One of Gardens Illustrated's Best Books of 2020Acclaimed author David Mabberley provides a ground-breaking analysis of early European understanding of Australia’s lora. Combining science, horticulture, art and economics, this lavishly illustrated book – with many never before-published images – reveals the motives and complex networks that led to the international spread of knowledge and cultivation of hundreds of Australian plants in Europe in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.Based on the superb Peter Crossing Collection, Botanical Revelation documents a revolutionary phase in the understanding of Australia’s flora and science more generally.Features:David Mabberley is one of the world’s foremost botanical scholarsof early colonial AustraliaThe detailed story of early European encounters with Australianplants is told here for the first timeA beautifully designed and produced book packed with stunningillustrations, many never before publishedUses a comprehensive private library - the Peter Crossing Collection-devoted to the early encountering, documenting and illustratingof Australian plants by Europeans before Darwin came here in1836 - to tell a fascinating story