Gamemaster: You are standing in a garden outside the palace.
Player One: What type of garden?
GM: ... Very formal.
Player Two: What’s the layout like?
GM: ... Very ... formal.

In a recent game, I re-created the pre-French Reformation Versailles. Because a large part of the action happened around the outside, I found myself researching frantically for pictures of the gardens to determine the layout of the grounds. I did not have as much fun as I normally would.

Truth is gardens usually provide an air of opulence and wealth, which is something you may need to provide to your players.

Here’s a list of the types of gardens you would see in various areas and eras around the world. Use this research to supply your players with all sorts of realistic places to play in. But first we’re going back ... to the dawn of civilization.

Pre-History

Civilizations only just started cultivating plants for food about 10,000 years ago. The different cultures went from hunting-gathering nomads to settled farmers at different times, but progressed relatively quickly once the basics were ironed out. These first farms were designed to produce food at a town-sized or smaller level and the early civilizations struggled to survive through changing climates and numerous natural disasters as the Earth settled. Survival was all that really mattered.

In the early days, however, we can assume that some gardens were quickly invented.

Courtyards: Many earlier houses were designed around a centralized courtyard. The earliest known courtyard is found in Jericho built between 7220 and 5850 BCE. The first courtyards had clay floors and were probably just used for a private outdoor area. Traditionally courtyards were used for everything: cooking, sleeping, working, playing, gardening, and even places to keep animals. These inner courtyards provided air, light, and tranquility in a place that was private and secure. As civilization progressed, the courtyards were developed to become places to grow privately used plants and made to be aesthetically pleasing to those within.

Domestic Garden: A domestic garden is one that is attached to a home. These types of gardens are seen in hieroglyphics from Ancient Egypt. The gardens of the pharaohs included shelters, pools, shady walks, pergolas, and container gardens in terracotta pots.

Herb Gardens: There are records of herb gardens in Ancient Egypt, India, and Rome. In these gardens medicinal and culinary herbs were foremost.

Hunting Parks: Seen first in Ancient Mesopotamia and Ancient China, hunting parks were fenced in areas that could support wildlife for hunting. First conceived for the wealthiest kings and emperors of these nations, this concept spread to other kingdoms throughout the world.

Temple Gardens: Temples were originally built to protect statues of gods from the weather. Since the ornate temples of the ancient eras were constructed similarly to other buildings, we can assume the first temples had courtyards as well. As temples grew, interest was taken in the grounds around the temple, to make these places seem ethereal and awe-inspiring. As temples began to house priests, the gardens became more useful for medicinal and culinary purposes.

Ancient Egypt

Egypt had farms along the Nile where the annual flooding produced a thick mineral-rich soil capable of sustaining two harvests a year. Besides grape vineyards, the Egyptian farmers grew barley, wheat, beans and lentils, leeks and onions, cabbages, radishes, lettuce, and cucumbers. Melons, dates and figs grew up along the oases as travelers discarded the pits there.

Although we can assume the earlier civilizations started gardening for pleasure in Sumer and Ur, our first evidence of a garden comes from ancient Egypt. From a picture found in the Nile Valley, we see a royal scribe and his wife wandering through their garden. They had a rectangular pool of water surrounded by date palms, pomegranates, grape vines, scarlet poppies, and lotus flowers.

Paradise Gardens: These gardens were called “Paradise Gardens,” but not for the reason you would expect. “Paradise” was a Persian word for “wall around.” Typically paradise gardens consisted of a rectangle pool of water with enough of a flow to give the surface movement, and a raised platform from which to view the water. A tent or pavilion sits on the raised area. Formally arranged trees surround the area and the perimeter is walled off to provide privacy. Mostly trees with fruits or strong scents were used. The concept of paradise was the tree of life with a spring at its roots. These gardens later became a standard garden design for Islamic and European countries.

Ancient Arabia/Assyria/Babylonia

Sennacherib, the king of Arabia and Assyria, tore down the old palace at Nineveh and by 703 BC had replaced it with a palace of his own design. This new palace had a park and artificial irrigation with large gardens and he also made several public gardens for the citizens of Nineveh.

Sennacherib’s garden had rare plants and animals, with planting spaces and irrigation channels blasted from the rocks.

Around 600 BCE, Nebuchadnezzar II built the Hanging Gardens of Babylon (also called the Hanging Gardens of Semiramis). It is said he built them for his wife, Amytis of Medea, because she missed the flora of her homeland. These gardens were built on platforms and walls some 25 feet thick and had enough dirt to sustain full-grown trees. This could be considered one of the most impressive and greatest of container gardens.

Zoological Gardens: Similar to hunting parks many of the kings from ancient times would house breeds of flora and fauna that were presented to them from conquered nations. Similar to hunting parks, but without the hunting.

Ancient Greece

In ancient Greece, most of the countryside consisted of farmers trying to eke a living out of the rocky mountainous regions. Barley was difficult to grow and many farmers turned to olive trees and bee-keeping, as well as timber development and flax for linen.

Although personal gardens were probably less known, the Greeks had large gymnasiums for men to come together and practice feats or strength and agility. These well-maintained and carefully laid-out gymnasiums were similar to hunting parks and temple gardens.

Sacred Groves: Sacred Groves were made outside the walled cities of Ancient Greece. Often, they were near springs and had altars for local gods. In time, they came to be used for exercise, worship and education, known as gymnasiums. As works of art and places of knowledge, they were related to the temple gardens of Egypt. But they were public places with seats, rooms for philosophers, swimming pools and courtyards for wrestling and exercise. Alcoves with outdoor seats were used for philosophical debate.

