Old Garden Tools

Shire Classics from Shire Library

• Paperback
• 32 pages
• illustrated B&W
• 15cm x 21cm.

Contents:

• Garden tools of the past
• Cultivation
• Cutting tools
• The lawn
• Garden sundries
• Further reading
• Places to visit

On the back Cover:

Some of the world's oldest implements are those that have been used in land cultivation. The basic shape of tools such as mattocks, knives and spades has changed little since Roman times, even as materials and designs have been refined. Many garden tools are universally in use, like the rake, scythe, slasher, spade and saw, but the intense interest in horticultural practice during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries brought the introduction of more specialised equipment, much of it no longer in use and therefore unfamiliar. The rise of gardening as a middle-class pursuit following the Industrial Revolution also led to the introduction of many curious and elaborate forms of garden equipment. This fully illustrated volume offers a wealth of information about these tools, the obscure as well as the familiar.

About the author:

Kay N. Sanecki worked for the Royal Horticultural Society and in horticultural publishing for many years. A Fellow of the Institute of Horticulture and a Vice President of the Garden History Society, she contributed to many gardening books, including the RHS Dictionary of Gardening. She also wrote Discovering Herbs for Shire.