OXFORD UNIVERSITY GARDENS & BUILDINGS

The city of Oxford was first settled in Saxon times.  It   began with the foundation of an oxen crossing in the early 900 AD period. Buildings in Oxford demonstrate an example of every English architectural period since then.              

The University of Oxford is the oldest university in the English speaking world.The rivers Cherwell and Thames - also  known as the Isis locally, run through Oxford and meet south of the city centre.There are many parks and gardens in Oxford, including the University of Oxford Botanic Garden and Christ Church Meadow.

UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD BOTANIC GARDEN

The Botanic Garden is the oldest botanic garden in Great Britain, and one of the oldest scientific gardens in the world. 

The garden was founded by the Earl of Danby, Henry Danvers, in 1621 as a physic garden, growing plants for medicinal research.

Today it contains over 8,000 different species of plant on 4½ acres.  It is one of the most diverse collections of plants in the world and includes representatives from over 90% of the higher plant families.  

The site covers 2 hectares and is bounded to the north by the High Street, to the east by the river Cherwell, to the west by Rose Lane and to the south by 

Christ Church meadows.

The site covers 2 hectares and is bounded to the north by the High Street, to the east by the river Cherwell, to the west by Rose Lane and to the south by Christ Church meadows.  

The Glasshouses cover approximately 600 m2. There are approximately 5000 different plant species growing at the Botanic Garden, making it one of the most bio-diverse areas of land in the World. 

The core collection of hardy plants are grouped in long, narrow, oblong beds by botanical family and ordered according to the classification system devised by nineteenth century botanists.

 

In 1983 the National Council for the Conservation of Plants and Gardens (NCCPG) chose the Garden to cultivate the national collection of euphorbia.  

Euphorbia stygiana was one of the rarest plants in the collection,  with only ten plants left existing in the wild.

The Garden began propagating the species as quickly as possible to reduce the possibility of it becoming extinct

The Botanic Gardens were often visited in the 1860s by Lewis Carroll and the Liddell children, Alice and her sisters. They were a source of inspiration for  Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. 

The Garden's waterlily house can be seen in the background of Sir John Tenniel’s illustration of 'The Queen's Croquet-Ground'.

Another Oxford professor and author, J.R.R. Tolkien often spent his time at the garden reposing under his favourite tree, the enormous Austrian pine, Pinus Nigra.



The last photograph of Tolkien before his death, taken on 9 August 1973, showed him standing with one hand resting on the tree:- ‘JRR Tolkien A Biography’ by Humphrey Carpenter, 1977.

In Philip Pulman’s novel ‘The Amber Spyglass’, a bench in the back of the garden is one of the locations/objects that stand parallel in the two different worlds that the protagonists, Lyra Belacqua and Will Parry live in. 

In the last chapter of the trilogy, both promised to sit on the bench for an hour at noon on Midsummer’s day every year so that perhaps they may feel each other's presence next to one another in their own worlds.   

www.botanic-garden.ox.ac.k/our-collections
www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Oxford_Botanic_Garden

CHRIST CHURCH GARDENS AND MEADOW

Christ Church Meadows is next to Christ Church college, one of the 46 colleges in Oxford University. Christ Church was established in 1546, and has been attended by many who went on to play a part in public life, including thirteen British prime ministers.

The buildings of Christ Church include the cathedral, one of the smallest in England, which also acts as the college chapel, a great hall and two libraries.

There are also gardens and a neighbouring sports ground and boat-house.

Stained glass windows in the cathedral and other buildings are by the Pre-Raphaelite artist William Morris with designs by Edward Burne-Jones.

Christ Church has both a Cathedral Choir  and a College Choir. The Cathedral Choir is made up of twelve men and sixteen boys. The men are made up of lay clerks and choral scholars, or academical clerks. 

The boys, whose ages range from eight to thirteen, are chosen for their musical ability and attend Christ Church Cathedral School. The Choir broadcasts regularly, and has many award-winning recordings to its credit. 

It  was the subject of a Channel 4 television documentary, Howard Goodall's Great Dates. The film was nominated at the prestigious Montreux TV Festival in the Arts Programme category - and has since been seen throughout the world. 

The college featured as the setting for a number of films including Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited, and Lewis Carroll’s Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. It was also used for the filming of  J.K, Rowling’s Harry Potter series and the film adaptation of Philip Pullman’s novel Northern Lights, - known in the US as The Golden Compass.

                                 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christ_Church,_Oxford

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford