Back to the Garden

The garden was the cultural foundation of the early Mediterranean peoples; they acknowledged their reliance on and kinship with the land, and they understood nature through the lens of their diversely cultivated landscape. Their image of the garden underwrote the biblical book of Genesis and the region’s three religions. For millennia, there was no sharp divide between humankind and the land that was home.

To be sure, the elements could be harsh, their origins mysterious, but there was a widespread consensus that presumed a largely harmonious working relationship with Nature. Traditional agriculture in the ancient Mediterranean mimicked the key traits of naturally occurring ecosystems. It was diverse, complex, self-regulating, and resilient.

This relationship effectively came to an end in the late eighteenth century, when “nature” was steadily equated with the untamed landscape devoid of human intervention. In the early part of the century, the human world, the agricultural realm, and the province of uncu