MEDIAEVAL GARDENS 



tree was sacred to Adonis, Attis, and Osiris l (all, 

 perhaps, varying forms of one and the same 

 divinity), or have been suggested by some 

 northern Saga. It makes its appearance in the 

 Chanson de Roland, which has come down to 

 us in a thirteenth-century form, incorporating 

 the earlier Epic of Roland, probably composed 

 towards the end of the eleventh century. In 

 this we find mention of it when Charlemagne, 

 after he is said to have taken Cordova, retires to 

 a garden with Roland and Oliver and his barons, 

 the elder ones amusing themselves with chess 

 and tric-trac, and the younger ones with fencing, 

 the king meanwhile looking on, seated under a 

 pine-tree. Later in the day tents are set up, in 

 which they pass the night, and in the early 

 morning Charlemagne, after hearing mass, again 

 sits under the pine-tree to take counsel of his 

 barons. 



In the Roman de la Rose, the fateful 

 fountain of Narcissus is described as being 

 beneath a pine-tree, which is represented as 

 being taller and fairer than any that mortal eye 

 had seen since the glorious pine of Charlemagne's 

 time, showing that here at least the poet is 

 making use of tradition. 



But to make our way into a mediaeval 

 garden, and see all that grows therein, we must 

 needs get within the precincts of the castle, for 

 inside its fortified enclosure the castle, like a 

 small village, was self-contained. And this was 



1 J. G. Frazer, Adonis, Attis, Osiris, 1906. 

 1 80 



