1654 Garden

1654 Francis Cleyn (After); Wenceslaus Hollar (Print made by) John Ogilby's The Works of Publius Virgilius Maro (London 1654, Virgil's 'Georgics', p 88)

1650 Discovering a Garden in a Painting Background - Herman Mijnerts Doncker (1620-1656)

Herman Mijnerts Doncker (Dutch, 1620-1656) 1650 Dutch Family Group in a Garden

Dutch artist Pieter de Hooch 1629-1684 paints City Gardens & Courtyards

Pieter de Hooch (Dutch artist, 1629-1684) Company in the Garden

1645 A Dear Surprise in the Spring Garden

1645 Joachim von Sandrart (After) Joachim von Sandrart (Published by) Jonas Suyderhoef Dutch - April

1644 Spring is a lot of work...

1644 David Teniers the Younger (1610–1690) Gardeners in Spring

1640-1660 Music before the Village Garden

1640-60 in the style of Joos de Momper the younger A Music Party before a Village Garden

A Man, a Woman, a Cherub, & A Dog exploring love & odors in a 17C Garden

Crispin de Passe (1565-1637), The Five Senses - Smell

17C English Gardens by L Knyff (1652-1722) & J Kip (1653-1722)

 Dyrham the Seat of William Blathwait Esq. 

A Garden in the Background - 1645 English Garden

Mathew Babington 1612-1669 of Rothley Temple, Leicestershire, painted in 1645 during the Civil War (1642–1651). Probably painted by Daniel Mytens (Anglo-Dutch artist 1590-1647) or one of his followers.

 Matthew Babington was a lawyer who was called to the bar in 1639. He must have done well during the war, as he is expensively dressed in a black silk doublet slashed in the sleeves & body. He presents himself as very upper-class & very up-to-date.

In the background of the portrait appears to be the up-to-date formal gardens of his Rothley Temple, where his family had lived for about 80 years. Gardens grew larger during the Stuart period as the influence of French & Dutch formal gardens brought features such as the long avenues & terraces seen above.  

The Medieval garden was fading from the English countryside, as influences from Renaissance Italy began to infiltrate English Tudor gardens. These included greater regularity of design & the relationship between the garden & the façade of the house, along with architectural features in the layout of the gardens appeared. 

Knot gardens, geometric beds edged with a low hedge of box or other shrubs appear in this painting. These garden beds of interlacing patterns were designed to be seen from the windows above the garden, & they were usually filled with herbs & popular flowers of the period such as gilly-flowers & carnations.

1729 Map 0f Rothley Temple Landscape & Gardens.  This shows evidence of a formal garden around the manor house. To the east of the Manor House is an area titled ‘Green Court’ with a barn & dovecote. To the south is a stable & a malt house & to the west are the formal gardens. Between these & the Rothley Brook are 2 stew ponds. There is a mill on the Brook & an orchard beyond, to the south east. 

Rothley Temple originally belonged to the Knights Templar from 1203, then to the Knights Hospitaller until their suppression in the 1560s, when it was acquired by the Babingtons.

In 1312, the Knights Templars were suppressed by Pope Clement V, who pronounced that the lands which they had held should be handed over to the Knights Hospitaller, in order to continue the support of the cause in the Holy Land. The  Knights Hospitaller, like the Knights Templars, were warrior monks, & already held lands in Leicestershire. They administered their local soke jurisdiction or franchise from Rothley & probably leased out sections of the property to sub-tenants. Soke was the right in Anglo-Saxon & early English law to hold court & administer justice with a granted franchise & to receive certain fees or fines arising from it.  The jurisdiction could be over a territory or over people or some combination of both.

Some of the Knights Hospitallers were named within the Rothley court documents, including a number of members of the Babington family, shown as knights in the early 16C. On 24th June 1529, a lease for 29 years was granted to Humphrey Babington, by the Prior & Brethren of the Order of the of the Knights Hospitallers. 

At the time of the Dissolution of the Knights Hospitaller in 1540, Humphrey Babington retained the manor house & certain of its lands, but the bulk of the estate, which had been owned by the  Knights Hospitallers, reverted to the Crown. 

The Babington lease was subsequently extended but it was not until 1565, during the reign of Elizabeth I, that the entire estate passed to Humphrey Babington, grandson of the Humphrey above. The Babington family continued to hold the manor house & the estate through many generations, until 1845. The house still stands; now known as Rothley Court, it has been an hotel since 1960.

