Kenilworth Castle

What is the historical significance of the garden at Kenilworth? What is special about it?

• The garden was created by Lord Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, to impress and woo Queen Elizabeth I, who arrived at Kenilworth on 9 July 1575 and stayed for 19 days, the longest stay with any courtier during her reign. It was the source of great excitement and admiration and was widely considered one of the most beautiful gardens of the Elizabethan age.
  
  Dudley created the garden on the cusp of garden design incorporating both Tudor and Renaissance style, as well as Italianate features. This would have been considered shocking and avant garde at the time as the fashion of the day was for French rather than Italianate style.

What state was the garden in before we embarked on this project? Why was it unsatisfactory?

• Prior to our project the garden at Kenilworth was created in the 1970s by the Ministry of Works based on a mapped survey of Kenilworth Castle of 1656 by Dugdale, which contains a garden layout that may have been little more than a proposal that was not carried out. Our own excavations found no evidence of the garden shown on the Dugdale plan having been carried out before the 1970s.In other words, the 1970s garden was trying to recreate something that never existed, and this has led to concerns that visitors can be misled.
  
  The box and yew plants of the garden were also significantly penetrating the Elizabethan garden archaeology and if left would cause severe damage.

What compelling evidence have you got for your recreation? How much conjecture is there?

• We have two main sources of evidence:
  
  Archaeology
  
  Archaeological excavations in 2004 found evidence of the base of an eight sided fountain. Fragments of Carrera marble were also found which provided clues to the material and colour of the fountain. The position of the boundary of the garden was worked out from the archaeological evidence of the terrace and curtain wall.
  
  Lack of physical evidence was also informative as lack of stone foundations supported the theory that the aviary, terrace balustrades and steps were made of timber and painted to look like stone which was a common practice as the time.
  
  The Laneham letter, also called the Langham letter
  
  This is a rare and detailed eye witness account of the garden, written by a courtier Robert Langham. Known as the Langham letter, it contains the earliest and most complete known description of an Elizabethan pleasure garden. This rare piece of contemporary evidence was the key to recreating the Kenilworth garden as it corroborated archaeological evidence from our own excavations in 2004. 
  
  Where we were able to cross reference evidence from the letter and archaeology we found an exact fit. For example the letter describes ‘a very fair fountain, cast into an eight-square, reared four feet high.’ The archaeology found evidence of an eight sided fountain with each side four feet wide; the letter tells us they were four feet high so we have worked out that each panel is four feet by four feet.
  
  The letter provides much detail of the layout of the garden, the size and detailing of the fountain, aviary and obelisks. The letter tells us where the arbours are placed and the view that can be seen from each. Unfortunately, their design was not mentioned in the letter in any detail.  We have therefore reconstructed  them according to arbours illustrated by Du Cerceau in 1565 from Montargis in France. The Du Cerceau design fitted exactly in place, in scale and proportion with the keep and other garden elements.
  
  Painting of a lost fresco
  
  It is an illustration of a fresco now lost at Newnham Paddox of Kenilworth Castle as it appeared in 1620. It confirmed that 45 years after Elizabeth I’s visit the fountain still existed in the space and gave us more clues as to how it might have looked.

But some people still have doubts about the reliability of Laneham’s letter.

• Langham’s letter is a well known and thoroughly researched academic document and we believe it to be an excellent source material.
  
  Work undertaken by the historian Elizabeth Goldring on Robert Langham has confirmed him as the author of the letter and his profession as a mercer would give him the vocabulary to describe what he saw and an ability to accurately estimate measurements and distances. The very detailed account provides a wealth of information much more than a plan could ever do.

What does the fountain consist of and how accurate is it to the original?

• The fountain is the centrepiece of the garden and features an octagonal basin, the exterior of which is decorated with carvings that illustrate scenes from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. On a central pedestal are two male figures – called ‘Athlants’ – holding a sphere surmounted by a ragged staff ( Dudley’s emblem).
  
  The fountain has been re-created using Langham’s detailed descriptions, archaeological evidence, and painstaking comparative historical research. Archaeological excavations in 2004 and 2006 found evidence of the base of an eight-sided fountain, confirming Langham’s letter. Langham says that the fountain was made of white marble: fragments of Carrara marble were also found which indicated the exact provenance and type of the marble from which the fountain was made. Langham mentions the subjects of five of the panels; the others have been chosen on stylistic and thematic grounds – most significantly because they fit the marine theme indicated by Langham. That the fountain included this type of decoration is confirmed by the survey of the 1590s which records a white marble fountain ‘engraven round about with storie woorke’.
  
  Detailed study has been made of contemporary fountains in England and Europe, including a similar surviving fountain in Austria. The designs of the fountain’s panels are based on 16th-century prints, in line with 16th-century creative practice, and the carving takes inspiration from the style of Cornelius Cure, the pre-eminent funerary sculptor of the day, who worked on fountains for Queen Elizabeth I.

Why resort to using models in the re-creation of the fountain?

• It is very common in sculpture and painting to use life models to get the anatomical details and proportions correct. Michelangelo used a life model for his great statue of David. Our sculptors wanted to have life models to get the proportions and the anatomy of the figure correct.
  
  The purpose of the exercise featured in the documentary was to help the designer and sculptors with a number of aspects of the design, from a visual and practical point of view. The models helped demonstrate the correct positions of the two Athlants, and the mock-up helped establish the proportions of the fountain overall. In addition, given that Langham’s text did not give a definitive answer to the question of whether a ball or a bowl should be used, and that there were strong arguments in favour of both (the strongest argument in favour of the ball was the illustration of the lost fresco, and the strongest argument in favour of the bowl was latest textual analysis of the letter), the experiment was intended to indicate which form would work better in practice. The unanimous decision was that the ball was most successful.

Did the aviary really exist?

• We have not found physical evidence of the aviary but its presence is clear in Laneham’s letter.

How much has the project cost?

• The total cost of recreating the garden is £2.1 million.

Why is it worth spending over £2million of tax payers’ money in recreating this garden?

• Advances in garden archaeology and the survival of the best-ever contemporary description of an Elizabethan garden presented an opportunity that cannot be missed. No where else in the world will you find a more complete picture of a16th century garden, nor a more vivid expression of one of history’s most famous love stories, that of Lord Robert Dudley and Elizabeth I. This will excite people for generations to come and also has immense educational value. The Tudor period is an important part of the school curriculum and the reconstructed garden will provide an important insight into Elizabethan culture.
  
  The project has also highlighted the importance of crafts people, designers, paint and wood analysts, stone masons, wood carvers, gardeners, historians and archaeologists. We expect the new garden to increase the numbers of visitors to the Castle which will help boost the local economy. We are also recruiting more staff at Kenilworth Castle to help deal with the expected increase in visitor numbers.

How much has the project been delayed?

• The initial scope and methodology of the project needed to be redefined in the light of the findings of the archaeological excavations and research, and the full extent of the highly skilled work involved in the reconstruction, both of which were more complex than anticipated. The completion date was deferred by a year as a result.  

Is it true that some contractors are not very happy with the management of the project?

• It is not unusual that disputes occur in projects of this scale and complexity. On the whole we have had very professional and constructive relationships with our contractors and discussions are ongoing to resolve outstanding issues.