Common Milkweed, Anselmus Boetius de Boodt, Botanical Illustration

This drawing of a milkweed plant was certainly not done from life. Various stages of flowering, which in reality never occur at the same time, are shown simultaneously on a single branch. The plant bears both flowers and seedpods. It is more a generic image of the milkweed than a
portrait of a specific specimen. De Boodt did this deliberately to facilitate identification.