Herbaria gallery

The are 136 herbaria exhibited in the gallery: a selection of the 800,000 items stored on the top floor in the historical herbarium which, on request, can be viewed by scholars and enthusiasts. The collections bequeathed by Prefects Bonato and Marsili are complemented by specimens collected in the Dalmatian and Balkan regions by Roberto De Visiani, the collections of Silvia Zenari, and the herbarium of the youthful Filippo de Pisis, with drawings and comments, donated in 1917 to the University of Padua. And again, the fungi of Pier Andrea Saccardo: this collection, started in 1882 with classification of the fungi species known at the time, became a herbarium of nearly 70,000 specimens from the Veneto and various other locations in the world. Finally the algae of Achille Forti, a collection enhanced by specimens of other scientists: a thousand genuses, fresh and salt water, from the Balkans to Norway. At the end of the gallery, visitors can engage with the interactive exhibit An illustrated history of botany and medicine, and see some of the books from the Vincenzo Pinali and Giovanni Marsili historic library of medicine and botany. Among the prized scientific books is a first edition of De humani corporis fabrica dated 1543. Works on plants include those with imaginary illustrations by Pseudo Apuleius — late 15th C — and based on direct observation by Leonhart Fuchs (1549), and the herbarium of Giovanni Macchion (1655).