About Anne Pratt

FP Plate24 Nasturtium

The scientific spirit of the nineteenth century, to observe and to classify, led to a spate of botanical illustrators, mainly women, who sought to convey the results of scientific work to a wider audience.

The most prolific among these was Anne Pratt, who produced over 20 books, many running to several editions.  Her magnum opus, The Flowering Plants, Grasses, Sedges, and Ferns of Great Britain (1865), contains 319 meticulously drawn and beautiful coloured plates, and gives detailed botanical descriptions of about 1500 species.

Due to poor health as a child she learn't to draw, and when a friend of the family, Dr Dodds, introduced her to botany she became enthralled by the variety and beauty of flowers.  Because of her frail health, these were collected by her sister Catherine; an early painting shows her looking at pressed plants in a personal herbarium.

FP Plate 39 Campion