The Medieval Flower Book

by Celia Fisher

In this charming book, Celia Fisher explores the beautiful flower illustration in medieval herbals and manuscripts, illustrating around 140 different flowers and plants in glorious full color. Many of the illustrations come from herbals, in which plants began to be depicted with realism by artists in the 14th century. But in the 15th century a different kind of flower illustration emerged in the margins of illuminated manuscripts. From around 1480, flowers became the dominant feature of the decorative borders of Books of Hours created in the southern Netherlands. The wonderfully innovative style showed the flowers as if they had been plucked from their stems and scattered onto the page where they cast little trompe l'oeil shadows as if they were indeed three-dimensional. Flower lovers and those interested in medieval art and history will find this richly illustrated book informative, entertaining and, above all, a joy to behold.

Genres: History, Reference, Nonfiction

144 pages, Hardcover

First published February 4, 2007

Reviews

[Marti Martinson]

Richly illustrated and enlightening text. Bocaccio, Chaucer, Dante, and breviaries, books of hours.....neat history.

[Eliza Day]

Quite interesting, discusses flower origins, their appearance in manuscripts and their medicinal uses.

[Carlotta]

I really enjoyed this small book, on medieval plants and the uses/stories on them. A pleasant thing to read in the summer ^_^

[Penny Kennard]

Beautiful book, picked up from library, may need to buy a copy as its the sort of book you want to reference again and again