A brief history of rose cultivation in Lithuania in the 18th–19th centuries. The legacy of old garden roses and their identification

Abstract

The first documented records of the cultivating roses on the present territory of Lithuania date back to 1795. There were very few descriptions of gardens in the period of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, they were not comprehensive enough, and moreover, they did not mention any roses at all. Roses suddenly became popular in Lithuania at the beginning of the 19th century and since then they have gradually started to gain recognition as ornamental plants. The following key political events affected rather limited printed information on the subject of research. First of all, participation of the academic society in the November Uprising in 1831–1832 which resulted in the closing of the Vilnius University and its Botanical Garden, and caused the discontinuation of academic research in botany in the region. After another Polish–Lithuanian Uprising in 1863, a number of Russification policies were implemented, including one of the most repressive legislations, i.e. the 1864–1904 press ban. All press publications in the Latin alphabet in Lithuania and partly in Poland were banned (Lithuanian-language publications that used Cyrillic were allowed and even encouraged) which resulted in a considerably worse availability of data about the research topic. The manuscript archives became the main source of information on ornamental plants during the Lithuanian press ban. Very few details about ornamental plants in the region were mentioned in the magazines published in Poland. During the first half of the 19th century, there were two important rose propagation centers in Lithuania, i.e. the Botanical Garden of the Vilnius University (from 1799 to 1840) and Józef Strumiłło’s (1774–1847) nursery. Ogrody Północne [Northern Gardens] written by Józef Strumiłło, first published in 1820, drew attention to ornamental plants and their horticulture.[...]