A lawn () is an area of soil-covered land planted with grasses and other durable plants such as clover which is maintained at a short height with a lawn mower (or sometimes grazing animals) and used for aesthetic and recreational purposes. It is also commonly referred to as part of a garden. Lawns are usually composed only of grass species, subject to weed and pest control, maintained in a green color (e.g., by watering), and are regularly mowed to ensure an acceptable length. Lawns are commonly used around houses, apartments, commercial buildings and offices and many city parks also have large lawn areas. In recreational contexts, the specialised names turf, parade, pitch, field or green may be used, depending on the sport and the continent. The term "lawn", referring to a managed grass space, dates to at least the 16th century. With suburban expansion, the lawn has become culturally ingrained in some areas of the world as part of the desired household aesthetic. However, awareness of the negative environmental impact of this idea is growing. In some jurisdictions where there are water shortages, local government authorities are encouraging alternatives to lawns to reduce water use. Researchers in the United States have noted that suburban lawns are "biological deserts" that are contributing to a "continental-scale ecological homogenization." Lawn maintenance practices also cause biodiversity loss in surrounding areas. Some forms of lawn, such as tapestry lawns, are designed partly for biodiversity and pollinator support.
Etymology Lawn derives from Middle English launde, a borrowing from Old French lande (meaning "heath", "clearing"), of either Germanic or Gaulish origin. The word shares an origin with land, and its first recorded use with the meaning of "ground with mown grass" was in the 18th century.
History
Origins
Areas of grass grazed regularly by rabbits, horses or sheep over a long period often form a very low, tight sward similar to a modern lawn. This was the original meaning of the word "lawn", and the term can still be found in place names. Some forest areas where extensive grazing is practiced still have these seminatural lawns. For example, in the New Forest, England, such grazed areas are common, and are known as lawns, for example Balmer Lawn. Lawns may have originated as grassed enclosures within early medieval settlements used for communal grazing of livestock, as distinct from fields reserved for agriculture. Low, mown-meadow areas may also have been valued because they allowed those inside an enclosed fence or castle to view those approaching. The early lawns were not always distinguishable from pasture fields. The damp climate of maritime Western Europe in the north made lawns possible to grow and manage. They were not a part of gardens in most other regions and cultures of the world until contemporary influence. In 1100s Britain, low-growing area of grasses and meadow flowers were grazed or scythed to keep them short, and used for sport. Lawn bowling, which began in the 12th or 13th century, required short turf. The first known documentation of establishing grass using sod instead of seed comes from a Japanese text of 1159.
Lawns became popular with the aristocracy in northern Europe from the Middle Ages onward. In the fourteen hundreds, open expanses of low grasses appear in paintings of public and private areas; by the fifteen hundreds, such areas were found in the gardens of the wealthy across northern and central Europe. Public meadow areas, kept short by sheep, were used for new sports such as cricket, soccer, and golf. The word "laune" is first attested in 1540 from the Old French lande "heath, moor, barren land; clearing". It initially described a natural opening in a woodland. In the sixteen hundreds, "lawn" came to mean a grassy stretch of untilled land, and by mid-century, there were publications on seeding and transplanting sod. In the seventeen hundreds, "lawn" came to mean specifically a mown stretch of meadow. Lawns similar to those of today first appeared in France and England in the 1700s when André Le Nôtre designed the gardens of the Palace of Versailles that included a small area of grass called the tapis vert, or "green carpet", which became a common feature of French gardens. Large, mown open spaces became popular in Europe and North America. The lawn was influenced by later seventeen-hundreds trends replicating the romantic aestheticism of grassy pastoralism from Italian landscape paintings. Before the invention of mowing machines in 1830, lawns were managed very differently. They were an element of wealthy estates and manor houses, and in some places were maintained by labor-intensive scything and shearing (for hay or silage). They were also pasture land maintained through grazing by sheep or other livestock.
The English lawn
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