The Germans call strawberries erdbeeren, or “earth berries”, because they grow on the ground.
The Romans called strawberries fragaria, or “fragrant berries”, because of their sweet smell.
So how did these delicious treats become known in English as strawberries?
It’s because the climate of both Britain and Ireland is very damp, and so to grow them, farmers needed to protect emerging berries from the muddy soil.
They did this by spreading a layer of straw around each new plant.
