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| Anita's creatively crafted lawn at Toad Hall |
…The history of the lawn begins at least 900 years ago in
Great Britain and Northern France, both of which have maritime climates with
relatively mild winters and warm humid summers that are ideal for many
different grasses. In its inception, the word ‘lawn’ may have referred to
communal grazing pastures—clearings in the woods where sheep and other
livestock continually munched wild grass into submission. Even today, some
place names retain the memory of these early lawns: Balmer Lawn in England, for
example, encompasses 500 acres of grass pasture. Soon enough, people found
other uses for grasses: aesthetics, sport and leisure. King Henry II (1113 to
1189) had gardens at Clarendon Palace that boasted ‘a wealth of lawns’ and
Henry III (1216 – 1272) ordered laborers to slice up tracts of naturally
occurring turf and transplant them to his palace. The world’s oldest bowling
green, in Southampton, England, has been maintained since at least 1299.
In ancient
times, lawns were not always expanses of unbroken green, however. Some medieval
paintings of gardens depict carpets of turfgrass stippled with various flowers,
such as lily of the valley, poppies, cowslips, primroses, wild strawberries,
violets, daisies, and daffodils. People walked, danced and relaxed on these
flowery meads, which were meant to imitate natural meadows. In the 15th and
16th centuries, Europeans used white clover, chamomile, thyme, yarrow,
self-heal (Prunella vulgaris) and other low-growing meadow and groundcover
plants—sometimes mixed with grasses—to create lawns and pathways on which to
walk and mingle. In the early 1900s, a weed known as cotula (Leptinella dioica)
began invading bowling lawns in New Zealand. When the groundsman of the
Caledonian Bowling Club tried to get rid of the weed by scarifying the lawn, he
only quickened its spread. Rugby players noticed, however, that they ran faster
and played better on the tightly knit, smooth carpet formed by the weed than on
grass. By 1930, Caledonian Bowling Club replaced all its grass with cotula;
other clubs did the same.
For most of
history, however, mixed plant lawns and non-grass lawns have been the
exception, in part because a smooth, well-kept, lush grass lawn became as much
a symbol as a functional part of one’s property. In the early 19th century,
vast grass lawns surrounding manors were not only aesthetically pleasing—providing
unobstructed views of an estate—they were also further proof of wealth. To keep
their lawns neat and trim, British aristocrats and landed gentry had to look
after grazing animals—most commonly a flock of sheep—or hire laborers to slice
through overgrown grass with scythes….
You can read his fascinating post here.
This entry was posted
at Wednesday, August 07, 2013
and is filed under
Beauty,
Creation,
Creation care,
Science
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