Editors: Christoffer Basse Eriksen (Aarhus University) & Pamela Mackenzie (University of British Columbia)
Journal: Centaurus, Volume 65, Issue 4 (Brepols) – Open Access
Nehemiah Grew was an active member of the Royal Society during the lively period of its early years in the 1670s and 1680s, serving both as Curator for the Anatomy of Plants and as Secretary to the society. As a result of his decade producing innovative studies on plants using a microscope, he published The Anatomy of Plants in 1682, a lavishly illustrated book that was widely circulated and very influential in the decades following its publication. Yet, despite the key role Grew and his work played in determining the direction of research in these formative years of the Royal Society and its networks, Grew today remains an understudied figure in the history of science.
Available in Open Access, this special issue brings together a group of scholars, who approach Grew’s work from a variety of different perspectives. The published articles analyse Grew’s definition of vegetable life, his imperial skepticism and political economy, his use of plant collections, his imaging techniques across multiple editions and translations, his science of vegetation and his use of analogies. The afterword reflects on Grew’s “feeling for the organism.”
Contents
Introduction: The Making of The Anatomy of Plants – Christoffer Basse Eriksen & Pamela Mackenzie
From Seed to Seed: Material Activities and Vegetable Life in Grew’s Philosophy of Botany – Fabrizio Baldassarri
A Utopian Model of Order: Imperial Skepticism and Local Ecologies in Nehemiah Grew’s Political Economy of Nature – Justin Niermeier-Dohoney
Apricots, Plums, and Garden Beans: Reassembling Nehemiah Grew’s Collection of Plants – Christoffer Basse Eriksen
What is Seen in a Garden Bean: Revisions and Copies in Nehemiah Grew’s Plant Anatomy – Pamela Mackenzie
Building an Early Modern Science of Vegetation: Nehemiah Grew’s Inquiries into the Anatomy of Plants – Oana Matei
Seeing Plants as Animals: Analogical Reasoning in Nehemiah Grew’s Anatomy of Plants (1682) – Justin Begley
Nehemiah Grew and the Anatomy of Plants: The Essential Tension – Anna Marie Roos