The Lime of Kasteel Westhove

The oldest tree in Zeeland is either about four hundred years old or about a thousand, and nobody can prove either. An information board at Kasteel Westhove puts the planting somewhere between 1000 and 1400. The national register offers a different reading: that the lime went in after the castle was rebuilt in the late sixteenth century, which would make it four hundred to four hundred and fifty. Neither figure rests on a planting record, because none exists. Both sources still call it the oldest tree in the province. There is a third account, told locally and sourced nowhere, that the trunk standing today is a daughter grown up out of the root of the original after the first stem died. If that were true both dates could be right about different things, which is presumably why the story keeps going. The castle behind it is at least documented. Westhove turns up in a charter to Floris V in 1277, was rebuilt in the late sixteenth century, and is a youth hostel in the dunes now. The lime stands out on the forecourt, cabled on every side to hold what is left of it together. Around it are old oak avenues, ash, abele and a sweet chestnut that still fruits.