Gardoni Herbarium part 2

Some proposals found in newspapers ads might sound bizarre to contemporary people. The list is endless: miraculous arsenic-ferruginous water, ferrate proteins, iodized horseradish syrup replacing cod liver oil, citron water against seasickness, potassium iodide depurative pills, bronchitis pine syrup, secret recipes of biscuits that cure every disease, watermelon ointments and finally also psychic sleepwalkers are suggested.

Labdanum – an oil-rich resin extracted from Cistus creticus in the Aegean Sea - is still one of the main fixatives in perfumery. Gardoni uses it in medicine for external use as a resolving drug and for internal use as a tonic and astringent. The presence of labdanum testifies to his exchanges with distant suppliers and to foreign contacts as to complete his collection. Gardoni has decorated the card with a sort of decoupage illustrating the original plant.

Some folders contain illustrations drawn in pencil or with Indian ink, in black and white or with watercolors, prints and woodcuts taken from different books or handmade, with the purpose of providing a reference in case of lacking of the plant specimen. Some folders have been watercolored later, perhaps by Gardoni himself.

Raccoglitore bramoso, catalogatore improvvisato, esperito speziale, botanico appassionato, accumulatore compulsivo: Luigi Gardoni non era solo questo. Ogni tanto lo coglieva il suo spirito di esteta, con l’obiettivo di trasmettere bellezza e di condividere l’amore per le specie a lui più care. Lo testimonia la camicia dedicata alla Viola, in cui fiori perfettamente essiccati e conservati nei cromatismi originali creano una griglia geometricamente precisa e un vero e proprio quadro.

His taste and aspiration to beauty can be found in certain arrangements in which he fixes on fine paper some specimens dried in a much more refined way than others, through the use of precious strips in pure gold. The result is such that at first glance they might be confused with beautiful naturalistic illustrations.

The vegetable specimens belonging to the category of the so-called "drugs" cannot be stored between two sheets of paper because of their larger size. These materials are well known to those who practice the profession of pharmacist. For their storage Luigi Gardoni makes use of wooden boxes that transform the exsiccata into an open book, both figuratively and literally.

In that time the themes of communication are the same as today: the purity of materials, the effectiveness explained through accreditation and emulation, little distinction between symptoms and causes. In modern pharmacies mustard is no longer present in pharmaceutical equipment: as a result of repeated applications, a high quantity of mustard is needed to observe a tangible effect, so new drugs and more effective remedies have replaced this product.

So Gardoni describes with ease the outing during which he collected a plant in the area of Castelguelfo near Parma, while noting its rarity. In recent years, new measures have been taken to safeguard the wild flora, establishing a list of rare species to be protected throughout the country, by forbidding their collection. Gardoni would be happy to know that the plant he was so proud of is not on the list.

Among the diverse collections stored at the School of Botany in the Botanic Garden stand out the herbaria of other illustrious scholars, such as Giorgio Jan’s. Eager to acquire as many species as possible, Luigi Gardoni sometimes goes to remove the plants of his interest directly from these scientific herbaria such as that of Jan. Other times he rather inserts tags as a reminder.

We find frequent mentions of doctor Giuseppe Riva di Montese, presumably a friend of his. The professional profile of the two experts is profoundly different: a chemist engaged in an impressive work and a botanist who takes note of the collection date and place of each specimen with a more scientific approach. His data collection activity takes place between 1875 and 1879 in the territories of the Emilian Apennines. It is therefore assumed that he works in place of Gardoni himself, presumably no longer able to herbalise on-site.