Hummatu Datura stramonium

Flowers, leafs and fruit of the Hummatu plant were used for their hallucinogenic properties. This image is from the Hortus Indicus Malabaricus.

The 12 volume Hortus Malabaricus compiled by Hendrick Adrian van Rheede, published in Amsterdam from 1678-1693 is a classic of pre-Linnean botany. The inspiration for the compilation was the thriving botanical medical tradition of Malabar and the need for new medicines by the Dutch colonists combined with van Rheede’s own scholarly interests. The volumes are also remarkable because Van Rheede, in no uncertain terms, acknowledges the sources of the knowledge documented in this work, which was unusual for the majority of the European works on Indian Botanical medical knowledge systems.

A “board committee had been brought together from various parts of Malabar” with the help of regional rajas, and these Malabar scholars provided the information on the medicinal properties of 742 plants, 691 species. The volumes were prepared in Malabar, with 791 double folio illustrations, of specimens correctly identified by the Malabar practitioners and “three or four painters at once accurately depicted living plants readily brought by collectors.” It is notable that the illustrations, drawn in Malabar and reproduced as copper plate engravings are identified with regional Malayalam names written in Malayalam, Arabic, Roman, and Nagari scripts. The Hortus Malabaricus was a key source for Carl Linnaeus on Asian plants (see Such Treasure and Rich Merchandize) in his important botanical classification work, Species Plantarum.