Choice of plants

The need for cooperation with nature is probably most felt by the amateur gardener in choosing the plants he wants to grow. The range of plants available to the modern gardener is remarkably rich, and new varieties are constantly being offered by nurseries. Most of the shrubs and flowers used in the Western world are descendants of plants imported from other countries. Because they are nonnative, they present the gardener with some of his most interesting problems but also with the possibility of an enhanced display. Plants that originated in subtropical regions, for example, are naturally more sensitive to frost. Some, like rhododendrons or azaleas, originated in an acid soil, mainly composed of leaf mold. Consequently, they will not thrive in a chalky or an alkaline soil. Plant breeding continues to improve the adaptability of such exotic plants, but the more closely the new habitat resembles the original, the better the plant will flourish. Manuals offer solutions to most such problems, and the true gardener will always enjoy finding his own. In such experiments, he may best experience his work as part of the historical tradition of gardening.

Early history

Western gardening had its origins in Egypt some 4,000 years ago. As the style spread, it was changed and adapted to different localities and climates, but its essentials remained those of disciplined lines and groupings of plants, usually in walled enclosures. Gardening was introduced into Europe through the expansion of Roman rule and, second, by way of the spread of Islam into Spain. Though clear evidence is lacking, it is presumed that Roman villas outside the confines of Italy contained native and imported plants, hedges, fruit trees, and vines, in addition to herbs for medicinal and culinary purposes.

In medieval times the monasteries were the main repositories of gardening knowledge and the important herbal lore. Though little is certainly known about the design and content of the monastic garden, it probably consisted of a walled courtyard built around a well or an arbour, with colour provided by flowers (some of which, including roses and lilies, served as ecclesiastical symbols), all of which maintained the ancient idea of the garden as a place of contemplation.

The earliest account of gardening in English, The Feate of Gardening, dating from about 1400, mentions the use of more than 100 plants, with instructions on sowing, planting, and grafting of trees and advice on cultivation of herbs such as parsley, sage, fennel, thyme, camomile, and saffron. The vegetables mentioned include turnip, spinach, leek, lettuce, and garlic.

Early gardening was largely for utility. The emergence of the garden as a form of creative display properly began in the 16th century. The Renaissance, with its increased prosperity, brought an upsurge of curiosity about the natural world and, incidentally, stirred interest in composing harmonious forms in the garden.

This awakening took especially firm root in Elizabethan England, which notably developed the idea that gardens were for enjoyment and delight. Echoing the Renaissance outlook, the mood of the period was one of exuberance in gardening, seen in the somewhat playful arrangements of Tudor times, with mazes, painted statuary, and knot gardens (consisting of beds in which various types of plants were separated by dwarf hedges). Flowers began to appear profusely in paintings and, as mentioned above, were used by poets in their verbal images.

This enthusiasm was accompanied by an earnest search for knowledge, and the period saw the birth of botanical science. A leading figure in this work was Carolus Clusius (Charles de l’Écluse), whose botanical skills and introduction of the tulip and other bulbous plants to the botanical gardens at Leiden, Netherlands, laid the foundation for Dutch prominence in international horticulture. The earliest botanical garden was that of Pisa (1543), followed by that of Padua (1545). The first in England was founded at Oxford in 1621, followed by Scotland’s first, at Edinburgh, in 1667. The gardens at Kew, near London, were founded almost a century later, in 1759. These centres of experiment and learning have contributed greatly to the art and science of horticulture.

The advances from the simple medieval style were marked and rapid at this time. The English statesman and scholar Francis Bacon could already, by 1625, advance a sophisticated and almost modern conception of the garden in his essay “On Gardens.” He saw it as a place that should be planted for year-round enjoyment, offering a wide range of experiences through colour, form and scent, exercise and repose. The flower garden, already well established by the early 17th century, was set against a background of tall, clipped hedges and neatly scythed lawns. The taste of the time, as contemporary lists show, was for perfumed varieties such as carnations, lavender, sweet marjoram, musk roses, and poppies.

The plant trade

As interest in gardening developed in Europe, the new trade of nurseryman was established, and the trade became highly important to the spread of knowledge and materials. By the end of the 17th century, nurserymen were relatively numerous in England, France, and the Low Countries, with keen customers among the nobility and gentry for all the exotica they could provide. The catalog of the Tradescant family’s private botanical garden in London listed 1,600 plants in 1656. A number of them had been brought back by the family from visits to Virginia. These early exotica from the New World included now familiar plants such as the Michaelmas daisy, the Virginia creeper, hamamelis, goldenrod, the first perennial lupine, and such fine autumn-colouring trees as liquidambar and the staghorn sumac. The work of the nurserymen thus spread new plants more widely and, as breeding skills developed, contributed to the acclimatizing of foreign imports.

Vegetables and fruits

The history of vegetables is imprecise. Though familiar types, including the radish, turnip, and onion, are known to have been in cultivation from early times, it is fairly supposed that they were meagre and would bear little clear resemblance to modern equivalents. The early range available to European gardens and, later, to those in America, included such native plants as kale, parsnips, and the Brussels sprout family, with peas and broad beans grown as field crops.

The Romans introduced the globe artichoke, leek, cucumber, cabbage, asparagus, and the Mediterranean strain of garlic to their imperial territory wherever these plants would flourish. Among plants imported to Europe from the Americas were the scarlet runner bean and tomato (both originally grown for ornament), corn (maize), and the vastly important potato. The numerous herbs in use were mostly native to European locations. One curiosity to the modern mind is that certain flowers, such as marigolds, violets, and primroses, were used as flavourings in the kitchen.

The cultivation of fruit trees was one of the most advanced skills and interests from the 16th century onward. Pride was taken in variety, and, judging by the opulent still-life paintings of the period, the quality was remarkably high. Among the challenges bravely taken up in the 17th century in northern Europe was the growing of orange and lemon trees, though this was done more for the pleasure of their evergreen qualities than for their fruit. The catalog of the British royal gardens in 1708 shows 14 varieties of cherry, 14 apricots, 58 kinds of peach and nectarine, 33 plums, eight figs, 23 vines, 29 pears, and numerous varieties of apple.