WHAT IS BOTANY?
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Botany, a Greek word meaning “herb,” was initially concerned with the study of plants as food. In early times, primitive medicine men and witch doctors were the first to specialize in the study of botany. They needed to identify plants that could cure or kill people. Botany was closely linked with medicine for hundreds of years.
In the sixteenth century, people began to observe plants and write books about their observations. These writers were the “fathers” of modern botany. In the nineteenth century, the work of English scientist Charles Darwin helped botanists gain a better understanding of how plants, as well as animals, evolved from simpler ancestors. His work led botanists to establish specific branches of botany.
One of these branches is “plant anatomy,” which deals with the structure of plants and how they might be related. Experiments on plant heredity were carried out to find out how various species came to be and how they could be improved. This study is called “genetics.”
“Ecology,” another branch of botany, deals with the distribution of plants throughout the world to find out why certain species grow in specific places. “Paleobotany,” another branch, works out plant evolution from the evidence of fossil remains.
Other branches of botany include “plant physiology,” which studies the way plants breathe and make food, and “plant pathology,” which is concerned with the study of plant diseases.
