Taxonomical Trouble in 16th-Century Medical Botany. Pietro Andrea Mattioli on Dioscorides, De materia medica

In this contribution we analyse De materia medica by Dioscorides (1 ^st cent. A.D.), which is the largest treatise on the natural substances used in medicine compiled in Antiquity, and its commented translation by the Renaissance Italian physician Pietro Andrea Mattioli (1501-1578) first published in 1544. Whereas the translation closely follows the Greek text, the commentary expanded on it by adding substances not mentioned by Dioscorides (especially plants), which were coming from either the Mediterranean or the New Worlds. These new entries interfered with the original structure of the treatise, which reflects a specific organization of the natural world, and probably accentuated the need for a new botanical taxonomy able to account for all species known at that time. On the basis of significant segments, we first reconstruct De materia medica structure, which is not explicitly explained by Dioscorides. Then, we closely analyse selected cases illustrating both the textual techniques used by Mattioli to introduce new material and their impact on De materia medica structure. This material destabilized Dioscorides’ original structure in a way that Mattioli might have perceived: in its 1562 Czech and 1563 German versions, he transformed the translation into an herbal similar to works of that time. Slightly later (1571), the botanists Pierre Pena and Matthias de Lobel opened a theoretical reflection on botanical taxonomy that might be significant of Mattioli’s deconstruction. This initial reflection was further pursued and explicitly formulated by Caspar Bauhin (1598) in his edition of Mattioli’s Complete Works . Through its line-by-line comparative textual method, our study brings to light a collateral effect of Mattioli’s work that had not been identified thus far: if it contributed to the assimilation of Dioscorides, De materia medica , into contemporary science, it also made its reading obsolete among the botanical, medical, and pharmaceutical communities of that time.