Cristóbal Acosta

Cristóbal Acosta, also known as Cristóvão da Costa and in Latin as Christophorus Acosta Africanus, was a Portuguese doctor and natural historian of the sixteenth century. He is considered a pioneer in the study of Asian plants, especially their use in pharmacology, and together with Tomé Pires and Garcia de Orta he was one of the pioneers of Indo-Portuguese medicine. He first travelled to the East Indies in 1550 as a soldier, returned to Goa in 1568 as personal physician to the viceroy, and from 1569 served as physician to the royal hospital in Cochin. In 1578 he published a book on the medicinal plants of the orient, the Tractado de las drogas y medicinas de las Indias Orientales.