Читать книгу The Essential Aromatherapy Garden - Julia Lawless - Страница 11

THE MEDIEVAL MONASTIC GARDEN

During the Middle Ages, the monasteries not only served as spiritual centres to the community but they were also seats of learning. The study of plants was one of the main areas of intellectual endeavour since herbal medicine was the most common method of treating illness. Concern for physical healing was a mark of Christian philosophy and thus based primarily on practical considerations. Thus the ‘cloister’ garden developed which was devoted to growing useful medicinal herbs and aromatic plants, as well as providing a place of contemplation for the monks.

This style of garden, known in medieval England as the ‘cloister garth’, was a large, enclosed garden with a beautifully kept green lawn in the centre of the monastery or cathedral. Surrounded by stone cloisters with a covered arcade, it provided a place where the monks could stroll in leisurely contemplation or sit at peaceful leisure and view the passing day.

These cloister garths were formally laid out, and often divided into four sections similar to Roman villa gardens. It was originally as a reaction against urbanised Rome that monastic Christianity had arisen with its keen interest in agriculture and gardening – yet Rome still proved pivotal in its horticultural influence in Britain. Water was frequently found in these gardens, as in the early Islamic paradise gardens, and the monks could meditate on the elements. The formal ordering of the cloister garden was also conducive to a state of restful ease – a tranquil haven where the monks or nuns could find the peace that ‘passeth all understanding’. Sometimes an orchard was planted at the sacred eastern end and was used as a place for contemplation on death and the eternal life. The ‘physic’ garden was generally found to the north of the eastern end of the church or sometimes in the cloisters or courtyards besides the church. The famous Benedictine monastery of St Gall in Switzerland, founded in the year 610 AD, served for centuries as an ideal model for monastic gardens throughout Europe. Here, the cloister garth provides the central feature or focal point of the whole design and was divided into four equal sections by footpaths:

The garth is square, an ideal plan based on the description of the Temple built by the Israelites.

(Aben and de Wit, The Enclosed Garden)

Traditional cloister garths can still be found throughout Europe and America, for example at Wells Cathedral, Somerset, in England; at the Basilica of St Francis, Assisi, in Italy; and at the National Cathedral, Washington, in the USA. Within the enclosure, as at St Galls, there were generally two herb gardens: one was the physic garden or infirmary garden, planted with healing medicinal herbs; the second was the kitchen garden. Here, culinary herbs for the table would be grown such as thyme, parsley, rosemary and mint, as well as vegetables – see Chapter 2. Information about medicinal and culinary herbs was exchanged extensively between monasteries over this period. Abbot Benedict of Aniane, in Languedoc, France, is known to have corresponded with his colleagues in Germany and England and exchanged medicinal plants with Alcuin of York around the year 800. In a letter to Charlemagne of France, Alcuin wrote of his hope that:

The French may learn the wonders of gardening from the British, so that a paradise – ‘a garden enclosed’ – may flourish not just in York but also in Tours, and that there might be ‘the plants of paradise’ with the fruits of the orchard.

(Palmer and Manning, Sacred Gardens)

A medieval cloister garden, with surrounding shaded arcade.

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The Islamic world encouraged migration of both ideas and plants from Spain and from the East. It was through the influence of the Byzantine church, however, that the Middle Eastern idea of the aromatic garden found its way into the very heart of European culture, initially in the form of a small paradise garden or flower garden. The flower garden generally lay behind the altar to the east of the church, which itself faced east – thereby facing Jerusalem and the rising sun. This garden was placed in the care of the sacristan – the monk in charge of sacred objects such as the high altar. This shows how important the medieval church considered aromatic and sweet-smelling flowers, which were valued both as symbolic votive offerings and for their intrinsic beauty.

This garden was usually round or semi-circular in structure and provided the sacred aromatic flowers and herbs for decorating the altar. The idea of a walled, perfumed garden was symbolically associated with the Garden of Eden, the original paradise, and was upheld in biblical imagery such as in the Song of Solomon.

In 1260, Albertus Magnus, a Dominican monk, specified the requirements of a perfect pleasure garden in much the same terms as its Persian counterpart, having a fountain at the centre and being redolent with perfume:

… every sweet-smelling herb such as rue, and sage and basil, and likewise all sorts of flowers, as the violet, columbine, lily, rose, iris and the like … behind the lawn there may be great diversity of medicinal and scented herbs, not only to delight the senses of smell by their perfume but to refresh the sight with their flowers.

These medieval monastic gardens had a strong sense of the symbolic connotations of plants, flowers and trees. For example, lungwort (Pulmonaria officinalis) was so called because its leaves, which are speckled and marked, were considered to resemble diseased lungs. Sweet violets represented humility, and the earliest of the cultivated lilies, the fragrant white Madonna lily (Lilium candidum), was linked with the Virgin Mary. Above all, the rose was held in the highest esteem. The red apothecary’s rose (Rosa gallica var. officinalis), was also closely linked with the Virgin Mary and with Christ’s blood. There was a widespread cult of planting ‘Mary gardens’, which featured wildflower meadows: today they are echoed in Christian Marian gardens, which use statues of the Virgin Mary together with lilies and roses, her traditional plants.

A statue of the Virgin Mary in a contemporary Christian Marian garden.

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