Abstract
The research of the Ostrov garden and its development under the Dukes of Saxony-Lauenburg and the Margraves of Baden was still largely done by art historians and conservationists. They have mostly taken account in available visual sources, particularly the engravings by Zacharias Lesche from the mid-17 century, and a picture by Johann Michael Sockh from the year 1715.
The existence of rich pictorial documentation suppressed researchers' need to work with written sources, which means both archive material as well as published texts that mention the garden. In this article I present three types of written sources that can be used for study.
The first source is an official material including bills, inventories, estate descriptions and instructions to gardeners. Then there are at least three narrative accounts of people who saw the garden with their own eyes.
Despite the fact that the literature used to work with the translation of one of them, a very colorful description from Cardinal Harrach's diaries was completely omitted. The third type are mentions in tractates about garden architecture, in topographic works and in travel guides.
The authors of these texts sometimes knew the garden, sometimes they only took over from other sources. What is common to all of them is a reference to the once famous garden, which was accessible to visitors, nevertheless had lost its beauty long time ago.
The complex was more famous for its park design then. Combination of the presented written sources with well-known visual material offers researchers new opportunities for their work.
The sources provide us with detailed information about location of several hundred works of art in the garden and explain their meaning that combines ancient motifs, Marian piety, but also a number of military elements.