Cecil, Evelyn: A history of gardening in England (London: Quaritch, 1896)

EARLY TUDOR GARDENS.

87

was adopted, as well as the straight-railed beds. This was
the “knotted bed,” or knot. They were laid out in curious
and complicated geometrical patterns. By the year 1520, the
style was in common use, and most of our English gardens
could boast of some kind of novel knotted bed. Cavendish
writes of Hampton Court, it was “ so enknotted it cannot be
expressed.” The earth in the knots was either raised a little,
being kept in its place by borders of bricks and tiles, or, as was

A proper knot to becaftiiithe quartcrof a Garden, or other-
wife, as there isfuniaentroome.


KNOT FROM THE GARDENER’S LABYRINTH.

more often the case, it was on the same level as the paths,
and then the divisions were made with box, thrift, and so on.
Generally, the beds were planted inside their thick margins,
with ornamental flowers or small shrubs, somewhat as “carpet
beds ” are now laid out; but, sometimes, instead of plants,
they were filled with variously coloured earths. In the
household accounts of the Duke of Buckingham, in 1502,
there is an entry of 3s. 4b. being paid to “John Wynde, gardener,