Smithsonian Catalog of Botanical Illustrations Feel the need for a touch of spring? The Smithsonian offers five hundred images (created by eleven artists) from its vast collection of botanical illustrations. Check out the images in the Curtis Botanical Magazine (1787-1807). For more wide-ranging overviews, try the Scientific Illustrators (1600-present); the Missouri Botanical Garden Library (digitized copies of 46 rare books); this special exhibition at the University of Delaware (general survey); and Haley & Steele (women artists of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries). Julene Sodt provides an extensive bibliography.
posted by thomas j wise on Mar 8, 2004 - 2 comments

The Missouri Botanical Garden Library has scanned and posted 46 volumes of its rare book collection. 16,133 pages and 2,050 beautiful illustrations are currently available.
As an example, see this engraving of a foxglove by Pierre Vallet from 1608.
posted by thatwhichfalls on Dec 22, 2003 - 7 comments