Cottage Garden Plants 1.....PINKS (Dianthus)

There can be few finer cottage garden flowers than the garden pink. Todays image is of a species pink, as opposed to one of the relatively modern hybrids, but it is still a pink, beautifully clove scented, and of course truly reminiscent of the pinks available to gardeners when cottages were cottages.....draughty, cold, smelly, damp, fart ridden (all that boiled cabbage), stinking places. Our image today is clearly tinted by Helen Alingham prints, and lavish non fart smelling productions such as "Larkrise to Candleford" which I must admit to hugely enjoying.....

......Have you ever wondered what they used as toilet paper?

Most couldn't read so a newspaper was unimportant. Probably moss.

I know this because on the Isle of Mull my grandfather kept buckets of moss in his privy for that very purpose. I can also tell you that stray bramble thorns or bits of thistle leaf are excruciatingly painful. Thank Frith we moved to England where they used a far more civilised method....tracing paper as I recall, something call IZAL. It was less absorbent than one would have preferred, serving more as a spreading and smearing agent....with skid marks like those it was no wonder Granny needed a copper boiler. She used to stew underwear all day in it, fishing them out occasionally with wooden tongs and skimming the scum off the top with some sieve like implement.

Our boiling was done in a scullery in which was kept two goats, a Nanny and a Billy. I never liked either, nasty spiteful animals that stank of piss, though their residence was a wash-house so perhaps they weren't altogether to blame, my Grandparents lived in the time of large underwear which was more often turned around, about or inside out than washed.

Pinks have been cultivated for thousands of years, being called the "Flower of Zeus" or the "Divine Flower". The word Dianthus means God, while Anthemion means flower.

From ancient times some were known as 'coronations' or 'carnations' because of their use in festivals.

Dianthus were also known as Gillyflower, probably derived from the French "Giroflier" meaning clove-bearing because of the distinctive scent. Another old name was Sops in Wine, this being because the flowers were used to flavour certain drinks, including wine. Getting back to my Grandparents, their version of Sops was bread & milk, broken pieces of stale bread were boiled in milk, honey was added and that was your breakfast. Or dinner in hard times.

Sops in wine later became the reference to a certain variety, though which one is still a matter of some discrepancy.

From Tudor to Edwardian time pinks had always been popular, perhaps the most famous being Mrs Sinkins, a lovely highly scented double off white, named after his wife by Mr Sinkins the master of a Slough workhouse.

Pinks are an essential cottage garden plant, beloved by gardeners, insects, and even goats. They have few enemies, a little scab and black spot perhaps, but given a sunny, hot open position, with good drainage they'll serve you well.