I've seen enough cloisers and cloister gardens in Europe to occupy my brain for a lifetime, but we went down to The Cloisters yesterday with friends to go on the Medieval Gardening tour. The museum overlooks the Hudson River near the northern tip of Manhattan, not far from where Alexander Hamilton's farm and country house was located.
Good fun. 1 1/2 hrs. Excellent docent, clearly loves her topic. She spent 15 minutes on the plants in the 15th C. unicorn tapestries besides going outdoors to discuss the medieval gardens. (I think most people go to the Cloisters just to see the unicorn tapestries, the subject of which is a symbolic mingling of romantic and sexual love with Christianity but it is difficult to understand them without an informed introduction to them.)
A Hortus conclusus is an enclosed garden, taken by monks from the Roman enclosed gardens, with a Christian symbolic gloss. (As I always say, if you want to understand the Romans, one must look at oneself. We of the Anglosphere are Romans.)
It's taken me many years to learn one thing: Wwherever you go, Always Take The Tour first. Be humble and learn.
That's the Hudson River in the distance.
More pics below the fold -
15th C German, for ceremonies
Catching the unicorn:
