Cordus, Valerius

German Botanist 1515-1544

Valerius Cordus was an early sixteenth-century German botanist who advanced the study of pharmacology by studying botany in a newly observant way. Born in 1515 as the son of botanist Euricus Cordus, Valerius Cordus was introduced to botany at an early age. He trained with his father and with an uncle who was an apothecary (druggist). In the early 1500s, plants were the main source of medicines used to treat human ailments, and the study of medicine required knowledge of botany. Cordus not only learned botany rapidly from his family, but made brilliant botanical observations of his own. He received his bachelor's degree at the age of sixteen in Marburg, Germany, and went on to study at Wittenberg University. He gave several lectures and wrote a number of important works that were published afterhis death. Unfortunately, Cordus died of fever in Italy in 1544 at the age of twenty-nine.

By the time of his death, Cordus was already well respected, known for his inventiveness in teaching botany. Rather than relying on just the standard botany in older texts, he made a point of lecturing using examples from his own fieldwork. It was his keen attention to detail in the field that allowed Cordus to write one of the first systematic accounts of herbal and botanical knowledge. Regarding herbals, Cordus gave each plant a full and clear description so that it might be identified without the use of illustrations. He followed a pattern in his descriptions, which was not often the case with other herbals at that time. He included information about the plant stems and leaf arrangements, the structure of the flowers and the time of flowering, and details about the fruits of the plants—and was able to do this despite a lack of descriptive botanical terminology. Cordus included details about the number and types of parts in the flowers and tried to give information about the appearance, smell, and taste of the plants, as well as where they might be found, in an attempt to minimize confusion and mistakes in naming and using herbs at the time. He included information in his works about the ways to derive medicines from the plants he described. After his death, his text became the standard for pharmacy in Germany.

Cordus's attention to detail helped him make great strides in plant taxonomy. Many of his observations and techniques anticipated work done hundreds of years later. Using flower parts to describe and classify plants is still an important taxonomic technique.

Candolle, Augustin De; Medicinal Plants.

Morton, A. G. History of Botanical Science. New York: Academic Press, 1981.

Reed, H. S. A Short History of the Plant Sciences. New York: Ronald Press Company, 1942.

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