At last, Sir Thomas, your garden is flowering - 400 years too late

An Elizabethan paradise has sprung back to life. Andrew Morgan on a floral time-capsule

PLANTS that were first planted 400 years ago have begun to bloom again in their original intricate patterns, after scrub was cleared at one of England's masterpiece Elizabethan gardens.

The gardens were laid out when Sir Thomas Tresham began the astonishing Lyveden New Bield, near Oundle, Northamptonshire, a garden-house lodge that was unfinished when he died in 1605 after 10 years' work.

It was planned in the shape of a Greek cross and now stands, a ruin in romantic isolation. It still looks immaculate, as if waiting for its roof. The gardens were also unfinished.

Most intact of the gardens isMiddle Garden, where Tresham created a series of truncated pyramids and circular mounds surrounded by moats and terraces. Historians knew the earthworks existed, but the gardens are only now being revealed after centuries of neglect. It is unique because the original plan was never modified to suit the tastes of subsequent periods.

However, scrub gradually grew over the mounds and terraces, preventing sunlight penetrating to the thousands of plants underneath. Now, however, the brambles, trees and blackthorn have been cleared,and primroses - planted four centuries ago - are flourishing once again.

As well as the primroses,violets, hellibores and cowslips, all of which were originally used in lining and colouring the banks of the complex system of moats, have re-emerged.

"At last, this historic site is being allowed to breathe again," says its custodian, Mark Bradshaw. "With allowing light back in, we can now see the original scheme and displays from some of the actual Elizabethan plants put in.

"Removing the cover provides the right environment for the plants. Opening up the canopy allows dormant species to once again come through with vigour."

Until the Elizabethan era, land was considered too valuable for food production to use for recreational purposes, but the gentry began to adorn their land with wild flora and cultivated plants from Europe.

Last October, the National Trust, which owns the site, discovered letters dated October 1597, in which Tresham, who was a staunch Catholic, directed his men working on the new garden while he languished in Ely prison.

It was an enormous enginering task because of the 25ft-wide moats and "snail's back" mounds with a base diameter of 40 yards, rising in a spiral to a height of 35ft.

A gazebo was planned for the top, with the spiral path allowing ladies to climb up. Primroses and violets were planted up the sides of the mounds, terraces and banks to give off a fragrance as they sat admiring the view.

Although the mounds were completed, the gazebos were never finished, nor was the lodge.

On Tresham's death, many of the plants being grown for use in the garden, as well as flowering stock, were sold on to the Cecil family at Burghley House, Lincolnshire.

Tresham's son, Francis, one of the conspirators in the Gunpowder Plot, was executed as a traitor, so plans for the house and gardens came to nothing.

"However, this spring, the flowering and patterns of these dormant plants will be identical to when they were being laid out four centuries ago," says Mark Bradshaw. "We are on the same pace as Tresham's team, and that's very exciting."

Lyveden New Bield is open daily throughout the year.