The Renaissance Garden at Ringve is a tribute to the first Norwegian book of gardening, published in Trondheim in 1694. Both the geometrical form and the plants in the Renaissance Garden follow guidelines in the book. The division into quarters and symmetrical beds are part of the Renaissance idea that man could master nature. The plants were all useful, and are a mix of vegetables, medicinal plants, herbs, fiber plants, and ornamental plants. The Renaissance Garden holds 123 species or varieties of species. The plant labels give information about the name and the traditional usage of each plant, also in English. A list of the plants´ scientific names is found here: http://www.ntnu.no/c/document_library/get_file?uuid=3c71f8ca-322c-4b20-b403-a28579b587bb&groupId=10476 The first Norwegian book of gardening was called “Horticultura” and was written by Christian Gartner, who was a “city gardener” of Trondheim in the late 1600s. He wrote the book to promote gardening in Mid-Norway at a time when this was considered to be very far north.

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