The Forgotten Botanical Charts of the Moretti Herbarium Room
A quiet, green-tinged stillness fills the Herbarium Room, where a penciled chart notation in a notebook stops mid-specimen, leaving pressed plants and notes forever incomplete.
Life in Leaves
These implements belonged to Giovanni Moretti, botanist (b. 1875, Florence), trained at a Tuscan botanical institute.
His Italian notes—delicate, precise, and methodical—recorded species names, habitat observations, and pressing techniques. A folded slip referencing his apprentice, Lucia Moretti, “organize ferns Monday,” hints at a disciplined daily routine: collecting, pressing, labeling, and cataloging plants, intertwined with careful domestic oversight.
Specimens and Instruments
On the main table, pressed leaves and flowers lie partially mounted on card stock. Tweezers, magnifiers, and knives are aligned by size. A ledger beneath folded charts tracks species, collection sites, and herbarium placement. Several incomplete botanical charts lean against the cabinet, edges curling slightly, paused mid-identification as though awaiting Giovanni’s hand to finish.
Signs of Waning Energy
Later ledger entries reveal repeated corrections to species names and press techniques. Several charts show misaligned specimens; annotations inconsistently applied. A margin note—“client museum rejects identification”—is smudged. Instruments lie scattered, one tweezers bent, reflecting fatigue and growing anxiety that disrupted Giovanni’s methodical pace. Partially completed charts remain on tables, the regular rhythm of cataloging broken.
In the Herbarium Room’s final drawer, Giovanni’s last chart entry trails into incomplete species notes and penciled observations. A penciled note—“verify with Lucia”—cuts off abruptly.
No explanation survives for why work ceased, nor why Lucia never returned to complete the remaining charts.
The house remains abandoned, its specimens, instruments, and charts suspended in quiet anticipation, preserving the halted rhythm of botanical cataloging that will never resume, a silent testament to careful labor left unfinished.
