Ethnobotanical Garden and Museum of Traditional Medicine

Cuernavaca, Mexico, Mexico

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The Ethnobotanical Garden and Museum of Traditional Medicine (Jardín Etnobotánico y Museo de Medicina Tradicional y Herbolaria) is located in the Acapatzingo neighborhood of Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico, at Mariano Matamoros No. 14. The facility is housed in an 19th-century summer house called "Casa de la India Bonita," built by orders of Emperor Maximilian I of Habsburg in 1865 on the former El Olindo estate for "La India Bonita," the daughter of his gardener at the Jardin Borda downtown. The ethnobotanical garden was inaugurated in 1976, and the museum opened three years later in 1979. Today it features Mexico's largest collection of medicinal plants and over 800 different plants organized into various collections: the National Collection of Medicinal Plants, Collection of Food and Spice Plants, Collection of Orchids, Collection of Cacti, Collection of Deciduous Lowland Jungle, and Ornamental Collection, including orchids, xerophytes, species of deciduous lowland jungle, native and introduced plants, medicinal, condiment, food, and cacti species. The museum is devoted to spreading the practice of traditional medicine and herbalism, showcasing a comprehensive collection of indigenous and traditional medicine based on plants and herbs according to 16th-century codices and other sources.