Darwin’s Plant Carrier (Vasculum) from the Beagle

Dear Readers, on Thursday I popped to the British Library – I needed to renew my Readers’ Pass, following the massive cyberattack on the library last year, and I also wanted to see “Unearthed – The Power of Gardening” before it finishes on 10th August.

The Readers’ Pass must be one of the best bargains in London. All of those books and manuscripts (and sheet music) for free! No wonder there was a hefty queue. I always find the staff at the Library endlessly polite and patient, and there is also a rather fine new café which is always something of a draw.

New caff at the British Library

Anyhow, I was not just here for cake (a scurrilous rumour) and so off I went to the exhibition. As is usual at the British Library, there were many, many books, but also some things I didn’t expect, such as the vasculum that Charles Darwin had with him on the Beagle (vasculi were used to hold plant specimens). The exhibition had sections on medieval gardens, gardening for food, medicinal plants, community gardening, guerrilla gardening, plant collecting and colonialism, and gardening for pollinators, so when I came out my head was absolutely spinning. However, here are a few highlights.

The book above is the only known Anglo-Saxon herbal – it advises that chamomile is good for sore eyes (and indeed I’ve been known to use a cold chamomile teabag when my eyes have been playing up), but the plant on the left with a snake under it was known as ‘hart’s fern’, and was said to be good for snake bite.

This is the first known article on the poinsettia, that mainstay of Christmases everywhere….

Gertrude Jekyll’s gardening boots!

And above are Gertrude Jekyll’s gardening boots, looking suspiciously as if they may have been re-soled. I admire the hobnails, though.

The section on Gardens and Food had some splendid WWII posters…

…some photos of people from the UK’s many different communities working their allotments…

and this rather wonderful painting of the humble cabbage.

A Wardian case

The Victorians are responsible for introducing thousands of plant species to the UK, and many of them were carried here in Wardian cases, which acted as a kind of mini-greenhouse. In some cases, local people were recruited to help with the hunt for unusual and rare plants and were paid for their labour, but Sir John Sloane used to quiz slaves about the way in which various plants were used. Artists were taken on plant-hunting trips to illustrate the plants, and some of the illustrations are strikingly beautiful, such as the one of a rhododendron below. If the Victorians had known quite how invasive some species of rhododendron were going to turn out (not to mention Japanese knotweed, giant hogweed and Himalayan balsam) maybe they’d have thought twice.

Some of the most interesting sections,  though, were where people were reasserting their power through gardening, whether by taking over land and planting  allotments, or guerrilla gardening. One project that particularly stood out for me was The Pansy Project. Artist Paul Harfleet has been planting pansies at sites of homophobic abuse since 2005, and has written a book, Pansy Boy, about bullying, and being different, and how the love of the natural world and of beauty can help.

So, I left the exhibition with my head spinning. There are so many things to think about here – after all, gardening has meant so many things to so many people. But what really came across was the way that growing plants is so often a force for good, be it through providing food or medicine, bringing people together, or broadening peoples’ horizons. It’s well worth a look if you’re in London, but hurry – it finishes next week.

https://events.bl.uk/exhibitions/unearthed-the-power-of-gardening