Michelangelo Tilli

Michelangelo Tilli was an Italian physician and botanist who lived from 1655 to 1740. Born in Castelfiorentino, he graduated in medicine and surgery at the University of Pisa in 1677 and in 1681 was appointed a naval surgeon by Cosimo III of Tuscany. His travels took him to Constantinople, where he helped treat a son of the sultan after a fall from a horse, and on to Albania, Adrianople and Tunis, where he collected plant specimens. He became professor of botany at Pisa in 1685 and directed its Botanical Garden, introducing plants from Asia and Africa and building greenhouses that allowed pineapples and coffee to be grown in Italy. He is best known for his catalogue of the garden, published in Florence in 1723, and was elected to the Royal Society in 1708.