Plants, their names and uses, their tradition and display are on stage worldwide. From the District of Columbia to New York and the Alhambra, from Renaissance to the most advanced DNA laboratories, and from Byzantium to the 21st century. Here is our selection.
The exhibition Spanish Paradise: Gardens of the Alhambra, which opened on May 21 and will be on display until August 21, 2011, features flowing fountains, elegant arches, and a broad palette of Mediterranean plants anchored by date palms, pomegranate trees, Italian cypress, and more--all within the Victorian elegance of the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory at The New York Botanical Gardens, Bronx, NY.
In August, the International Society for Byzantine Studies will open its doors in Sofia (Bulgaria). The five day program (August 22-27, 2011) of the Byzantine Studies Conference will illustrate all the facets of the Byzantine world, which is far from being a Dark Ages, and certainly not in the field of medicine.
A neighbor of Byzantium, the Arabic world, is on stage in Los Angeles, CA, at the California Science Center. 1001 Inventions: Discover the Golden Age of the Muslim Civilization is an encyclopedia of the work performed by the many scientists in the Arabic world, who took advantage of the Greek, Indian, and Persian legacy, and enriched it with their own experiments, discoveries and other inventions. More than anything else, the exhibition, which will be opened through December 31, 2011, engages the visitors in an interactive experience thanks to many reconstructions of ancient scientific instruments.
The US Botanic Gardens in Washington, D.C., presents through October 13, 2011 a garden exhibition on the Conservatory Terrace where scientists explain how they assign scientific names to the world’s flora, estimated at about 300,000 species, and how such names can guide plant admirers in understanding relationships between botanical species. The title of the exhibition may be misleading: Green Genes: Mapping the Plant World.
Historians of medicine will explore the theme of Public Health, Private Healers at the 12th Biennial Conference of the Australian and New Zealand Society for the History of Medicine (ANZSHM) in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia in July 12-15, 2011.
Mark your calendar: in 2012, the Renaissance will be celebrated in Washington, D.C., during the conference of the Renaissance Society of America, which will be held March 22-24, 2012. The Institute will be present with a session on Renaissance herbals.
Ethnobotanists, ethnopharmacists and ethnobiologists from all over the world will convene in Montpellier (France) for the 13th Congress of the International Society of Ethnobiology, in May 21-25, 2012 organized by the Center for Functional and Evolutionary Ecology (CEFE).
Last, but far from least, the International Association for the History of Nephrology will hold its 8th bi-annual congress on September 20-22, 2012, in one of the cities of the Magna Graecia: Paestum, Italy. As usual, it will award the Eva Maria Kinne Saffran Lecture to a young promising medical historian. IPMT Scientific Director Alain Touwaide will chair the Selection Committee and will be happy to receive nominations at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
