"Trees even in their very roads": Trees, Streets and Politics in 17th-century Britain
This talk explores some of the lesser-known avenues in the history of street trees in Britain, examining the idea of street trees as 'public ornaments' in the context of the English civil wars, revolution and Restoration. Through discussion of late Elizabethan, Stuart and civil-war period ideas in relation to urban sprawl, fuel-use and urban air pollution, this talk allows us to reflect on the origins and value of street trees in terms of their political potential and public capital, at a time when the idea of trees in the street was to some preposterous and to others, little more than a twinkle in the eye of seventeenth-century 'improvers'.