The Gardens of Eton College, Windsor, Berkshire
FLOREAT ETONA’, as all good classicists know, means ‘May Eton Flourish’. But its near-gardening connotations are fitting, as the horticultural history of the college stretches back to its royal founder, Henry VI. When he died in 1471, he left provision for gardens in his will: ‘The space between the wall of the Church and the wall of the cloister shall contain 38 feet which is left for to set in certain trees and flowers, behovable and convenient for the service of the same church.’
In the college archives is a mid-18th-century plan of the gardens, as well as 19th-century lists of fruit trees purchased and
