Human history is strewn with gardens. Heavenly and earthly gardens, royal gardens and gardens of the aristocracy, mythological gardens and illustrated gardens. The seminar will offer an intimate acquaintance with the "locked gardens" of the ancient world. The garden appears to be a useful viewpoint in the study of societies and elite classes; as an expression for the domestication of nature, a mean of manifesting status, wealth and sovereignty, as well as the location where political dramas, cultural and artistic activities took place. The archaeological study of recent decades provides a close insight into the types and species of the planted flora of those gardens; those will be presented alongside water installations and leisure and entertainment architectural elements that decorated the gardens in addition to the animals that inhabited them.