Here we are, in front of the building that was originally the home of the Praefectus, the name of the botanical garden’s Scientific Director.

One of the Scientific Director’s responsibilities was to increase the number of species grown. Initially, only species useful for medicinal purposes were collected, but later those of scientific importance were also added.

Botany was not considered an independent science until later, in the 1700s. The great Carl Linnaeus developed a systematic method for the study of the plant world and he was in contact with the scientific directors who actively participated in the academic debate from Padua.

Linnaeus’ esteem for the Padua scientific directors was such that he named a number of species of plants after them. Or even entire genera. For example, the aquatic Pontederia was named after the Scientific Director Giulio Pontedera.

The list of plants imported to Italy by the garden is long and remarkable: sunflower, robinia, lilac, and even the potato! Pietro Arduino, Professor of Agronomy at the University of Padua from 1763 and Scientific Director of the garden at that time, made potatoes a focus of his studies. As you will have understood, the scientific directors were dynamic people, and even adventurous folk who travelled personally to look for new species.

One was Prospero Alpini. He was a “field botanist” in that he travelled tirelessly in the East, in Egypt and in many other places, collecting species never described before. The University, and above all the Republic of Venice, funded these “excursions”. Just imagine what an adventure it must have been to travel in those days! Even the garden’s bylaws made explicit reference to the islands of Crete and Cyprus, subject to the dominion of Venice, and since ancient times among the major centres for production and marketing of spices and medicinal plants.

But collecting the plants was not enough: it then became necessary to preserve them, and to do so, particular climatic conditions had to be guaranteed. So these greenhouses were built in the nineteenth century. Today we call them “old greenhouses”, but they were a very innovative concept.

They are made up of three interconnected rooms fitted with large glass panes, which can be opened to circulate air and heat. Each of the three rooms has a fireplace and vents in the flooring that deliver the hot air to the rest of the greenhouse. The three fireplaces were originally supplied with garden waste, left in a sort of “collection box” in the shed behind the greenhouses.

In short, in the nineteenth century the garden knew how to design and make provision for an efficient and sustainable use of its resources.