Shakespeare Birthplace Trust

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The flowers of Bayleaf garden (Weald & Downland Open Air Museum)

Here at the Weald and Downland Open Air Museum we have 50 traditional rural buildings from South East England saved from destruction, carefully dismantled, conserved and rebuilt on our 45 acre site. They span a period from the late 13th century to the beginning of the 20th century. Three of these buildings, Bayleaf, Winkhurst and Cowfold barn form part of our 1540s Tudor farmstead, which also includes a period garden and orchard. See our twitter diary @Bayleaf1542 on the seasonal life of a typical yeoman farmer at that time. The produce from the garden and orchard is used in our daily demonstrations of seasonal domestic activities.

Most vegetables were home grown and marketed locally. Green leafy vegetables were the most common: kale, colewort, longworts and leaf beet. Parsnips, turnips, leeks, garlic, onions. and skirrets were common. However, some vegetables that are frequently mentioned in recipe books were high status and not widely in use - spinach, artichokes, asparagus, lettuces and carrots, for example. Many plants which we might nowadays term as herbs or even weeds were widely used, such as orach, nettles, sorrel, Good King Henry, fat hen, savory, smallage, parsley, dandelion and ground elder.

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We also grow peas and beans in Bayleaf garden but they were used in such large amounts that they were actually field crops. Peas were of the marrowfat type such as the Carlin Pea, a variety dating back to the 16th Century, and the beans were a field bean rather like small broad beans, such as the 12th Century Martock variety grown we grow - both dry well for winter storage These peas and beans formed the base for many of the pottages that were the main meal, together with bread, in most households. Some of this crop was also used as animal fodder.
The orchard provides us with old varieties of apples, medlars, wardens (pears) and cherry plums.
We also grow many flowers in the Bayleaf garden but, unlike the decorative gardens of the rich, all our flowers are there for a more practical reason than simply looking pretty! So over the coming week I will be introducing a different flower from our garden each day - together the reasons a Tudor housewife found them so useful.

Lesley Parker, Interpretation department