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THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY GENTLEMAN, June 29, 1858. 197 
THE HISTORY AND LITERATURE OF 
BRITISH GARDENING. 
BY THE EDITORS. 
( Continued from ‘page 182.) 
CHAP. II. 
FROM THE NORMAN INVASION TO THE END OF THE 
FIFTEENTH CENTURY. 
(1166—1499.) 
We liave recorded all that can be stated with cer¬ 
tainty, respecting English gardening previous to the 
Conquest; but, in the absence of positive documents, 
much of our information is, of necessity, either in¬ 
ferential or conjectural. But, coming now to a period, 
the account of which has been written, and of which 
we possess some existing records, we are enabled to 
ascertain with greater certainty the state of garden¬ 
ing during that period, and to watch, in some measure, 
its gradual development. 
During these periods, marked by a continued series 
of intestine broils, the continued invasions of the 
Danes, who finally established their power in the 
island, a.d. 1017, and who, in their turn, were suc¬ 
ceeded by another conquering dynasty in 1066, in the 
person of William I., horticulture continued un¬ 
impaired and silently to advance. Nor is this a matter 
of surprise ; for the Saxons and Danes, when they won 
a better home than they had left in their native land, 
came as students in the arts of civilisation, which their 
successive sovereigns (Alfred and Canute need alone 
l be instanced), used every means in their power to 
1 foster and improve. They came not, as did the Caliph 
Omar to Alexandria, to destroy those acquirements as 
: useless which he did not already possess. That the 
conquest of a polished nation, by others more bar¬ 
barous than themselves, is not productive of that 
lamentable decay of civilisation that at first sight might 
be apprehended, is further instanced by the result of 
the conquest of the Roman state by the Goths. The 
estimable arts of civilisation were prized and studied 
by the brave and manly nations of the north, whilst 
the meretricious ornaments spread over them by the 
effeminate Romans were despised and swept away. It 
is only a savage, or a bigot, that conquers to destroy ; 
the Saxons, the Danes, and the Goths conquered to 
improve their own comfort and condition, which alone 
i could be effected by sustaining the superior arts 
pursued by the nations they overcame. 
In the previous chapter, we have noticed the vine¬ 
yards of the Anglo-Saxons ; and the Normans did not 
decline from this attention paid to the Yine by their 
predecessors. At Edmonsbury, in Suffolk, the monks 
of its Monastery planted a vineyard in 1140, and 
William of Malmesbury, their contemporary, says | 
that vineyards were possessed by barons as well as 
monks, and that the Grapes of the Isle of Ely furnished 
| wine next best in quality to that from the Grapes of 
| the vale of Gloucester. Among other places, it is 
! evident that Winchester was at a very early period 
celebrated for its vineyards; for among our most 
ancient literature are verses allusive to them, and this 
fine,— j 
“ Testis est London ratibus, Wintonia Baccho,” 
is quoted by TWynne (De Rebus Albionicis , 116) in 
| proof that AVinton, afterwards named by the Saxons 
Winchester—that is, the City of Wine—was so called 
! because there was the best vintage in Britain. 
> Another old monkish verse is,— 
“ Quatuor sunt Elite; Lanterna, Capella, Mari® ; 
Et Molendinum, nec non dans Vinea vinum.” 
It is translated thus by Ralph Austen :— 
“ Four things of Ely town much spoken are, 
The leaden Lanthorn, Mary’s Chapel rare, 
The mighty Millhill in the minster field, 
And fruitful vineyards which sweet wine do yield.” 
Of Canterbury and that neighbourhood, the same 
author makes the abbot of St. Augustine’s say, that 
their house was formerly not destitute of Vines : and 
Somner informs us, that, in the year 1285, both that 
abbey and the priory of Canterbury were plentifully 
furnished with vineyards. 
At Rochester, a large piece of ground adjoining to 
the city is now called the Yine ; another is so called 
at Sevenoaks, in Kent: this also is the name of the 
seat formerly of the Barons Sandes, in Hampshire, 
and now of Mrs. Chute. 
At Hailing, near Rochester, the Bishop of that see 
had formerly a vineyard; for when Edward II., in 
the nineteenth year of his reign, was at Bockingfield, 
Bishop Hamson sent him thither, as Lambarde tells 
us, “ a present of his drinkes,” “ and withal both wine 
and Grapes of his own growth in the vineyarde at 
Hailing.” Captain Nicholas Toke, of Godington, in 
Great Chart, in Kent, “ hath so industriously and 
elegantly,” says Philipot, “ cultivated and improved 
English Vines, that the wine, pressed and exacted out 
of their Grapes, seems not only to parallel, but almost 
to outrival that of France.” 
Of Sussex, Lambarde writes, “ History doth men¬ 
tion, that there was about that time (the Norman in¬ 
vasion) great store of Vines at Santlac (near to 
Battel).” He adds, as to Berkshire, “ the like whereof 
I have read to have been at Windsor, in so much as 
tithe of them hath been there yielded in great plenty, 
which giveth me to think, that wine hath been made 
long since within the realm ; although in our memory 
it be accounted a great dainty to hear of.” He further 
observes, that some part of the wine was spent in the 
king’s household, and some sold for the king’s profit. 
Domesday Book mentions at Rageneia, in Essex, one 
park and six arpennies of vineyard, which, if it takes 
well, yields twenty modii of wine. And at AVare, a 
park and six arpennies of vineyard very lately planted. 
We hear of vineyards also in Middlesex, Cambridge¬ 
shire, at Denny Abbey, the Isle of Ely, at Dunstable, 
and at St. Edmunsbury, in the engraved plan of which 
town the vineyard of the abbey is particularly noted. 
Within the walls of the city of London there is a 
street called the AGneyard; and others in the liberties 
and suburbs, and in Westminster; there are also 
the Vineyards of Houndsditch and Coldbath-fields. 
In the Journal of Works at Windsor, in the reign 
of Edward III., which is preserved among the Ex¬ 
chequer Records, we find every operation of Vine 
culture detailed by the keeper of the vineyard at 
Windsor Castle, from planting, grafting, and manuring, 
till the pressing of the fruit, the making and repairing 
of the casks, and the barrelling of the wine. The 
superintendence of this AVindsor vineyard was, for 
some time, entrusted to one Etienne de Bordeaux, wiio, 
no doubt, was brought over from Guienne. 
In the archives of the church of Ely is the following 
register:— 
Exitus Vineti.2 15 31 
Ditto Vine® . . . . . . . 10 12 2^ 
10 bushels of Grapes from the vineyard . .076 
7 Dolia Musti from the vineyard, 12 Edw. II. 15 1 0 
Wine sold for . . . . . . 1 12 0 
Verjuice . . . . . . ..170 
For Wine out of this vineyard . . .12 2 
For Verjuice from thence . . . . . 0 16 0 
No wine, but verjuice, made 9 Edward IV. Hence it 
appears plainly that, at Ely, Grapes would sometimes 
ripen, and the convent made wine of them ; and when 
they did not, they converted their produce into ver¬ 
juice. 
In Northamptonshire, Martin, Abbot of Peter- 
