Three prints of the photographs of palm trees taken by the illustrious Florentine botanist Odoardo Beccari and the volume "Dissertatio de generatione et metamorphosibus insectorum Surinamensium ..." by the German naturalist and painter Maria Sibylla Merian are exhibited in Parma, at the Palazzo del Governatore, at the exhibition "Impronte. Noi e le piante".
The prints portray samples of 3 species of Asian palms of the genus Daemonorops photographed by Beccari during his travels in south-east Asia and were published in volume 12 of the "Annals of the Royal Botanic Garden, Calcutta" (1911).
Merian's volume, a 1726 reprint of the first edition of 1705, is illustrated with drawings of caterpillars, butterflies and other insects on flowers and plants, taken from life by the author herself during her journey to Suriname.
The documents were loaned by the Sciences Library to the University of Parma, organizer of the exhibition, and come respectively from the Botany section and that of Sciences Campus of Sesto Fiorentino.
