Captions: 1.The Botanical building of Sapienza University in an old photo (1938). In the frame the location of the HerbariumMuseum. 2. The plan of the Herbarium Museum. 3.A herbarium specimen with its label.
The Herbarium Museum and Botanical Garden
The Herbarium Museum of Sapienza University of Rome (identified by RO)stores approximately a million specimens and is Italy's second most important Herbarium. The origin of the collections dates back to 1872,when Giuseppe De Notaris contributed withhis own personal collections and acquired pre-existing collections. At that time, the Botanic Institute was located inside the San Lorenzo convent in Panisperna (Rome).
From 1938, the year of the inauguration of the University City, the collections were relocated in what is now the site of the Environmental Biology Department. The current set-up was completed in 2006/2007 following works for hall air conditioning for conservation purposes.
A herbarium is a collection of flattened and dried plants, arranged in accordance with scientific methods and purposes. Specimens are archived in packs and placed in cupboards. Cataloguing is based on taxonomic ranks of family, genus and species.
According to international criteria, a herbarium specimen consists of a piece of heavy paper on which previously flattened and dried specimens (or parts of them) of the same species and population are arranged and fastenedon. A label (or tag) is placed on each sheet containing information on: location, environment and collection date, the name of the person who collected the specimen (preceded by legit, meaning "collected" in Latin), and who determined it (preceded by determinavit, meaning "determined" in Latin).
The Herbarium Museum contains seven important historic-contemporary herbaria with specimensfrom Italy and the rest of the world: Roman, Regional, General, Cesati, Montelucci, Anzalone and Educational Herbaria.
In virtue of the type of information contained on specimens, Herbaria are very important in scientific, historic and educational terms.
The collections are extremely useful in the study of plant diversity, as well as for basic research in Taxonomy, Floristics, Phytogeography and Phytochemistry.
The specimens collected from ancient times are particularly rich sources of information to retrace the natural history of many territories which have been extensively altered by man ever since.
Some ultra-centenary specimens at the Botanical Gardens of Rome (spontaneous species of Lazio are in red)
Fagus sylvatica L.
Quercus suber L.
Pistacia terebinthus L.
Quercus ilex L.
Quercus petraea L
Agathis robusta (C. Moore ex F. Muell.) Bailey
Acer palmatum Thunb.
Ehretia acuminata R. Br.
Erythrina crista-galli L.
Nolina longifolia (Schult.) Hemsl.
Platanus orientalis L.
Sequoia sempervirens (D. Don) Endl.
Torreya grandis Fort. ex Lindl.
Nannorrhops ritchieana (Griff.) Aitch.
Cladrastis kentukea (Dum.-Cours.) Rudd.
Parrotia persica (DC.) C. A. Mey.
Apollonias barbusana A. Brown
The Botanical Garden of Rome is an integral part of “La Sapienza” University's Department of Environmental Biology and islocated along the slope of Gianicolo Hill on a site of approximately 12 hectares. The flat area reflects the structure of the historic garden of Palazzo Corsini, enriched with tree species (in particular a valuable palm tree collection), euphorbias (Monumental Greenhouse erected in 1877), succulents (The Corsini Greenhouse, 1800) and tropical species (The Tropical Greenhouse, 1900) and the "Giardino dei Semplici", based on a Medieval model.
The hilly areas of the garden contain tree collections including conifers, Juglandaceae and Fagaceae as well as a section of Mediterranean forest featuring local potential vegetation.
The Garden is also home to numerous ultra-centenary specimens of various species, both indigenous and not. There are also other important and extensive collections, such as bamboo (70 taxa), palm trees, (40), conifers (76) and succulents (800).
