An Interactive Annotated World Bibliography of Printed and Digital Works in the History of Medicine and the Life Sciences from Circa 2000 BCE to 2022 by Fielding H. Garrison (1870-1935), Leslie T. Morton (1907-2004), and Jeremy M. Norman (1945- ) Traditionally Known as “Garrison-Morton”

15959 entries, 13943 authors and 1935 subjects. Updated: March 1, 2024

DIOSCORIDES, Pedanius [Πεδάνιος Διοσκουρίδης]

18 entries
  • 6816

Vienna Dioscorides. Codex Vindobonensis Med. Gr. 1.

Istanbul (Constantinople), circa 512.

The oldest surviving copy of Pedanius Dioscorides's treatise on medical botany and pharmacology, De materia medica, is an illuminated Byzantine manuscript produced about 512 CE. Dioscorides, a Greek physician, who may have served in the Roman army, wrote De materia medica in the first century CE.

"Presented in appreciation for her patronage in the construction of a district church in Constantinople, the parchment codex comprises 491 folios (or almost a thousand pages) and almost four hundred color illustrations, each occupying a full page facing a description of the plant's pharmacological properties. . . .

"In the Anicia codex, the chapter entries of De Materia Medica have been rearranged, the plants alphabetized and their descriptions augmented with observations from Galen and Crateuas (Krateuas), whose own herbal probably had been illustrated. Five supplemental texts also were appended, including paraphrases of the Theriaca and Alexipharmaca of Nicander and the Ornithiaca of Dionysius of Philadelphia (first century AD), which describes more than forty Mediterranean birds, including one sea bird shown with its wings both folded and open" (http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/aconite/materiamedica.htmlOffsite Link, accessed 11-22-2008)

The Anicia Juliana codex also contains the earliest illustrated treatise on ornithology. It is one of the earliest surviving relatively complete codices of a scientific or medical text, one of the earliest relatively complete illustrated codices on any medical or scientific subject, and arguably the most beautiful of the earliest surviving scientific codices. It also contains what are probably the earliest surviving portraits of scientists or physicians in a manuscript. See Singer, Charles. "The herbal in antiquity and its transmission to later ages, " J. Hellen. Stud. 47 (1927) 1-52. For further details about this manuscript see the entry at HistoryofInformation.com at this link.



Subjects: ANCIENT MEDICINE › Roman Empire, BOTANY, BYZANTINE MEDICINE, NATURAL HISTORY › Late Antiquity, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines, ZOOLOGY › Illustration, ZOOLOGY › Ornithology
  • 6934

De materia medica. Ed: Petrus de Abano. Comm: Petrus de Abano.

Colle di Val d'Elsa, Italy: Johannes de Medemblick, 1478.

The first printed edition of Dioscorides, translator unidentified. A Greek physician from Anazarbus in Cilicia (now Turkey), Dioscorides traveled to the Greek mainland, to Crete, Egypt and Petra. He is believed to have served in the army of the emperor Nero, and may have practiced in Rome in the first century CE. His work, which was of great practical medicinal value, remained in circulation throughout the Middle Ages, in Latin, Greek, and Arabic versions, and was often supplemented with commentary and additions from Arabic and Indian sources. The text which Medemblick published in print was a medieval Latin translation, reworked into alphabetical order, with commentary by the thirteenth century professor of medicine at Padua, Pietro d' Abano. ISTC No. id00261000. Digital facsimile from the Bayerisches Staatsbibliothek at this link.



Subjects: ANCIENT MEDICINE › Roman Empire, BOTANY, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines
  • 2069

Dioscorides, De materia medica [Greek]. Add: Pseudo- Dioscorides, De venenis, De venenatis animalibus [Greek]; Add: Nicander, Theriaca; Add: Alexipharmaca; Scholia [Greek].

Venice: Aldus Manutius, 1499.

Nicander was a Greek poet and physician. His Theriaca, in 958 hexameters, dealt with the symptoms and treatment of poisoning by the bites of poisonous animals; the Alexipharmaca considered intoxications through animal, vegetable, and mineral poisoning, and their suitable antidotes. Nicander was also the first writer to mention the medicinal use of the leech. The above work has a Greek text, and is one of the few medical incunabula issued by Aldus Manutius of Venice. A Latin translation appeared at Cologne in 1531. See Nicander: The Poems and Poetical Fragments edited by A. S. F. Gow and A. F. Scholfield.(Cambridge, 1953), and also P. K. Knoefel & M. C. Covi, A Hellenistic Treatise on Poisonous Animals (The "Theriaca" of Nicander of Colophon): A Contribution to the History of Toxicology (1991).

Nicander's works were first published in print by Aldus Manutius together with the first edition in Greek of Dioscorides, De materia medica, and two works on venoms by "Pseudo Dioscorides" ISTC No: id00260000. Digital facsimile from Bayerisches Staatsbibliothek at this link



Subjects: ANCIENT MEDICINE › Greece, ANCIENT MEDICINE › Hellenistic, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines, THERAPEUTICS › Bloodletting, TOXICOLOGY, TOXICOLOGY › Venoms, TOXICOLOGY › Zootoxicology
  • 7820

Di Pedacio Dioscoride Anazarbeo Libri cinque della historia, et materia medicinale tradotti in lingua volgare italiana da M. Pietro Andrea Matthiolo Sanese Medico, con amplissimi discorsi, et comenti, et dottissime annotationi, et censure del medesimo interprete.

