It is thought it may have come to the UK by the Romans and was first mentioned at the Cistercian built Abbey of Warden in Bedfordshire in the 13th century.

As a long keeping fruit, it formed an important part of the winter diet until root-crops were introduced.

The fruit is larger than average and the flesh hard and coarse, but is reported to be excellent when stewed.

Michael Drayton's poem of the battle, notes “Wor’ster a pear tree laden with its fruit”.

[4] So admiring was she of the good management that had allowed the fruit to remain unplucked that she granted an augmentation of honour of a canton charged with "three pears sable" to be added to the city's coat of arms.

In Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery-Books, edited by Thomas Austin for the Early English Text Society (Original Series, Volume 91), a recipe is given (p. 51) for "Quyncis or Wardouns in past" Also known as 'Parkinson's Warden'.