6 



HISTORY OF GARDENING. 



Part I. 



Id. The existence oj these gardens^ however, is very problematical. Bryant {Ancieiit 

 Mythology) gives his reasons for disbelieving the very existence of Queen Semiramis, who, 

 Dr. Sickler says, was not a queen, but a {heyschldferinn) concubine. Bryant acknowledges, 

 however, that paradises of great extent, and placed in elevated situations, were with great 

 probability ascribed to the ancient people called Semarim. Quintus Curtius (lib. xv. 

 cap. 5.) calls these gardens " fabulous wonders of the Greeks:" and Herodotus, who 

 describes Babylon, is silent as to their existence. Many consider their description as 

 representing a hill cut into terraces, and planted ; and some modern travellers have fan- 

 cied that they could discover traces of such a work. The value of such conjectures is 

 left to be estimated by the antiquarian ; we consider the description of this Babylonian 

 garden as worth preserving for its grandeur and suitableness to the country and climate. 



Sect. V. Persian Gardens. B. C. 500. 



19. The Persian Kings xvere very fond of gardens, which, Xenophon says, were 

 cultivated for the sake of beauty as well as fruit. " Wherever the Persian king, 

 Cyrus, resides, or whatever place he visits in his dominions, he takes care that the 

 Paradises, shall be filled with every thing, both beautiful and useful, the soil can 

 produce." {Xen. Memorab. lib. v. p. 829.) The younger Cyrus was found by Ly- 

 sander, as Plutarch informs us, in his garden or paradise at Sardis, and on its being 

 praised by the Spartan general, he avowed that he had conceived, disposed and adjusted 

 the whole himself, and planted a considerable number of trees with liis own hands. 

 Cyrus had another paradise at Celena;, which was very extensive, and abounded in wild 

 beasts ; and we are informed that the same prince " there mustered the Grecian force* 

 to the number of thirteen thousand." [De Cyri Exped. lib. i.) 



20. A paradise in the Island of Panchcea, neai- the coast of Arabia, is described by 

 Diodorus Siculus, as having been in a flourishing state in the time of Alexander's 

 immediate successors, or about B. C. 300. It belonged to a temple of Jupiter .Try- 

 philius, and had a copious fountain, which burst at once into a river, w^is cased with 

 stone near half a mile, and was afterwards used for irrigation. It had the usual accom- 

 paniments of groves, fruit-trees, thickets, and flowers. 



21. The grove of Orontes in Syi'ia, is mentioned by Strabo (lib. x\i.) as being in his 

 time nine miles in circumference. It is described by Gibbon as " composed of laurels 

 and cypress, which formed in the most sultry summers a cool and impenetrable shade. 

 A thousand streams of the purest water issuing from every hill preserved the verdure of 

 the earth, and the temperature of the air ; the senses were gratified with harmonious 

 sounds, and aromatic odours ; and the peaceful grove was consecrated to health and joy, 

 to luxury and love." [Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chap, xiii.) 



22. In Persian gardens of a more limited description, according to Pliny and other Ro- 

 man authors, the trees were arranged in straight lines and regular figures J and the mai'gins 

 of the walks covered with tufts of roses, violets, and other odoriferous flowering plants. 

 Among the trees, the terebinthinate sorts, the oriental plane, and, what may appear to 

 us remarkable, the nan-ow-leaved elm, (now called English,' but originally, as Dr. 

 Walker and others consider, from the Holy Land), held conspicuous places. Buildings 

 for repose , banqueting, voluptuous love ; fountains for cooling the air, aviaiies for 

 choice birds, and towers for the sake of distant prospect, were introduced in the best 

 examples. 



Sect. VI. Grecian Gardens. B. C. 300. 



23. Tlie Greeks copied the gardening of the Persians, as they did tlieir manners and 

 architecture, as far as the difference of climate and state of society would admit. 

 Xenophon, a Greek philosopher of the fourth century before Christ, admired the gardens 

 of the Persian prince Cyrus, at Sardis ; and Diogenes Laertius informs us that Epicurus 

 delighted in the pleasures of the garden, and made choice of one as the spot where he 

 taught his philosophy. Plato also lays the scene of his dialogue of beauty on the 

 umbrageous banks of the river Ilissus. In the first eclogue of Theocritus, the scene 

 is laid under the shade of a pine-tree, and the beauty of Helen is compared to that of a 

 cypress in a garden. It would appear from this and other circumstances, that the love 

 of terebinthinate trees, so general in Persia, and the other eastern countries, was also 

 prevalent in Greece ; and the same flowers (made choice of for their brilliant colors 

 and odoriferous perfumes) appear to have been common to both countries. Among 

 these may be enumerated the narcissus, violet, ivy, and rose. [Historical View, &c. 

 p. 30. etseq.) There are many curious observations on this subject in-Stackhouse's edition of 

 Theophrastus. Loi-d Bacon, in his Essay on Gardens, and G. Mason, already quoted, 

 concur in considering gardening as rather a neglected art in Greece, notwithstanding the 

 progress of the sister art of architecture, which gave rise to the remark of the former, 

 " that when ages grow to civility and elegancy, men come to build stately sooner than 

 to garden finely, as if gardening were the greater perfection." 



