulture. Master Gerard comming last, but not the least, hath many waies accommodated the whole worke unto our English nation.” The ‘Herball’ is a massive volume, in clear Roman type, contrasting