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| Cawdor Gardens |
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Introduction | The Walled Garden | The Flower Garden | The Wild Garden | Auchindoune Gardens
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| The Walled Garden |
The Walled Garden is the oldest garden and is towards the north east of the castle. It was enclosed with walls and bastions in 1620, and cultivated in the old-fashioned manner where soft fruit, flowers, vegetables and orchards were mingled closely together.
The family records mention Orchards at Cawdor in 1635. In the first half of the 17th century, home-grown and local seeds were presumably used solely, and the first note of imported foreign seed occurs in 1681: French sorrel and lamb's lettuce. By 1960 the list of exotic seed is becoming lengthy and includes Savoy kale, endive, Indian cress, Spanish thistle, Turkish parsley, all sorts of herbs and, for the first time, an ornamental flower - double hollyhock. Up to that date flowers perhaps were neglected: in those turbulent Scottish days, the emphasis was on survival. By 1722, the list of alien seeds is quite extensive and embraces Strasburg onion, Flanders onion, Dutch Parsnip, celery, Siletia lettuce and skirret and gradually this area became a kitchen garden.
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In 1981 Lord Cawdor decided to remodel this garden and plant a holly maze. The pattern for this was taken from a design set in the mosaic floor of the ruined Roman villa of Conimbriga in Portugal, and which in classical form depicts the Minotaur's labyrinth at Knossos in Crete, a conundrum devised, mythologically, by Daedelus. In the second half of the garden is a paradise garden, knot garden and thistle garden, as well as an orchard that has been planted with Old Scottish fruit trees.
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