Early Modern Philosophy of Plants and the Unwelcome Guest: Pseudo-Aristotle’s De plantis

Especially after Julius Caesar Scaliger ruled out that De plantis (Περὶ φυτῶν) had been written by Aristotle, the fate of the treatise during the Renaissance and early modern period was sealed, as shown by Karen Reeds (1991, 19). Scholars owned and read the text. They looked at it – in particular, the section dealing with the notion of vegetative soul – as a genuine document of orthodox Aristotelianism. However, botanists were little interested in repeating or elaborating its contents. In many cases, they simply did not refer to it. Indeed, while providing a compelling philosophical Aristotelian interpretation of plants, De plantis was of little use to naturalists working on the various characteristics and functions of vegetal bodies.