CHAPTER III 



MEDIAEVAL, RENAISSANCE AND TUDOR GARDENS 



NECKAM^^^ ^/^x^/zo'^r Neckam, the earliest Englishmmt to write on Gardens, was 

 (1157-1217). ""^ ^^ ^^'^^'"' ''57, being the foster-brother of Richard Cceur de Lion 



—his another ''fovit Ricardum ex mamilla dextra, sed Alexandrum fovit ex 

 mamilla sua sinistrd ''-at the age of twenty-three he became a professor at the 

 University of Paris, 1 180- 1 186. Hurt at the pun on his name by the 

 Benedictine Abbot of St Albans '^ Si bonus es venias ; si nequam, nequaquam " 

 (" Come if you are good, if naughty, by no means ") he became an Augustinian 

 monk at Cirencester, and Abbot 1213. Died 1217 near Worcester and was 

 buried in Cathedral. Author of a Latin poem, '' De Laudibus Diviner 

 Sapientice;' a metrical paraphrase of his own prose treatise '' De Naturis 

 re^-um " which was meant to be a manual of the scientific knowledge of 

 the time, with contemporary anecdotes a7id i-/^r/,?j-.— Thomas Wright, M.A. 

 Preface to Neckam's Works. 



IT ERE the garden should be adorned with roses and lilies, the 



turnsole (heliotrope), violets, and mandrake; there 'you 



should have parsley, cost, fennel, southern-wood, coriander, sage, 



savery, hyssop, mint, rue, ditanny, smallage, pellitory, lettuces] 



garden-cress, and peonies. 



There should also be beds planted with onions, leeks, garlic, 

 pumpkins and shalots. The cucumber growing in its lap, the 

 drowsy poppy, the daffodil and brank-ursine (acanthus) ennoble 

 a garden. Nor are there wanting, if occasion furnish thee, pottage- 

 herbs, beets, herb-mercury, orache, sorrel and mallows. Anise, 

 mustard, white pepper and wormwood (absynth) do good service 

 to the gardenlet. 



A noble garden will give thee also medlars, quinces, warden- 

 trees, peaches, pears of St Riole, pomegranates, lemons (citron 

 apples), oranges (golden apples), almonds, dates, which are the 

 fruits of palms, and figs. I make no mention of ginger and 

 gariofllics, cinnamon, liquorice, and zttuala, and Virgo; Sabece dis- 



