Ancient apples

‘It is remarkable how closely the history of the apple-tree is connected with that of man’.

_{Henry David Thoreau, Wild Apples, 1862}

The history of the common apple (Malus domestica) can be traced as far back as 6500 BC. Its wild apple ancestors probably first grew in the forests of Central Asia but the domestic apple is known to have been enjoyed by the Egyptians, Persians and Ancient Greeks.

Early traders travelling from China along the Silk Road helped to spread new varieties of domestic apple across Europe. However, the Romans were the first to use growing techniques still familiar today. Disliking the sour taste of native European crab apples, they cultivated sweeter and now long-gone varieties such as the ‘Syrian Red’, the ‘Honey Apple’, and the ‘Decio’.

After the Romans, new apple varieties only really reappeared in Britain in the 1500s. Up to this point, apples were primarily pressed for cider. However, advances in orchard growing inspired a new appetite for fresh fruit. Many varieties from this time still grow today, including the ‘Flower of Kent’ – the famous apple said to have fallen on Isaac Newton’s head.

How do you grow an apple?

Some of our best-loved apples were grown by accident. It is hard to believe that the now universal ‘Granny Smith’, was discovered by chance by Mary Ann Smith near a creek on her Australian farm. The apple had sprung up from a French crab apple pip that Smith had thrown away. It quickly became a worldwide commercial success despite its unintended beginnings. 

In fact, any apple variety with ‘pippin’ in its name has grown directly from the apple pip. One of Yorkshire’s best-known varieties, the Ribston Pippin, originally grew from a French apple pip brought over from Rouen in 1688. The popular Warwickshire variety, the ‘Wyken Pippin’, on the other hand, grew from an apple pip sent over from the Netherlands in the 1700s. 

However, growing apples from its pip (or seed) is slow and unpredictable. The resulting trees do not always produce the same fruits of their parents. The only reliable way to grow a particular variety of apple tree is to take a cutting and attach it onto another tree. This ancient process is called ‘grafting’ and has been used for centuries to grow apples with particular characteristics such as a desirable flavour or a resistance to pests.

Portrait of an apple

The cultivation of apples has always held an important place in the work of the RHS. A year after the society was founded in 1805, its president, Thomas Knight called on gardeners to develop new and improved varieties of fruit.

Apples proved by far the most popular choice and more were presented to the RHS for official identification than any other fruit.

For the RHS, capturing accurate visual representations of these new fruit varieties was crucial. In 1815, this ambitious task fell to the Society’s first commissioned artist, William Hooker (1779– 1832) in an extensive fruit painting project that lasted almost a decade.

Hooker was a highly regarded painter and apple enthusiast, but he was dependent on Society members for good quality fruit specimens. He also had to work quickly to capture the fruits’ defining characteristics while they were in season. Ultimately, a number of other painters were recruited to help.

Nonetheless, the resulting 200 fruit portraits represent both a vital contribution to the botanical art tradition and an irreplaceable record of fruit varieties. Many of these no longer exist or have only recently been rediscovered.

Varieties under threat

From its earliest years, the RHS cultivated a rich apple tree collection. The substantial orchard at its first official garden at Chiswick (1823–1903), was a living reference library for the identification of new fruit and the reliable growth of new apple trees. Robert Thompson, the gardener in charge, painstakingly described each variety in his dedicated apple books. He helped nurserymen and gardeners choose varieties that would grow well and give a range of different flavours across the seasons.

However, by the late 1800s, British apple growers began to struggle against cheaper imported apples from North America, France, Australia and New Zealand. The number of apple varieties grown in the UK sharply declined as commercial growers prioritised apples that were cheaper to produce. At the same time, the expansion of towns and cities led to the loss of many small, local orchards.

This threat to a vital part of our food heritage was of great concern to the RHS. When its main garden moved from Chiswick to Wisley in 1903, the Society ensured that it included an extensive orchard. After the First World War, they put out appeals in newspapers and on the radio to recover ‘lost varieties’ of apples.

In recent years, the Wisley orchard has focused on varieties of dessert and cooking apples suited to growing in gardens rather than to commercial production. Across the country, the RHS gardens continue to nurture regional varieties such as the Devonshire ‘Poltimore Seedling’ grown at RHS Rosemoor and the ‘Braintree Seedling’ grown at RHS Hyde Hall.

The future of apple growing

Once widespread, orchards have been steadily disappearing from the British landscape. In the second half of the 20^th century alone, two thirds of our traditional orchards were lost.

Since the late 1980s, environmental campaign groups have been highlighting the urgency of this issue and sounding calls to action. On the 21^st October 1990, the charity, Common Ground organised the first ‘Apple Day’ and the event quickly became a fixture in the national calendar. It continues to inspire apple-themed events across the country including at the RHS gardens. Other progress has been made, with traditional orchards being designated a ‘priority habitat’ in 2007 and being added to the Countryside Stewardship grant scheme in 2015.

The apple-inspired artworks in the RHS Lindley Collection are a particularly beautiful reminder of what we could lose without the continuation of this work. With regional apple varieties continuing to decline and the biodiversity of apple habitats under threat, the fight to save our apple heritage remains as urgent as it has ever been.