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History behind much-loved green, green grass of home
Oct 20 2007 By Graham Porter, Huddersfield Daily Examiner
Lawns – love them or hate them, we have had variations on the word for a very long time and, despite the changes in gardening styles in recent years, the weekly grass cutting will probably continue in Britain for many years to come.
If you look the word up in a dictionary you will find that it describes a lawn as an open space between woods, although the word did not occur in the English language until the latter part of the 17th Century and was not used in its modern interpretation until the middle of the 18th century.
Go back in history even further to the 1st century and areas of ‘lawn’ were used in Roman villas but were made of a mixture of wild flowers, a flowery mead, that gave off a wonderful scent when walked on.
I suppose that bathing and general hygiene were probably not what they are today and a nice smelling ‘lawn’ may well have helped to disguise the bodily odours. The chamomile lawns of today give the same effect.
In the 14th century linear areas were made for the playing of bowls and the lawns would have been made of herbs. By the early 1600’s the lawn, as we know it, had come into being and was made from grass turfs cut out of wild grassland and then beaten flat with ‘beetles’ or wooden mallets.
The grass was cut with scythes and was very soon seen as a status symbol by the gentry. In 1625 Francis Bacon was praising the new garden feature…… ‘because nothing is more pleasant to the Eye that Greene Grasse, kept finely shorn.’
By the early 18th century our forebears were able to put a new lawn down using grass seed, although the quality of the grass was nothing compared with the quality of modern grass species and hybrids.
As gardening styles changed from the strict formality of the 16th and 17th centuries to the relaxed landscape style of the early 18th century and beyond, through the work of William Kent and Lancelot Brown, the expanses of manicured grass increased dramatically and the range of tools to care for it increased alongside.
With scything, rolling, brushing and edging, the lawn began to take on a more modern appearance.
In 1830 Edwin Budding changed the whole outlook that the British gardener had of the lawn when he invented the cylinder mower.
Up to that point, the process had been very labour intensive, requiring gardeners to scythe the lawns and their labourers to pick up the cuttings. Budding had taken the cylinder mower technology from the cotton industry and changed our outlook on grass care for ever. The rest, as they say, is history!!
So, the next time that you step out onto your green carpet, remember the complex history of this piece of British gardening – there is nothing quite like it anywhere else in the world.
In the first article of the new monthly series on the selection, cultivation and values of vegetables, starting on November 17th, I will be looking at one of my favourite Brassicas, the Brussels Sprout.
Yes, I know, according to some radio presenters, they should have been boiling since August to get them ready for Christmas but I prefer mine to be slightly al dente and so will not be putting them on to boil until about twenty minutes before Christmas dinner is ready to be served.
If you have any favourite recipes for Brussels Sprouts that you would like to share with the rest of Huddersfield, please send them in to the usual address at Graham’s Favourite Vegetables, Features Office, Huddersfield Daily Examiner, PO Box A26, Queen Street South, Huddersfield, HD4 7SP.
Skelmanthorpe and District Chrysanthemum Society have announced that their Late Flowering Show, due on November 3rd, has been cancelled. Will all competitors and visitors please note.
