1612 DODONAEUS, R. - Cruydt-Boeck van Remberus Dodonaeus. . .

Scarce, the last edition of Dodoens' Cruydt-Boeck, one of the most influential and important botanical works of the 16th and 17th centuries.

With richly engraved frontispiece with a view into a fine garden seen through an architectural gate richly decorated with fruits and plants and Moses and Aron. The first 4 text pages of the first book are replaced by pages in manuscript.

The Cruydt-Boeck , not to be confused with the Cruydeboeck first published in 1554, was a translation in Dutch of the Stirpium Historiae Pemptades Sex, Libri XXX , first published by Plantin at Antwerp in 1583. The Stirpium represents Dodonaeus' best and last great work: a monumental botanical study, divided into 6 large sections, each containing 5 books, with classification of the plants in 26 groups, which was far superior to all his former classifications.

To this translation, Joost van Ravelingen, the translator, added considerably. After each chapter, he inserted, in smaller print, additional information on the virtue of the plant taken from the Cruydeboeck if not present in the Stirpium , and new information or descriptions of new plants taken from the work of other authors, like C. Clusius, Math. de Lobel, etc.

At the end Joost van Ravelingen added a whole new part on exotic plants taken from the works of Clusius, Garcia da Orta (Horta, or de la Huerta), Nic. Monardès, Chr. Acosta, etc. The woodcut illustrations are for the greater part the same as in the Stirpium , the woodblocks evidently having been taken over by the Plantin House at Leyden, but there were several alterations made and some replacements, while 25 new woodcuts of new plants were added, not counting the 52 new woodcuts in the extra supplement on exotic plants. Rembert Dodoens, Latin Dodonaeus (Malines 1517-1585), was the first great botanist of the Netherlands.

In 1659 Zacharias Wagenaer presented to the Bakufu an edition of this work after which it was translated and re-translated for some two centuries. The book was revised and enlarged by an unknown editor after a copy annotated by Joost van Ravelingen, who died in 1608, and contains a number of newly cut illustrations. The preface and the identifications of the plants (except for those in the last part) are printed in a handsome 'civilité type. The last two leaves reinforced, little browning a very good copy stamp on verso of title.

Due to Dutch presence; Japan learned many aspects of the scientific and technological revolution occurring in Europe at that time, helping the country build up the beginnings of a theoretical and technological scientific base, which helps to explain Japan's success in its radical and speedy modernization following the opening of the country to foreign trade in 1854.

Rangaku, literally "Dutch Learning", and by extension "Western learning") is a body of knowledge developed by Japan through its contacts with the Dutch enclave of Dejima.

• More items relating to the Dutch in Japan and Rangaku

Reference: Bibl.Belgica, D 121, Nissen 518, Pritzel 2345, Stafleu 1492.