20 
A HISTORY OF GARDENING IN ENGLAND 
poma hoc anno.” 1412 was another bad apple year, and no 
cider was made at Abingdon, and the not unfrequent purchase 
of apples and pears for the use of some of the monasteries shows 
they did not always grow sufficient for their consumption, 
although in some years there was enough and to spare. 1 The 
Wardon pear, which was such a favourite for many centuries, 
originated at the Cistercian monastery of that name in Bedford¬ 
shire, and they bore three Wardon pears for the arms of the 
house. 2 It was a kind of cooking pear, and every early cookery- 
book contains recipes for “ Wardon pies,” or “ pasties.” They 
are usually mentioned quite as a distinct fruit, as “ apples, 
pears, Wardons, and quinces,” because they were the best- 
known variety, and are even specified as a “ quit rent,” land 
having been held by the payment of three “ Wardon Peryz ” 
yearly at Christmas. 3 
Some of the orchards must have been of considerable size. 
In the time of King John the grant of land to Llanthony Priory 
included twelve acres of orchard. An oft-quoted example to 
prove the early existence of orchards is a Bull of Pope Alex¬ 
ander III., dated 1175, confiscating the property of the monks 
of Winchenley, in Gloucestershire, with the “ town of Swiring 
and all its orchards.” 
The cherry was a popular fruit in this country from the 
date of the introduction of garden varieties by the Romans. 
The “ ciris beam,” or cherry-tree, continued to be grown in 
early Saxon times. In the twelfth century it was one of the 
fruit-trees praised by Necham, Abbot of Cirencester, in his 
poem, “ De laudibus divinae Sapientiae,” and this fruit was 
not forgotten in any monastic garden. 
At Norwich, besides the “ Pomerium,” the appleyard or 
orchard, there was a “ cherry5erd,” or, as it is called in another 
place, “ orto cersor,” or cherry-garden, and in spite of this addi¬ 
tional cherries had to be bought “ for the convent ” from time to 
1 Gardeners’ Accounts, Abingdon, 1388, “ Et de xiii s. iiii d. de cicera 
vendita per estimacione et de xxxii s. vi d. ob. de fructibus venditis, 
viz. : pomis wardon et nucibus.” 
2 Dugdale, Monast., vol. v., p. 371, says they were also called Abbot’s 
pears, but assigns no authority. 
3 Land granted to Roger Barfot and Margaret his wife, of Wikemere, 
8th Richard II. Ancient Deeds Record Office, A9011. 
