Medicine and Botany in the Kings and Knights’ Imprese Collected by Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo in Batallas and Quinquagenas

Abstract

Batallas y Quinquagenas, by Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo, is one of the most important device´s corpus in Spanish language of the moment. All the devices of this work are authentic, that is, they were used by kings and knights to flaunt politic, loving or religious ideals between the XVth and XVIth centuries. The topics of the devices are as varied as their owners. Nevertheless, the topics associated with medicine, zoology or botany knowledge, which are based in classical sources, are especially interesting. Undoubtedly, the devices supported on the curative or prejudicial qualities of very different elements, like garlic or emeralds, make an original and creative mosaic which reflects the way of thinking and feeling of these knights.