This collection of observations by early southern African travellers presents a picture of the vegetation as they saw it painted by the pens of the earliest European visitors to the Cape and by those who, coming after, penetrated the subcontinent. The review covers South Africa, with additional notes on the neighbouring Namibia, Botswana, Lesotho and Zimbabwe. The extracts are taken from many diverse works and the partial picture given here should go some way towards helping ecologists and botanists to visualize early conditions and, at the same time, save themselves the chore of searching through many volumes for what might be no more than a minor item.
Historical Plant Incidence in Southern Africa will be of significant use to plant taxonomists, geographers, ecologists, environment historians and students of climate change. Seven early landscapes by various artists have been reproduced in colour.