Elderflora - A Modern History of Ancient Trees (PBK)

Winner of the Jacques Barzun Prize in Cultural HistoryCombining rigorous research with lyrical writing, Elderflora chronicles the complex roles ancient trees have played in the modern world and illuminates how we might need old trees now more than ever. Humans have always revered long-lived trees. But as historian Jared Farmer reveals in Elderflora, our respect took a modern turn in the eighteenth century when naturalists embarked on a quest to locate and precisely date the oldest living things on earth.