John Tradescant the elder

John Tradescant the Elder (; c. 1570s – 15–16 April 1638), father of John Tradescant the Younger, was an English naturalist, gardener, collector and traveller.

Life John Tradescant was probably born in Suffolk. On 18 June 1607 he married Elizabeth Day of Meopham in Kent, England. She was the daughter of Jeames Day, a vicar.

Tradescant began his career as head gardener to Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, at Hatfield House, who initiated Tradescant in travelling by sending him to the Low Countries for fruit trees in 1610/11. He was kept on by Robert's son William, to produce gardens at the family's London house, Salisbury House.

Legacy

The Tradescant collection, which was added to significantly by Tradescant's son, John Tradescant the Younger, was later given to the University of Oxford by Elias Ashmole. It was combined with an older University collection to become the Ashmolean Museum, which opened in 1683.

A genus of flowering plants (Tradescantia) was named in honour of the two men by Carl Linnaeus in 1752.

Tradescant Road, off South Lambeth Road in Vauxhall, marks the former boundary of the Tradescant estate.

Popular culture Tradescant is the subject of the novel Earthly Joys by Philippa Gregory.