Was Shakespeare an avid gardener? We’ll never know for sure – but he does sound as if he knew what he was talking about...
Shakespeare's most magical plots: To commemorate the 400th anniversary of his death, an enchanting new book visits the gardens the Bard drew his inspiration from
Shakespeare was known for his knowledge of plants in his plays
A new book looks inside the gardens that gave him inspiration
By Jackie Bennett and Mary Greene For The Daily Mail
18 March 2016
Was Shakespeare an avid gardener? We’ll never know for sure – but he does sound as if he knew what he was talking about.
He compares the state of the nation in Richard II to a neglected garden, choked with weeds, the plants swarming with caterpillars. The gardeners enter, in Act III, to lop branches and cut back unruly plants.
Richard II was written a couple of years before Shakespeare bought his own house and garden in New Place, Stratford-upon-Avon, in 1597 when he was 33. The house was dilapidated and a murder had been committed there, so Shakespeare paid only £60.
Anne Hathaway’s cottage in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, where he was known to have visited during their courstship
Around 1609, he planted a mulberry tree, which was very much the fashion as King James I hoped to foster silkworm cultivation. Mulberries are among the fruits that lovestruck Titania’s fairies feed donkey-headed Bottom in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Sadly, Shakespeare’s tree was cut down in 1758 by a later owner of the house, the Reverend Francis Gastrell, who was annoyed by tourists’ demands to see the garden.
Shakespeare made references to many gardens in his plays
The house on Henley Street, Stratford-upon-Avon, where the Bard was born in 1564
A year later, he demolished the house too. Yet Shakespeare’s garden is still there, and following a major refurbishment, is reopening to the public in July. Now a lavishly illustrated new book, published to commemorate the 400th anniversary of his death, takes a journey through this and other gardens he would have known.
Today, close to a million people visit Shakespeare’s birthplace in Henley Street each year. But its garden was laid out by the Victorians; it now has modern roses with Shakespearean names, and a heather parterre alludes to Macbeth’s Scottish heath. It is very different from the yard Shakespeare knew.
William’s father John was a glove-maker. Animal carcasses would have arrived daily. There would have been mounds of lime and ash to clean the skins, tanning pits and leather drying racks. But there would also have been pigs, geese and a vegetable garden.
Shakespeare was born in 1564, just after the worst plague outbreak of the century – so his mother Mary Arden may have taken him to her parents’ farm at Wilmcote, three miles away, to avoid infection.
In its garden would have been vegetables for pottage, the soup that was a Tudor staple: cabbages, carrots, onions, turnips and beans. Skirrets – a root vegetable – were used before potatoes were widespread. When Sir John Falstaff says, ‘Let the sky rain potatoes,’ in The Merry Wives Of Windsor he was referring to an aphrodisiac and a luxury.
Country farmers ate well. Birds were fed on rosemary and pennyroyal (Mentha pulegium) to flavour the meat. Today at the Ardens’ farm Tudor-style vegetable plots, enclosed with woven willow hurdles, are planted with alexanders (Smyrnium olusatrum), wild rocket, salsify and strawberry spinach (Chenopodium capitatum).
Richard II was written a couple of years before Shakespeare bought his own house and garden in New Place (pictured), Stratford-upon-Avon, in 1597 when he was 33
The ‘wise woman’s garden’ is so-called because you’ll find herbs there that might have been used by Mary and her mother in home remedies: mullein, bugle, clary sage, sweet cicely, selfheal, lungwort, valerian and chamomile. Rosemary was used as a mouthwash and marjoram soothed painful joints.
Shakespeare often used his affinity for botany in his work. King Lear’s ‘crown’ of weeds contains fumitory, burdocks, nettles, darnel and thistles. Hamlet’s Ophelia, driven mad by grief, makes garlands of ‘crow-flowers, nettles, daisies and long purples’. Crow-flowers are either buttercups or crowfoots; ‘long purples’ could be wild arum or early purple orchids.
