A student of Aristotle, Theophrastus succeeded his teacher as head of the Athens Peripatetic School. This is the earliest work of scientific botany, a subject not addressed in any of the writings of Aristotle. Theophrastus collated and systematized the existing botanical knowledge and described about 500 plants. His system of botanical classification was analogous to the zoological system in Aristotle’s Historia animalium. Part of the book is devoted to plant-lore and the gathering of drugs for medicinal purposes. Theophrastus noted the principle of drug tolerance, observing that the power of a drug taken over a long period diminishes in people who become accustomed to taking it. He was also aware of individual differences in assimilation.

 First edition in Greek in Aristotle, [Opera omnia], Venice, Aldus Manutius, 1495-98. ISTC No. it00155000. Digital facsimile of the 1483 edition from the Bayerische StaatsBibliothek at this link.

Between November 1495 and June 1498 scholar printer Aldus Manutius (Teobaldo Mannucci) of Venice issued the first edition in the original Greek of Aristotle's Opera omnia. The set appeared in five thick quarto or small folio volumes, often bound in six. Assembling all of the texts was a major challenge for Aldus and his associates, requiring the help of scholars in different countries, and yet during the publication process Greek texts of both the Poetics and On Rhetoric, remained elusive, so they were excluded from the set. The editio princeps of Aristotle appeared at the close of a century that had witnessed a strong revival in Greek and humanistic studies; it was the first major Greek prose text, or collection of texts, to be reintroduced to the Western world in its original language by means of the printing press, and its success launched Aldus's efforts to produce further editiones principes of other Greek authors. In addition to the Aristotelian works, the five volumes contained works by Aristotle's successor, the botanist Theophrastus, the commentator on Aristotle, Alexander of Aphrodisias, the neo-Platonic philosopher Porphyrius, and Philo of Alexandria (Philo Judaeus) along with the spurious De historia philosophia attributed to Galen. ISTC No.: ia00959000. Digital facsimiles of the whole set are available from the Bayerische StaatsBibliothek, vol. 1 at this link.

Digital facsimile from the Internet Archive at this link.