Dioscorides, Pedanius

Dioscorides, Pedanius pĭdān´ēəs dīəskôr´ĭdēz [key], fl. 1st cent. AD, Greek physician of Anazarbus, Cilicia. While traveling as a surgeon in the Roman army, he collected information on the remedies of the period and wrote a work on materia medica (tr. The Greek Herbal of Dioscorides, 1934, repr. 1959) that remained standard for centuries.