He would have seen wild daffodils in the woods and meadows by the River Avon, the River Stour and the Shottery Brook by Anne Hathaway’s cottage, now a popular tourist attraction. He courted Anne, a farmer’s daughter, in the summer of 1582, when he was 18; she was three months pregnant when they married in November that year.
A 1910 fresco of the Temple Garden scene in Henry VI Part 1
So how did her family’s farmyard become one of the world’s best-known cottage gardens? Shakespeare tourism was developing from the late 18th century; then in the 19th century cottage life was romanticised – and gradually Anne’s home was prettified.
The garden’s real revival came in the 1920s and was led by celebrated plantswoman Ellen Willmott. Her budget for revamping the cottage’s garden was £25. The orchard was underplanted with 4,000 bulbs and she designed borders with columbine, lungwort (Pulmonaria), cranesbill and primula. Snake’s head fritillaries have been planted by the brook. Shakespeare knew them well – in his long poem Venus And Adonis, a purple and white chequered flower springs up in the blood of the fallen youth.
Shakespeare’s work allowed him to see other gardens, including at court. At Whitehall, Henry VIII had created a garden of raised flower beds with a fountain, a sundial and gilded heraldic beasts on poles. Shakespeare was also familiar with the Inns of Court – Temple Garden is where the nobles in Henry VI Part 1 pluck white or red roses to show their allegiance to York or Lancaster. But the roses Shakespeare knew were wild hedgerow roses: eglantine (Rosa rubiginosa), burnet rose (R. spinosissima) and dog rose (R. canina). The bank where Titania sleeps in A Midsummer Night’s Dream is ‘canopied’ with ‘musk-roses’ and ‘eglantine’.
Dr John Hall, who married Shakespeare’s daughter Susanna, listed 60 uses for roses in his case notes. The Halls built their house on land Shakespeare gave them in Stratford. The two men were friends – and possibly discussed the use of drugs and potions in his plays. Titania is drugged with the juice of a pansy and the sleeping potion taken by Juliet was possibly sleeping nightshade (Atropa belladonna).
In one remedy he prescribed for a man with dropsy and jaundice, John Hall used liquorice, chicory, watercress, centaury, rhubarb, chamomile and fennel. Some herbs grew in the garden; others had to be collected in the wild. For epilepsy he prescribed peony roots, hung around the neck, and rue and vinegar to be dabbed under the nose.
Gardens are ephemeral; archaeology and letters offer no more than hints about Shakespeare’s gardens. It was claimed in the 18th century, by someone who remembered the family, that Shakespeare laid out his garden ‘in a handsome manner’ – and it is not unthinkable that, with his love of plants and his growing prosperity, he created a garden of his own – filled with scent, his favourite flowers, and maybe copying the fashionable ideas of the day.
WHY EVERY DAY WAS SALAD DAY
In Shakespeare’s day, vegetables were a staple; for poor households, they were almost the only food. ‘Sallet’ was the name for all plants grown for eating, while ‘herbs’ had specific uses. In reality, a ‘sallet’ was a mix of herbs, vegetables and what we would today call salad crops – radishes (above) and lettuce – all dressed with oil, vinegar and sugar.
Globe artichokes were commonly grown in kitchen gardens; they had been cultivated first by the Romans in Britain and had a revival in the 16th century. It wasn’t until 100 years later that the writer and gardener John Evelyn divided salads into those to be eaten uncooked (including rocket and purslane) and those to be cooked (including endive, cabbage and lettuce).
Adapted by Mary Greene from Shakespeare’s Gardens by Jackie Bennett, published by Frances Lincoln, £25. To order a copy for £18.75 (25% discount) visit mailbookshop.co.uk or call 0808 272 0808, p&p free on orders over £12. Offer valid until 2 April 2016.