Academy Gardens: In Ancient Greece, the Academy was a sacred grove outside the walls of Athens dedicated to the god Academus and used for teaching. Plato’s used his own garden for teaching his philisophy and this became known as Plato’s Academy.

Ancient Rome

Farms in ancient Rome were small and often run by retired soldiers. Other farms were large estates specifically focused on one crop or another for the state at large.

Rome copied a lot of the Greek garden features. They had sports grounds where the men regularly practiced and exercised. Wealthy Romans owned townhouses that surrounded central courtyards and walled gardens with stone columns, pools, fountains, statues, and terraces. People would eat out here on warm evenings, reclining on couches surrounded by roses, lilies, bay trees, and cypresses. The rich also had herbal gardens for culinary purposes; the Romans were known for their preferences for spiced foods.

Indoor container gardens were common among the richest estates in the Empire.

Classical Court Gardens: By the first century BC, the wealthy Roman might have three types of enclosed outdoor space:

1. A paved yard (atrium), allowing light to enter and giving access to other rooms.
2. A colonnade yard (peristyle), ornamented and often used for outdoor eating.
3. A flower or vegetable garden (xystus).

The peristyle yard, and sometimes the others too, had pools, fountains, altars, trees, shrubs, flowers and statues. Evergreens were favored: bay, myrtle, oleander, rosemary, box, and ivy. In flowers, they liked the rose, iris, lily, violet, daisy, poppy, and chrysanthemum.

Palace Gardens: First seen in Rome, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Minoa, and Macedonia, the kings’ stately abodes had internal courtyards that could be used as rooms themselves. Roman emperors built palace gardens which combined element of the classical courtyard, the gymnasium (sacred grove), and the hunting park. In Southern Spain, the Moors also built palace gardens, planned like their Roman predecessors but decorated and ornamented in the Islamic tradition.

Ancient Aztecs

Even the Aztecs far away from the “civilized” regions of the world had well-planted courtyards within the homes of the wealthiest landowners.

Chinampas: The capital city was built on a very swampy area, making gardening a bit more difficult. The Aztecs used Chinampas as a result. Sticky mud was brought from the lake bottom and mixed with compost and manure (sometimes human manure). A raft was made by sinking layers of twigs and branches under the surface of the lake and the enriched mud was poured overtop, creating a wet island that would support a crop by itself. These chinampas were very successful.

Ancient China

Poor people lived in the countryside in simple thatched huts that were noisy, overcrowded, and drafty. Wealthier houses were designed to be in harmony with each other and with nature. In the hot, humid south, courtyards were covered to provide shade and shelter from the elements. In the drier north, courtyards were mostly open.

Chinese gardens offered peace and beauty amidst the hustle and bustle of the city. The wealthy had spacious homes and beautiful gardens filled with peonies, bamboo, and wisteria. Some of these gardens included orchards, ponds, and pavilions. They would floats lotuses on their pools of water and include roses and chrysanthemums among their flowers, and peaches and lychees within their orchards.

In 618 CE, the Emperor Yang-ti, constructsthe vast imperial garden known as “The Western Garden

Chinese Scholar Gardens: Confucius believed civil servants should be chosen on grounds of birth and this led to the development of a class of scholars. Their interest in gardens was not horticulture or agriculture, but in developing an area as befitting their scholarship—places to meditate. These small representations of woods, water, and mountains helped the scholar reach cooler, fresher places.

The 17 elements of a scholar’s garden are:

1. near or at the home
2. small
3. walled
4. small individual sections
5. asymmetrical
6. various types of spatial connections
7. architecture
8. rocks
9. water
10. trees
11. plants
12. sculpture
13. jie jing (borrowed scenery)
14. chimes
15. incense burners
16. inscriptions
17. use of feng shui for choosing site.

Ancient Japan

The amount of land that was suitable for growing was very precious on the islands, so the Japanese had to make the most of it for growing food and for pleasure gardening. All Japanese that could afford it surrounded their homes with beautiful gardens where they could exercise, read, and entertain. These gardens were small but arefully planned to create miniature landscapes that looked good from whichever side they were viewed upon in every season. Some gardens, called Zen gardens, had no plants at all but coaxed beauty out of rocks and lines in the surrounding sand.

One principle common to all Japanese gardens is enclosure, though the small amount of space often available in Japan often makes enclosure inevitable, but even when a large area is available, enclosure is usually desirable. The exception to this is with the principle of shakkei, or borrowed scenery. Enclosure not only makes the garden into a private space with the potential for quiet and calm, but the enclosing element can also serve as a background for the compositions and other elements in the garden. The sky is also a crucial element which must be enclosed in a garden. The sky represents yang, and the earth represents yin. If there is too much sky, there is an imbalance. Subtle internal barriers such as elevation changes can also be used within the garden to separate different areas.

Ancient India

Gardens were an indispensable feature of ancient times among rich Aryans. When Buddha arrived on the scene the pleasure gardens of the rulers became public so veryone could enjoy them. Gardens were attached to the houses of the rich and includedflowering plants and trees, vegetables, and a well or tank in the center. The garden was kept by the woman of the house who was to save all the seeds from the vegetable and medicinal plants. Bowers and vine groves with raised platforms completed the garden, as well as a swing under a canopy.

The public gardens were favorite places for the townspeople to relax and have picnics. Treaties on horticulture and landscape design were prominent throughout the ages.

Up Next: The Developing European/Mediterranean Traditions of Gardening