DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16633#0325
The English Landscape Garden
up, and these adjoined the old castle, which still kept its mediaeval style. The pleasure-
garden proper was m great part destroyed through the burning of the castle m 1774..
There was no more talk in Goethe's time of the park and the fertile canal gardens
alongside; but in the park there was now the so-called "Stern (star)," then a public walk,
a well-known spot, a space full of trees and shrubs—ancient trees planted in straight lines,
trees which rose high into the air; also many avenues and broad plots for meetings and
entertainments. Besides all this, there was a high place, the Schneckenberg (Fig. 595), with
winding paths up to a castle—still standing even in the nineteenth century—in whose green-
clad walls were windows and little turrets; this was always the special sign of an old park.
Quite near here Charles Augustus in 1776 had built a summer-house to give to his friend,
FIG. 595. THE PARK AT WEIMAR—THE SCHNECKENBERG
with a terrace-garden adjoining. The fire at the castle and the destruction of the old
gardens had not only made a bare space, but "the lordliest persons, robbed of a home
suited to their comfort and their station, betook themselves to the open."
Directly after Goethe had composed his little idyll about the Luisenkloster, as the
hermitage (Fig. 596) was called, "people loved to go back to the place. The young prince
liked to spend the night there, and for his pleasure they erected the rum and a sham
campanile." What looked like a rum was an old shooting-stand, built out of the stones
of the burnt castle. And now that the paths were also transformed to suit a romantic
necessity; "they wound about (Fig. 597), now over rocks, now under arches, now passing
out into the light; with their empty, wild aspect, and here and there a hollow place or
a seat, they gave some idea of the famous rock-paths of Chinese gardens."
Here we find the first picture of the kind of garden which Goethe so happily called
"aesthetic," to indicate the sentiment of his time. Thus out of a romantic necessity
came into existence one picture after another, mostly started as a setting for some
up, and these adjoined the old castle, which still kept its mediaeval style. The pleasure-
garden proper was m great part destroyed through the burning of the castle m 1774..
There was no more talk in Goethe's time of the park and the fertile canal gardens
alongside; but in the park there was now the so-called "Stern (star)," then a public walk,
a well-known spot, a space full of trees and shrubs—ancient trees planted in straight lines,
trees which rose high into the air; also many avenues and broad plots for meetings and
entertainments. Besides all this, there was a high place, the Schneckenberg (Fig. 595), with
winding paths up to a castle—still standing even in the nineteenth century—in whose green-
clad walls were windows and little turrets; this was always the special sign of an old park.
Quite near here Charles Augustus in 1776 had built a summer-house to give to his friend,
FIG. 595. THE PARK AT WEIMAR—THE SCHNECKENBERG
with a terrace-garden adjoining. The fire at the castle and the destruction of the old
gardens had not only made a bare space, but "the lordliest persons, robbed of a home
suited to their comfort and their station, betook themselves to the open."
Directly after Goethe had composed his little idyll about the Luisenkloster, as the
hermitage (Fig. 596) was called, "people loved to go back to the place. The young prince
liked to spend the night there, and for his pleasure they erected the rum and a sham
campanile." What looked like a rum was an old shooting-stand, built out of the stones
of the burnt castle. And now that the paths were also transformed to suit a romantic
necessity; "they wound about (Fig. 597), now over rocks, now under arches, now passing
out into the light; with their empty, wild aspect, and here and there a hollow place or
a seat, they gave some idea of the famous rock-paths of Chinese gardens."
Here we find the first picture of the kind of garden which Goethe so happily called
"aesthetic," to indicate the sentiment of his time. Thus out of a romantic necessity
came into existence one picture after another, mostly started as a setting for some