Read more: Shakespeare's most magical plots: To commemorate the 400th anniversary of his death, an enchanting new book visits the gardens the Bard drew his inspiration from | Daily Mail Online
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
Shakespeare's most magical plots: To commemorate the 400th anniversary of his death, an enchanting new book visits the gardens the Bard drew his inspiration from
Shakespeare was known for his knowledge of plants in his plays
A new book looks inside the gardens that gave him inspiration
By Jackie Bennett and Mary Greene For The Daily Mail
18 March 2016
Was Shakespeare an avid gardener? We’ll never know for sure – but he does sound as if he knew what he was talking about.
He compares the state of the nation in Richard II to a neglected garden, choked with weeds, the plants swarming with caterpillars. The gardeners enter, in Act III, to lop branches and cut back unruly plants.
Richard II was written a couple of years before Shakespeare bought his own house and garden in New Place, Stratford-upon-Avon, in 1597 when he was 33. The house was dilapidated and a murder had been committed there, so Shakespeare paid only £60.
Anne Hathaway’s cottage in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, where he was known to have visited during their courstship
Around 1609, he planted a mulberry tree, which was very much the fashion as King James I hoped to foster silkworm cultivation. Mulberries are among the fruits that lovestruck Titania’s fairies feed donkey-headed Bottom in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Sadly, Shakespeare’s tree was cut down in 1758 by a later owner of the house, the Reverend Francis Gastrell, who was annoyed by tourists’ demands to see the garden.
Shakespeare made references to many gardens in his plays
The house on Henley Street, Stratford-upon-Avon, where the Bard was born in 1564
A year later, he demolished the house too. Yet Shakespeare’s garden is still there, and following a major refurbishment, is reopening to the public in July. Now a lavishly illustrated new book, published to commemorate the 400th anniversary of his death, takes a journey through this and other gardens he would have known.
Today, close to a million people visit Shakespeare’s birthplace in Henley Street each year. But its garden was laid out by the Victorians; it now has modern roses with Shakespearean names, and a heather parterre alludes to Macbeth’s Scottish heath. It is very different from the yard Shakespeare knew.
William’s father John was a glove-maker. Animal carcasses would have arrived daily. There would have been mounds of lime and ash to clean the skins, tanning pits and leather drying racks. But there would also have been pigs, geese and a vegetable garden.
Shakespeare was born in 1564, just after the worst plague outbreak of the century – so his mother Mary Arden may have taken him to her parents’ farm at Wilmcote, three miles away, to avoid infection.
In its garden would have been vegetables for pottage, the soup that was a Tudor staple: cabbages, carrots, onions, turnips and beans. Skirrets – a root vegetable – were used before potatoes were widespread. When Sir John Falstaff says, ‘Let the sky rain potatoes,’ in The Merry Wives Of Windsor he was referring to an aphrodisiac and a luxury.
Country farmers ate well. Birds were fed on rosemary and pennyroyal (Mentha pulegium) to flavour the meat. Today at the Ardens’ farm Tudor-style vegetable plots, enclosed with woven willow hurdles, are planted with alexanders (Smyrnium olusatrum), wild rocket, salsify and strawberry spinach (Chenopodium capitatum).
Richard II was written a couple of years before Shakespeare bought his own house and garden in New Place (pictured), Stratford-upon-Avon, in 1597 when he was 33
The ‘wise woman’s garden’ is so-called because you’ll find herbs there that might have been used by Mary and her mother in home remedies: mullein, bugle, clary sage, sweet cicely, selfheal, lungwort, valerian and chamomile. Rosemary was used as a mouthwash and marjoram soothed painful joints.
Shakespeare often used his affinity for botany in his work. King Lear’s ‘crown’ of weeds contains fumitory, burdocks, nettles, darnel and thistles. Hamlet’s Ophelia, driven mad by grief, makes garlands of ‘crow-flowers, nettles, daisies and long purples’. Crow-flowers are either buttercups or crowfoots; ‘long purples’ could be wild arum or early purple orchids.
