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Lot Essay
Rembertus Dodonaeus is the latinized name of Rembert Dodoens (born Rembert Doedesz Joenckema in 1517). Working as 'city physician' of the Flemish town Malines, he became court-physician to Holy Roman emperor Maximilian II and his son Rudolf II. In 1582 Dodoens was appointed professor of Medicine and Pharmacologie/Botany at Leiden University. Dodoens died in 1585.
The present lot is the last and most complete edition of Dodoens important botanical publication. The first edition dating from 1556 was continuously reworked and revised at the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th century. With the discovery of the Americas botanical knowledge grew, the 1618 edition, edited by Joost van Ravelingen, was added with circa 14 woodcuts of new species and corrections to the text were made. The present lot incorporates all the revised and additional material including the chapter on American plants from the 1608 edition and plants and drugs of the West and East Indies from the 1618 edition. Research by Museum Plantin-Moretus in Antwerp, made clear 1250 copies of the 1644 Cruydt-Boeck were printed on 'normal paper' and 250 copies were made on 'luxury paper'. The books were sold to booksellers for fifteen and twenty-one guilders (the average wage of a craftsman was circa five to ten guilders a year!). Nevertheless the 1644 issue was sold completely short after.
The present lot is the last and most complete edition of Dodoens important botanical publication. The first edition dating from 1556 was continuously reworked and revised at the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th century. With the discovery of the Americas botanical knowledge grew, the 1618 edition, edited by Joost van Ravelingen, was added with circa 14 woodcuts of new species and corrections to the text were made. The present lot incorporates all the revised and additional material including the chapter on American plants from the 1608 edition and plants and drugs of the West and East Indies from the 1618 edition. Research by Museum Plantin-Moretus in Antwerp, made clear 1250 copies of the 1644 Cruydt-Boeck were printed on 'normal paper' and 250 copies were made on 'luxury paper'. The books were sold to booksellers for fifteen and twenty-one guilders (the average wage of a craftsman was circa five to ten guilders a year!). Nevertheless the 1644 issue was sold completely short after.