Garden Plants - Candytuft

Just one glance at this flower would convince any amateur botanist that they knew the origin of its common name. 'It's obvious,' they'd say 'the pink and white flowers look like lollipops, so that's why it's called candy-tuft - get it?'

Nice idea. Sadly, it's completely wrong. The name comes from the Elizabethan term for the island of Crete - Candia - because that's where the flower was imported from during that era.

Elizabethans did nothing by halves, and Lord Edward Zouche was one such. He is supposed to have spent so much money on his gardens that he became too poor to remain in England and had to 'live cheaply abroad' to keep them going. Another lovely idea. Also completely wrong. There's no doubt that it was the rumour of the time, but it's much more likely that canny Lord Zouche, having been the victim of several visits by the Queen, was saving his fortune, not spending it. Elizabeth - the Virgin Queen - had a habit of travelling the countryside, descending on her nobles, and staying until their castle was empty of food, their land empty of game, their cellar drained of wine and their pockets denuded of coin. She 'lived off the land' if you like, but it wasn't her land!

It is known that she bankrupted several nobles, and so Zouche may have simply skipped off to avoid having the royal hands rifling through his coffers - she couldn't invite herself in if the noble in question wasn't home, you see. Anyway, Zouche already had a black mark against him in Elizabeth's eyes - he was the only peer to acquit Mary, Queen of Scots, at her trial and to vote against her death sentence. So smart Zouche stayed out of the Queen's reach, and incidentally sent home seeds for his gardens, including that of the Candytuft or Cretan Cress. Its third name is Treacle Mustard because you can make a cheap (and not very nice) condiment from it.

Garden Candytuft photograph by bc anna, used under a creative commons attribution licence