He would have seen wild daffodils in the woods and meadows by the River Avon, the River Stour and the Shottery Brook by Anne Hathaway’s cottage, now a popular tourist attraction. He courted Anne, a farmer’s daughter, in the summer of 1582, when he was 18; she was three months pregnant when they married in November that year.
A 1910 fresco of the Temple Garden scene in Henry VI Part 1
So how did her family’s farmyard become one of the world’s best-known cottage gardens? Shakespeare tourism was developing from the late 18th century; then in the 19th century cottage life was romanticised – and gradually Anne’s home was prettified.
The garden’s real revival came in the 1920s and was led by celebrated plantswoman Ellen Willmott. Her budget for revamping the cottage’s garden was £25. The orchard was underplanted with 4,000 bulbs and she designed borders with columbine, lungwort (Pulmonaria), cranesbill and primula. Snake’s head fritillaries have been planted by the brook. Shakespeare knew them well – in his long poem Venus And Adonis, a purple and white chequered flower springs up in the blood of the fallen youth.
Shakespeare’s work allowed him to see other gardens, including at court. At Whitehall, Henry VIII had created a garden of raised flower beds with a fountain, a sundial and gilded heraldic beasts on poles. Shakespeare was also familiar with the Inns of Court – Temple Garden is where the nobles in Henry VI Part 1 pluck white or red roses to show their allegiance to York or Lancaster. But the roses Shakespeare knew were wild hedgerow roses: eglantine (Rosa rubiginosa), burnet rose (R. spinosissima) and dog rose (R. canina). The bank where Titania sleeps in A Midsummer Night’s Dream is ‘canopied’ with ‘musk-roses’ and ‘eglantine’.
Dr John Hall, who married Shakespeare’s daughter Susanna, listed 60 uses for roses in his case notes. The Halls built their house on land Shakespeare gave them in Stratford. The two men were friends – and possibly discussed the use of drugs and potions in his plays. Titania is drugged with the juice of a pansy and the sleeping potion taken by Juliet was possibly sleeping nightshade (Atropa belladonna).
In one remedy he prescribed for a man with dropsy and jaundice, John Hall used liquorice, chicory, watercress, centaury, rhubarb, chamomile and fennel. Some herbs grew in the garden; others had to be collected in the wild. For epilepsy he prescribed peony roots, hung around the neck, and rue and vinegar to be dabbed under the nose.
Gardens are ephemeral; archaeology and letters offer no more than hints about Shakespeare’s gardens. It was claimed in the 18th century, by someone who remembered the family, that Shakespeare laid out his garden ‘in a handsome manner’ – and it is not unthinkable that, with his love of plants and his growing prosperity, he created a garden of his own – filled with scent, his favourite flowers, and maybe copying the fashionable ideas of the day.
WHY EVERY DAY WAS SALAD DAY
In Shakespeare’s day, vegetables were a staple; for poor households, they were almost the only food. ‘Sallet’ was the name for all plants grown for eating, while ‘herbs’ had specific uses. In reality, a ‘sallet’ was a mix of herbs, vegetables and what we would today call salad crops – radishes (above) and lettuce – all dressed with oil, vinegar and sugar.
Globe artichokes were commonly grown in kitchen gardens; they had been cultivated first by the Romans in Britain and had a revival in the 16th century. It wasn’t until 100 years later that the writer and gardener John Evelyn divided salads into those to be eaten uncooked (including rocket and purslane) and those to be cooked (including endive, cabbage and lettuce).
Adapted by Mary Greene from Shakespeare’s Gardens by Jackie Bennett, published by Frances Lincoln, £25. To order a copy for £18.75 (25% discount) visit mailbookshop.co.uk or call 0808 272 0808, p&p free on orders over £12. Offer valid until 2 April 2016.
Read more: Shakespeare's most magical plots: To commemorate the 400th anniversary of his death, an enchanting new book visits the gardens the Bard drew his inspiration from | Daily Mail Online
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
Last edited:
