Nicolás Monardes

(1493 - 1588)

Not long after receiving a medical degree in his native Seville in 1547, Nicolás Monardes began a treatise—containing the first published illustrations of tobacco—on the curative powers of plants found in the Americas. Besides advocating for the benefits of tobacco, he popularized sassafras tea as a potent elixir. The book was translated into English (and given the enticing title Joyful News Out of the New Found World) by John Frampton in 1577. It was widely read by Elizabethans.