17C English Gardens by L Knyff (1652-1722) & J Kip (1653-1722)

 Dumbleton the Seat of Sr Richard Cocks Bart 

17C Burton Constable, in the East Riding before Capability Brown

Burton Constable, in the East Riding

There is early evidence of formal gardens close to the house in a document of 1610, when the Dowager Lady Margaret Constable was given access to "two litle gardens adjoyneinge upon & lieing near unto the Northe Tower & one parcell of ground called North garth adjoyn. upon the aforesaid gardens."

In the 13C the Constables added their name to the manor of Burton (meaning settlement at a fortified dwelling). The lower part of the north tower, known as Stephen’s Tower, is the oldest part of the house that survives & had served to protect the village since the reign of King Stephen in the 12C. In the late 15C a new brick manor house was built at Burton Constable, eventually replacing Halsham as the family’s principal seat. Much of this was demolished in the 1560s when Sir John built "a new addition of a greater beauty." The new Elizabethan mansion at Burton Constable incorporated remains of the earlier manor house including the north lodgings wing & north tower, both of which were updated with new stone mullioned windows & mock quoins to match the new building.

A survey carried out in 1621 by William Senior of Hull indicates that by then the park was made up of a series of enclosures with the main entrance to the house from the east, approached by a walk or avenue. The ancient moat stretched around 2 sides of the hall, to the west there were three long narrow fishponds.

Detail Burton Constable, in the East Riding

An early painting shows a wall surmounted by urns, with a central entrance arch flanked by turrets enclosing formal gardens between the 2 east wings, with a secondary forecourt to the east with central gates and urns ranged along the top of the walls.

Sir John’s transformation included the addition of a new range with a great hall, parlor & great chamber, together with a south wing that had another tower to harmonise with the surviving north tower. This south wing contained a kitchen, additional lodgings & a chapel. A turreted gatehouse & courtyards, together with a stable block adjacent to the north wing can be seen in the painting of the house that hangs in the Great Hall.

In 1715 considerable work was undertaken for William, 4th Viscount Dunbar in leveling land for new gardens. It seems likely that a lawn was created at this time on the west front, and to the north a grove containing a geometrical arrangement of paths.

The Entrance Front, Burton Constable George Barret the elder (1728-32–1784) 1777

Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown was commissioned from 1772-82 to landscape the gardens & parkland.

17C English Gardens by L Knyff (1652-1722) & J Kip (1653-1722)

 Doddington in the County of Lincolne, the Seate of the Honble. Sr. Thomas Hussey Barrett.

17C Amsterdam Country House (1637-1712)

Jan van der Heyden (1637-1712) The Château of Goudestein, on the River Vecht, near Maarsen. The banks of the Amstel and the Vecht River near Maarsen provided the most popular sites for the country houses of Amsterdam.

17C English Gardens by L Knyff (1652-1722) & J Kip (1653-1722)

 Didmarton the Seat of Robert Codrington Esq 

1690s Park & Formal Gardens of Zorgvliet at Catshuis in The Hague

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. General view of the beautiful park of Sorgvliet [Zorgvliet]

An estate at Sorghvliet, near The Hague in South Holland, was established in 1651 by the statesman & author, Jacob Cats (1577-1660). The original building was known as Catshuis. The formal gardens were a part of the 1651 estate.

After Cats' death in 1660. The building & grounds were redesigned & expanded by Hans Willem Bentinck (1649-1709), the Earl of Portland, who was the superintendant of King William's estate near Apeldoorn, Het Loo, & the royal gardens in England. The garden was designed in the highly decorative baroque taste, lined by orderly rows of topiaries & trees, & with symmetrical & geometric trimmed hedges.

A set of 32 illustrations by Johannes van den Aveele (1650-1712) were produced by Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher during the 1690s. Johannes van den Aveele (or Avelen) was a Dutch-born artist, cartographer & engraver. After the death of Willem Swidde, the artist was called to Sweden in 1698, to work on a major work Suecia Antiqua et Hodierna [Ancient & Modern Sweden], containing 160 illustrations by Aveele, which was published in 1716. Aveele remained in Sweden for the rest of his life. Later he held a post in the Dutch church in Stockholm, where he died in poverty.

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. One of the most beautiful views of the parterre of the park of Sorgvliet [Zorgvliet]

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. The parterres of the flower garden

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. Terrace No. 11, on both sides and with long and square green hedges

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. General view of the orangerie

ohannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. Green berceaux

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. Mount Parnassus

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. Vivarium for foreign and local birds

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. The beautiful grotto

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. The grotto with its cascades seen from the side

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. The large vivarium with the green berceaux

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. The very artful gotto with its cascades and fountains

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. Allée

Johannes van den Aveele (Dutch artist, 1650-1712) for Amsterdam printer Nicolaus Visscher 1690s. Catshuis. Fountain in the latticework gate [next to the parterre garden]