Botanical wall charts

Botanical wall charts used to be part of the equipment of every school. In addition to collecting their own herbarium, the schoolchildren learned about plants from artfully painted charts. There are dozens of old botanical wall charts in our chart collection. They were produced especially by German companies, for example, the first two charts were made by Verlag von Friedrich Vieweg & Sohn.

juniper (Juniperus communis) and yew (Taxus baccata)

Veronica chamaedrys

sun flower (Helianthus annuus)

But there were other companies involved in the business. The following charts were painted by Albert Peter and published by Verlagsbuchhandlung Paul Parey, Berlin.

This wall chart presents the typical characteristics of the Euphorbiaceae family.

Correspondingly, this wall chart presents the family of aroids (Araceae). However, modern taxonomy places Acorus calamus shown on the right in its own family Acoraceae.

The former taxonomic status of the family Asclepiadaceae has also changed. Today it is classified as part of the family Apocynaceae.

Family Bromeliaceae.

Botanical wall charts were not only used for teaching taxonomy and plant systematics, but were also used to teach plant anatomy. The following three plant anatomy wall charts were produced by the German Wilhelm Ahles.

The following wall chart from the middle of the 19th century shows different calyxes of flowers. Like the previous ones, this is a German production, this time published by Farbendruck und Verlag von C. C. Meinhold & Söhne, Dresden.