Hortus
（
κῆπος). A garden. Gardens among the ancients were usually
of a strictly utilitarian character. Even the mythical garden of Alcinoüs, described
in the
Odyssey (vii. 112-130), is divided into a fruit-garden, a vineyard, and
a kitchengarden, with no mention of flowers; and when, in later times, flower-gardens are
spoken of (e. g.
κήπους εὐώδεις,
Aves,
1066), they are probably gardens in which flowers were cultivated for profit. The
ancients, in fact, had much less love of landscape beauties than the moderns, and some of
their garden arrangements seem shocking to modern taste. Longus (
Pastoralia,
ii. 3) describes a garden in which flowers were mingled with fruits; and Plutarch says that
the beauty of roses and violets is enhanced by planting them side by side with onions and
leeks! The suburbs of Athens abounded in market-gardens, which supplied the city with both
flowers and vegetables (Pliny ,
Pliny H. N. xxxvi.
18). Plato speaks of books on gardening (
Min. p. 316 E).
Roman gardens are described in two letters of the Younger Pliny (ii. 17; v. 6), from which
it appears that they were rather prim and formal in their plan, with regular walks (
ambulationes) lined by closely-clipped hedges of box, yew, and cypress; and
diversified with statues, pyramids, and summer-houses (
diaetae). As in
modern Italy and in France under Louis XV., so at Rome the trees and shrubs were often cut
into figures of animals, ships, letters, and grotesque forms (
ars
topiaria), so that the regular name for an ornamental gardener is
topiarius. (Cf. Pliny,
H. N. xvi. 140;
xxi. 68;
xxii. 76.) The principal flowers known to the
ancients were the rose, violet, crocus, narcissus, lily, iris, poppy, amaranth, and gladiolus.
Conservatories with windows closed by
specularia (windows of talc) are
mentioned by the writers of the first century A.D. (
Mart.viii. 14
and 68;
Epist. 90; Pliny ,
Epist. ii. 17). Columella speaks of
forcing-houses for grapes and melons. For flowers in private houses see
Domus.
Ornamental gardens were called
viridaria. The regular name for a
gardener is
cultor hortorum, vilicus, viridarius, and
topiarius.
Hortus pensĭlis is a term meaning
1.
a hanging (i. e. terraced) garden (see
Babylon); and
2.
a frame like our frames for melons and cucumbers, and used for forcing vegetables and
fruits. See Pliny,
H. N. xix. 64.