Venice: Nicolo de Bascarini, 1544.

Mattioli's translation and commentary on Dioscorides provided much new botanical information. As Mattioli continued to expand the commentary, adding new botanical and pharmacological information, through editions in Latin, the images of plants that the work contained also increased both in number and in size and quality, the largest and finest images appearing in the edition of Venice, 1565. Digital facsimile of the 1565 edition from the Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.



Subjects: BOTANY, BOTANY › Botanical Illustration, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines
  • 13125

Acerca de la materia medicinal, y de los venenos mortiferos, traduzido de lengua griege, en la vulgar castellana, & illustrado con claras y substantiales annotationes, y con las figuras de innumeras plantas exquisitas y raras, por el Doctor Andres de Laguna....

Antwerp: En casa de Juan Latio, 1555.

Laguna' translation of Dioscorides into Spanish included commentaries and additions that double the original text. It included very beautiful botanical woodcuts of plants and animals, and is considered one of the best and most faithful renditions of Dioscorides' work into a modern language.



Subjects: BOTANY › Medical Botany, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines
  • 1814

In hoc volumine continentur Valerii Cordi ... Annotationes in Pedacii Dioscoridis Anazarbei De medica materia libros V : longè aliae quàm ante hac sunt evulgatae. Ejusdem Val. Cordi Historiae stirpium Lib. IIII. posthumi, nunc primùm in lucem editi, adjectis etiam stirpium iconibus, & brevissimus annotatiunculis. Sylva, qua rerum fossilium in Germania plurimarum, metallorum, lapidum & stirpium aliquot rariorum notitiam brevissimè persequitur, nunquam hactenus visa. De artificiosis extractionibus liber. Compositiones medicinales aliquot, non vulgares. His accedunt Stocc-Hornii et Nessi in Bernatium Helvetiorum ditione montium, & nascentium in eis stirpium, descriptio Benedicti Aretii ... Item Conradi Gesneri De hortus Germaniae, liber recens, unà cum descriptione tulipae turcarum, chamaecerasi montani, chamaemespili, chamaenerii, & conozoidis ... Omnia summa studio atque industria ... Conr. Gesneri ... collecta, & praefationibus illustrata.

Strasbourg, France: excud. I. Rihelius, 1561.

This work not only updated the species listed by Dioscorides, but also listed about 500 new species of plants. Published posthumously, the work was carefully edited by Conrad Gesner.  

Cordus was the inventor of phytography and the discoverer of ethyl (sulphuric) ether. Digital facsimile from the Biodiversity Heritage Library at this link.



Subjects: ANESTHESIA › Ether, BOTANY › Phytography, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines
  • 1786

De materia medica. Edidit Max Wellmann. 3 vols.

Berlin: Weidmann, 19061914.

Dioscorides’ work is the authoritative source on the materia medica of antiquity. He described over 600 plants and plant principles. The above edition by Wellman is the definitive Greek text. It also contains the Fragmenta of Krateuas. 

 



Subjects: ANCIENT MEDICINE › Roman Empire, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines
  • 8564

The Greek herbal of Dioscorides, illustrated by a Byzantine, A.D. 512; Englished by John Goodyer, A.D. 1655; edited and first printed, A.D. 1933, by Robert T. Gunther ... with three hundred and ninety-six illustrations.

Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1934.

Goodyer's translation is considered more of a paraphrase than a translation.



Subjects: ANCIENT MEDICINE › Roman Empire, PHARMACOLOGY › History of Pharmacology & Pharmaceuticals, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines › History of Materia Medica
  • 9245

La "Materia médica" de Dioscórides: Transmisión medieval y renacentista by César E. Dubler. Vol. I: La transmisión medieval y renacentista y la supervivencia en la medicina popular moderna de la "Materia médica" de Dioscórides, estudiada particularmente en España y África del Norte. Vol. 2: La versión árabe de la 'Materia Médica' de Dioscórides (texto, variantes e indices): estudio de la transcripción de los nombres griegos al árabe y comparación de las versiones griega, árabe y castellana. Vol. 3: La "Materia médica" de Dioscórides traducida y comentada por D. Andrés de Laguna (Texto crítico). Vol. 4: D. Andrés de Laguna y su época. Vol. 5: Glosario médico castellano del siglo XVI. Prólogo de Gregorio Marañón. Vol. 6: Indices generales y léxico especial de Andrés de Laguna.

Barcelona: Tipografia Emporium, 19531959.


Subjects: PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines › History of Materia Medica
  • 12177

Pflanzen, Wurzeln, Säfte, Samen. Antike Heilkunst in Miniaturen des Wiener Dioskurides.

Graz, Austria: Akademische Druck-und Verlag-Anstalt, 1981.


