Greenhouse Gardening - Early Times

Nearly two thousand years ago the ingenious Romans experimented to encourage the early flowering of roses. They made greenhouses roofed in selenite, a type of gypsum formed of transparent crystals. Some of these were warmed by hot air; another method was to dig channels “two hands wide” around them which were filled with hot water twice a day. An alternative “greenhouse” was formed by digging a pit and covering it with thin sheets of mica or talc.

Many centuries later this probably led to “pit light”, a heavy, wooden-framed structure with small panes of glass. It was widely used in horticulture until the middle of the 1900s; then replaced by a lighter, single-pane, Dutch type of frame. With the fall of the Roman Empire, the desire to grow plants out of their natural seasons diminished. Later, references in 1259 describe roses and lilies being grown under glass in Padua, north-east Italy. By the fourteenth century, “glass pavilions” were used in France.