Plantago maior | Vintage Botanical Print

Vintage Botanical Print | 16th-Century Herbal Illustration | Antique Plant Art | Printable Natural History Wall Decor | Digital Download

Bring timeless botanical beauty to your walls with Plantago maior, a remarkable 16th-century watercolor illustration by Italian artist and botanist Gherardo Cibo. Originally included in Mattioli’s expanded edition of Dioscorides’s De Materia Medica, this piece captures the healing plantain herb with expressive detail, set against a dramatic landscape with a rainbow and grazing sheep.

Perfect for enthusiasts of vintage herbal art, natural history illustrations, medicinal plant decor, and printable botanical wall art.

➤ Instant digital download
➤ High-resolution file, print-ready
➤ Ideal for herbalist spaces, cottagecore interiors, academic decor, or nature-inspired kitchens

Pixartiko Collective – Usage License

Prints allowed for personal use and resale only as physical products in local shops. Use in other physical goods permitted if pixartiko.com is credited when possible.
Digital resale, sharing, or publishing is strictly forbidden.
Designs are not public domain and cannot be distributed online.

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Print Sizes

🖼 Included Print Sizes (No Cropping Needed)

This high resolution digital file is optimized for printing at the following standard sizes, no cropping or borders required. Just download, print, and frame:

Inches	Centimeters	Suggested Use
11.7 x 16.5	A3 – 29.7 x 42	Wall art, poster, vertical frame
8.3 x 11.7	A4 – 21 x 29.7	Standard frame, home office decor
5.8 x 8.3	A5 – 14.8 x 21	Small prints, journaling inserts
4.1 x 5.8	A6 – 10.5 x 14.8	Greeting card, mini gift
7 x 10	17.8 x 25.4	Portrait print, versatile framing
5 x 7	12.7 x 17.8	Classic photo size, shelf display

 

🖨️ All sizes are print-ready at 300 DPI, maintaining the original image ratio. No cropping or borders required.

📂 Your download includes:

• 1 high resolution JPEG file (2134 x 2988 px).
• Artistic Declaration Certificate in PDF.
• Free gift: The Ages of Painting guide — a visual journey through the history of painting.

🎨 Need a different size or format?
No problem! Just send me a message and I’ll be happy to adapt it for you.

Art Review

“Plantago maior” by Gherardo Cibo: A Leaf Between Storm and Shepherd

In “Plantago maior”, Gherardo Cibo conjures a masterstroke of visual philosophy: a plantain rising solemnly beneath a storm-split sky, its roots curled in midair as if caught between the heavens and the soil. At once scientific and symbolic, the work captures the essence of Renaissance thought — that plants are not merely organisms, but participants in the moral and cosmic order of the world.

The composition is breathtaking in its balance and subtle drama. The large, ribbed leaves of the Plantago maior dominate the center, portrayed with naturalistic care and quiet nobility. From them spring elongated flower spikes, rendered with delicate touches of pink and brown, bending gently as though responding to the weight of the clouds above.

And those clouds! Cibo paints them not as passive background but as elemental presences — a thunderous wall of greys and violets, pierced by sunlight, bisected by a spectral rainbow. This is no mere weather; it is metaphor. The plant exists within a world of tension: between rain and light, turbulence and calm, threat and healing.

Beneath this celestial theater, a peaceful pastoral scene unfolds: sheep graze, a shepherd watches, and another figure tends the stream. It is a world that continues despite the clouds — a world, perhaps, sustained by the quiet resilience of the plantain, known for its healing properties and ability to thrive in even the most trodden paths.

Cibo’s choice of Plantago maior is telling. Often overlooked, this humble herb was revered in traditional medicine for its power to soothe wounds and inflammation — a botanical balm for a wounded world. In this rendering, it becomes a symbol of persistence and grounded wisdom, standing tall and centered while the skies threaten and promise in equal measure.

“Plantago maior” is more than a botanical illustration. It is a meditation on the quiet dignity of endurance — of being rooted in a world that changes, that storms, that heals. Through this singular plant, Gherardo Cibo speaks not only to the eye, but to the spirit.