Trust Publications

and publications associated with members of
Hertfordshire Gardens Trust's Research Group

Medieval Parks of Hertfordshire Medieval Parks of Hertfordshire
Anne Rowe

To date over sixty medieval parks have been identified in Hertfordshire – a large number for a relatively small county. In this ground-breaking study of parks created between the 11th and 15th Centuries Anne Rowe has adopted an holistic approach to landscape history. Geographical locations have been determined and mapped and a documentary history of each park complied to give an insight into park management in medieval times.

There is also a detailed analysis of the parks and their owners alongside how the parks related to the physical and social geography of the county at the time – there was a marked difference in the numbers of parks in different parts of the county and reasons for this are explored focusing on the unusual relationship between the distribution of the parks and the distribution of woodland at Domesday.

This book opens a window onto medieval Hertfordshire and shows a significant aspect of the county's landscape heritage. To buy a copy go to www.herts.ac.uk/UHPress and click on the link to Hertfordshire Publications


Parks in Hertfordshire since 1500 Parks in Hertfordshire since 1500
Hugh Prince

An authoritative history of Hertfordshire's great parks, looking at the cultural, political and economic influences on their changing fortunes over the past 500 years.

Over the centuries, the county's proximity to the capital proved particularly attractive to ambitious and acquisitive newcomers, with great houses and their parks changing owners at a rapid rate. When it came to the design and development of their parkland, landowners followed the prevailing fashions from keeping in step with courtly enthusiasm for deer-hunting in the 16th Century to embracing the golden age of landscape gardening in the 18th Century. Against this backdrop, Hugh Prince examines the business of managing parks as crucial elements of landed estates and establishes the special role played by parks in the display of landowners' power.

To buy a copy of Parks in Hertfordshire since 1500, go to www.herts.ac.uk/UHPress and click on the link to Hertfordshire Publications


Hertfordshire Garden History: a miscellanyHertfordshire Garden History: a miscellany (2007)
Edited by Anne Rowe

A book of essays written by Members of HGT's Research Group and Conservation Team with an introductory chapter by Professor Tom Williamson, Chair in Landscape History at the University of East Anglia

Essays include:

To buy a copy of Hertfordshire Garden History: A miscellany go to http://www.herts.ac.uk/UHPress/ and click on the link to Hertfordshire Publications



A history of Knebworth's ParksA history of Knebworth's Parks (2005)
Anne Rowe, The Herfordshire Gardens Trust

Research by Anne Rowe into the landscape of the parish reveals the existence at different times of no fewer than three parks at Knebworth. This well illustrated narrative reveals the locations of the two medieval parks and then describes the development of the Knebworth Park which replaced them, from the l7th Century to the present day.

To buy a copy of this book send a cheque for £5.00 (£3.50 plus £1.50 p&p) made payable to Anne Rowe, 8 Hamels Mansion, Knights Hill, Buntingford SG9 9NA.







The Parks and Gardens of West HertfordshireThe Parks and Gardens of West Hertfordshire (2000)
Tom Williamson and the Hertfordshire Gardens Trust

This book represents the results of investigations of historic landscapes west of a line drawn along the old Watling Street (the A5) as far north as the M25, then along the M25 to the M1 and then as far north as the county boundary. This district has a certain topographical coherence. It represents in effect the towns of Berkhamsted, Hemel Hempsted, Watford and Rickmansworth and the parishes and their hinterlands. It embraces the valleys of the Gade and Bulbourne and that of the lower Colne.

Several country houses around which the most extensive designed grounds were laid out were demolished in the last century and where they do survive, they are now mostly used as schools, conference centres and hotels with golf courses, playing fields and farms. Neverthless we discovered examples of the work of some of the greatest English garden designers – Charles Bridgeman, Capability Brown, Humphry Repton, Edward Kemp and Thomas Mawson.

Some 42 gardens in all are featured taking the reader through from gardens before the 18th Century, early 18th Century landscapes, the age of the landscape park, picturesque and gardenesque, high Victorian landscapes and the late 19th Century and beyond. The book is 118 pages long and is filled with beautiful black and white and colour photographs.

To buy a copy of this book, send a cheque for £14.00 (£12 plus £2.00 p&p) made payable to Herfordshire Gardens Trust to: Hertfordshire Gardens Trust, c/o Gardens, Ashridge, Berkhamsted , HP4 1NS



Hertfordshire Gardens on Ermine StreetHertfordshire Gardens on Ermine Street (1996)
Richard Bisgrove and The Hertfordshire Gardens Trust

The Trust's first publication and the story of some great gardens along Ermine Street (the A10) featuring designers such as Humphry Repton, Capability Brown and more recent designers such as Brenda Colvin. There is a gazetteer of over 100 gardens with descriptions and synopses of some of the more important gardens such as Haileybury – and the East India Company, Hertford Castle, Hamels, Julians Park – described in the l930s as one of the most beautiful in the country, Wormley Bury and Youngsbury.

To buy a copy of this book, send a cheque for £4.50 (£3.00 plus £1.50 p&p) made payable to Hertfordshire Gardens Trust to Hertfordshire Gardens Trust, c/o Gardens, Ashridge, Berkhamsted, HP4 1NS