Plants, names and places of eighteenth century Sardinia in Flora Sardoa by Michele Antonio Plazza

As one of the works from the second half of the XVIII century which bear witness to a lively cultural and civilised period when the most sensitive and capable Sardinian intellectuals were opening their minds to the new European ideas, Flora Sardoa by Michele Antonio Piazza has still not had the honour of being published and even today is to be found within two not easily consulted manuscripts. And yet it is a praiseworthy scientific text, well linked to the widespread botanical movement of that time. Piazza´s manuscript treatise, published entirely in Latin, can be seen to be extremely interesting from several aspects. For the moment considering it from a historical point of view, the treatise represents in fact a valid example of regional flora inspired by the most advanced and fertile currents of continental research and structured on the basis of the revolutionary method of classification and denomination of the systema naturae introduced by Carolus Linnaeus. Furthermore Piazza´s manuscript papers are rich with precious information from a linguistic, lexicographical and topographical point of view. Several of the most salient characteristics of the treatise are illustrated in the paper, prior to the forthcoming publication of a critical-historical edition.