Interpretation
Ryff’s publications on subjects ranging from anatomy and surgery to mathematics and cooking place him in the pantheon of Renaissance polymaths. According to the title, the text is accompanied by “depictions made from nature of some common herbs and their virtues and strength, burnt or distilled.” This woodcut depicts valerian root, with instructions on where to find it, how to identify it, and how to use it to ward off the plague. Ryff instructs how to hold the root in a cloth to one’s face to keep out pestilent (or miasmic) air. Herbals, as such books were called, were instrumental in teaching both lay people and physicians how to identify and use plants as health remedies in a time before modern medicine.
Information
- Title
- Kurtzs Handtbüchlin unnd Experiment vieler Artzneyen . . .
- Object Number
- L.2019.37.12
- Maker
- Walther Hermann Ryff
- Dates
- Strasbourg: 1571
- Dimensions
- 16 cm (6 5/16 in.)
- Credit Line
- Rare Book Division, Special Collections, Princeton University Library
- States of Health: Visualizing Illness and Healing (November 2, 2019 –Sunday, February 2, 2020)
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