Antonio Mizauld

Antoine Mizauld, in Latin Antonius Mizaldus (1510 to 1578), born at Montluçon and dying in Paris, was a French astronomer and physician, a doctor and professor of medicine in Paris and a close friend of Oronce Fine, who acted as astrologer and physician to Marguerite de Valois. His first published work, a treatise on weather prediction, appeared in 1546, and he was a prolific author on comets, gardens, herbs, medicine and astronomy, producing tracts on medical, astronomical, botanical and meteorological subjects. He is best known for his treatises on medicine and astrology, the Secrets of the Moon of 1571 and the Harmonia Coelestium Corporum et Humanorum of 1555, which is rooted in Renaissance discussion of macrocosm and microcosm. Most of his research went to natural curiosities, including books on horticulture and the care of fruit trees, and he published unusual treatises on gardening, medicinal plants and popular pharmacy. He tried to make medicine accessible to all and to free poor patients from the rapacity of apothecaries, and in several books he claims that remedies can often be found in a patient's own garden.