Subjects: BYZANTINE MEDICINE › History of Byzantine Medicine, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines › History of Materia Medica
  • 9244

The Arabic materia medica of Dioscorides.

St-Jean-Chrysostome (Québec): Les Editions du Sphinx, 1983.


Subjects: MEDIEVAL MEDICINE › Medieval Islamic or Arab Medicine, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines › History of Materia Medica
  • 12521

Die Dioskurides-Erklärung des Ibn-al-Baitār: Ein Beitrag zur arabischen Pfanzensynonymik des Mittelalters. Edited and translated by Albert Dietrich. (Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Göttingen, phil.-hist. Kl., fol. 3, no. 191).

Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1991.


Subjects: BOTANY › Medical Botany, MEDIEVAL MEDICINE › Medieval Islamic or Arab Medicine
  • 11943

Farmacopea araba medievale. Codice Ayasofia 3703. Edited by Alain Touwaide. 4 vols.

Milan: Antea Edizioni, 19921993.

Iconographic reconstruction and original size facsimile in color of 127 sheets, including 97 preserved in Istanbul and 30 sheets dispersed in different institutional collections in Europe and the U.S., of this illuminated manuscript of the Arabic text of Dioscorides that was completed in 1224 in Baghdad, and preserved in Byzantium. For each plate Touwaide provided a commentary. He also provided an historical introduction in the first volume. 



Subjects: MEDIEVAL MEDICINE › Medieval Islamic or Arab Medicine, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines
  • 12522

Die Erganzung Ibn Gulgul's zur Materia Medica des Dioskurides: Arabischer Text nebst kommentierter deutscher Ubersetzung herausgegeben von Albert Dietrich.

Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1993.


Subjects: ISLAMIC OR ARAB MEDICINE, MEDIEVAL MEDICINE › Medieval Islamic or Arab Medicine, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines
  • 8565

Dioscorides: De Materia Medica, being an herbal with many other medicinal materials, written in Greek in the first century of the common era. A new indexed version in Modern English by Tess Anne Osbaldeston and Robert P. A Wood.

Johannesburg: Ibidis Press, 2000.

Rather than a new translation from the Greek, this is a updated and usefully indexed version, in modern English, of Goodyer's paraphrase from the 17th century. See No. 8564.



Subjects: ANCIENT MEDICINE › Roman Empire, BOTANY › Medical Botany, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines
  • 8566

Pedanius Dioscorides of Anazarbus, De materia medica. Translated by Lily Y. Beck. (Altertumswissenschaftliche Texte und Studien, vol. 38).

Hildesheim-Zurich-New York: Olms-Weidmann, 2005.

A new English translation, directly from the Greek text edited by Wellmann, and thoroughly indexed.



Subjects: ANCIENT MEDICINE › Roman Empire, BOTANY › Medical Botany, PHARMACOLOGY, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines
  • 10908

De materia medica. Il Discoride di Napoli (Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli - Ms ex-Vindobonense Greco 1, VI-VII sec d. C. 2 vols.

Sansepolcro: Aboca Museum Edizioni, 2013.

Translation into Italian of the text of the Naples Dioscorides, a 6-7th century illustrated manuscript. With color facsimiles of the original paintings in the manuscript, 243 modern drawings in color.  Foreword by Mauro Giancaspro and Valentino Mercati. Essays by Paolo Caputo, Paolo De Luca, Roberto De Lucia, Roberto Romano and Manuela De Matteis Tortora, Hans Walter Lack, Pietro Baraldi, Paolo Bensi and Alessandro Menghini. Afterword by Alain Touwaide. 243 Modern botanical images by Luca Massenzio Palermo.



Subjects: BOTANY, BOTANY › Botanical Illustration, BOTANY › Medical Botany, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines
  • 10909

A database for three Dioscoridean illustrated herbals.

HortScience, 49, 977-979, 2014.

"Abstract. An image database was developed for three illustrated recensions of the nonillustrated manuscript of Dioscorides entitled ... (De Materia Medica in Latin; On Medical Matters in English) written in approximately Year 65: Juliana Anicia Codex (JAC) or Codex Vindobonensis produced in Year 512, Codex Neapolitanus (NAP) produced in the late sixth or early seventh century, and Morgan 652 (M652) produced between 927 and 985. The database that brings up images and accompanying records is searchable by herbal, common name in English and Greek (Roman alphabet), binomial (current and in source document), and botanical family. In addition, a Venn diagram of images in the three herbals permits a search for images that are common or unique among the three herbals. The database makes it possible to locate images in herbals written in Greek that are difficult to access and will be useful to horticulturists and herbal scholars." The database is available at: https://www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/pdfs/herbal-database-hortsci-v49-2014.pdf

 



Subjects: BOTANY › Botanical Illustration, BOTANY › History of Botany, BOTANY › Medical Botany, DIGITAL RESOURCES, PHARMACOLOGY › History of Pharmacology & Pharmaceuticals, PHARMACOLOGY › PHARMACEUTICALS › Materia medica / Herbals / Herbal Medicines › History of Materia Medica, WOMEN, Publications by › Years 2000 -