The Linden and the Oak
One day, Zeus and Hermes, who were travelling through Phrygia in human form, sought refuge; the only ones who welcomed them were Philemon and Baucis, an elderly couple who offered the travellers a simple meal and wine that never ran out. After the meal, the gods revealed their true identities, and Zeus offered to grant any of their wishes: Philemon and Baucis asked to become priests at his temple and to die together. After many more years of life, the couple was transformed into trees: Philemon into an oak and his wife into a linden. This myth is told in Ovid's Metamorphoses and celebrates the virtue of hospitality.
At the center of the Castle's meadow, there are some trees, the only ones that seem to have strayed from their fellow trees that form the green crown, a distinctive feature of Kurten's designs: there are two lindens and, next to them, two oaks. One is young, and the other, which fell one night in 2020, is resting on the ground. The Cosso Foundation chose to preserve it beyond its beauty and monumentality, not only to respect the philology of the English garden, in which nature reveals itself to man in all its forms, but above all, for the lives that, beyond death, it continues to generate. And perhaps to remind us that the Castle of Miradolo, for many years, was a home.
To welcome and host.
One day, Zeus and Hermes, who were travelling through Phrygia in human form, sought refuge; the only ones who welcomed them were Philemon and Baucis, an elderly couple who offered the travellers a simple meal and wine that never ran out. After the meal, the gods revealed their true identities, and Zeus offered to grant any of their wishes: Philemon and Baucis asked to become priests at his temple and to die together. After many more years of life, the couple was transformed into trees: Philemon into an oak and his wife into a linden. This myth is told in Ovid’s Metamorphoses and celebrates the virtue of hospitality.
At the center of the Castle’s meadow, there are some trees, the only ones that seem to have strayed from their fellow trees that form the green crown, a distinctive feature of Kurten’s designs: there are two lindens and, next to them, two oaks. One is young, and the other, which fell one night in 2020, is resting on the ground. The Cosso Foundation chose to preserve it beyond its beauty and monumentality, not only to respect the philology of the English garden, in which nature reveals itself to man in all its forms, but above all, for the lives that, beyond death, it continues to generate. And perhaps to remind us that the Castle of Miradolo, for many years, was a home.
To welcome and host.