PETERHOUSE—THE FIRST COURT The entrance to the chapel faces the spectator. On the right is seen the Combination Room (1460) and the Hall. Through the Cloisters we get a view into the street. This is the oldest college in Cambridge.PETERHOUSE—THE FIRST COURTThe entrance to the chapel faces the spectator. On the right is seen the Combination Room (1460) and the Hall. Through the Cloisters we get a view into the street. This is the oldest college in Cambridge.
iconoclastic fever had spent itself. But still we have only the shell of the original chapel, the roof of which was adorned with figures of a hundred and fifty angels the statue of S. Peter presiding from the west. Nine years later all this was pulled down by the Commonwealth men and the ritualist movement it embodied came to an end.[108]
Hall portraits.
Peterhouse hall, in common with the halls of all other colleges, contains the portraits of its great men: here, however, they look down upon us not only from the wall above the high table but from the stained glass of the windows. Holbroke Master of the college, chancellor of the university during the Barnwell process, and an early student of science; Cardinal Beaufort scholar of the house who represented Henry V. at the Council of Constance, and was himself, perhaps,papabile; Warkworth writing his Lancastrian Chronicle—are in their doctor’s scarlet: here also are Whitgift, Cosin, and Crashaw, who is depicted as a canon of Loreto; the poet Gray, the third duke of Grafton chancellor of the university and Prime Minister, and Henry Cavendish the physicist. The panel portraits were removed here from the Stone parlour. The painting of Bishop Law by Romney (?) reminds us that many of the Laws were at Peterhouse, including the first Lord Ellenborough. Over the high table is Lord Kelvin the latest famous son of the house. Among these must also be noted Thomas Heywood “a prose Shakspeare,” Hutchinson “the regicide”one of the first Puritan gentlemen and one of the best, Peter Baro, Markland the classical critic, and Sherlock who measured himself against Bossuet.
Peterhouse owes nothing to royal endowments but it has not lived outside the stir of national movements either political or religious. There were fervent Lancastrians within its walls in the xv century, fervent partisans of the Stuarts in the xviith. It was, second to none in England, the anti-Puritan college, numbering among its masters Wren and Cosin, and that Doctor Andrew Perne who was among its most munificent benefactors.[109]Perne was a Petrean first and a theologian afterwards, and, as vice-chancellor, was to be found burning the remains of Martin Bucer and Paul Fagius[110]in order to ingratiate the university with Mary, and signing the Thirty-nine Articles on the accession of Elizabeth. The letters AP AP on the weather cock of his college are said to mean: Andrew Perne, “a Papist” or “a Protestant,” as you will; and in Cantabrigian language a coat that has been turned is a coat that has beenperned, andpernaresignifies to change your opinions with frequency.
Since the xvii century Peterhouse has been connected with no great movements. In the xv century and again in the early xixth it produced eminent physicaland mathematical students; and in the xviii century Sir William Browne, President of the College of Physicians, learnt here his science. Scotchmen have a predilection for the college; and a nucleus of history men is being formed under the present Master’s guidance.
Little S. Mary’s.
The patronage of the historical church which was for three or four centuries the chapel of Peterhouse remains in the hands of the college. It is indeed an integral part of Peterhouse for every Petrean. But its interest does not end here; it reaches across the Atlantic and binds the new continent to the home-hearth of learning in England. A monument in the chapel to Godfrey Washington who died in 1729 bears the armsargent two bars gules, in chief three estoiles—the origin of the Stars and Stripes. The Washington crest is an eagle issuant from a crown—affirming sovereignty or escaping from a monarchy?[111]
Cherry Hinton.
The Rectory of Cherry Hinton two and a half miles south-east of Cambridge, on the way to the village of Balsham, is no less important in the history of the Ely scholars. In the xiv century the endowment of the college was not sufficient for their maintenance all the year round: the college nevertheless had made rapid progress since its separate existence at Peterhouse began, and Fordham Bishop of Ely (1388-1426) decided to confirm to them the greater tithes of Cherry Hinton of which the college is to this dayrector; but which had indeed been first assigned them by Bishop Simon Langham as early as 1362.[112]
A visit to this interesting church completes our picture of the college which “his affection for learning and the state of the poor scholars who were much put to it for conveniency of lodging” persuaded Balsham to endow.
Peterhouse lodge.
The lodge of Peterhouse is on the opposite side of Trumpington Street, and is the only example of a lodge outside the college precincts in the university. The house belonged to Charles Beaumont, nephew of the metaphysical poet Joseph Beaumont who was Master of Peterhouse, and was bequeathed by him for the college lodge in 1727.
Peterhouse has always been one of the small colleges. Balsham founded it for a master, 14 fellows, and a few Bible clerks.[113]In the time of Charles I. (1634) it maintained 19 fellows, 29 Bible clerks, and 8 scholars, making with the college officers and other students a total of 106. Sixty years earlier, when Caius wrote, there were 96 inmates, and in the middle of the xviii century, 90. To-day there are 11 fellowships, and 23 scholarships varying from £20 to £80 a year in value.
PETERHOUSE FROM THE FELLOWS’ GARDEN On the right is the Combination Room (1460), while farther back in the picture is the Hall, a continuation of this range of most ancient and picturesque buildings.PETERHOUSE FROM THE FELLOWS’ GARDENOn the right is the Combination Room (1460), while farther back in the picture is the Hall, a continuation of this range of most ancient and picturesque buildings.
The bishops of Ely have never ceased to be the visitors of the college.
Michaelhouse.
Nearly forty years elapsed before a second college was projected. On September 27 1324 Hervey de Stanton, who like other founders in both universities—like Merton, Alcock, Wykeham, and Wolsey—was a notable pluralist,[114]opened Michaelhouse on the present site of Trinity. His purchases for the site had been made in 1323-4, and as was the case with the foundations preceding and succeeding it, Michaelhouse was an adaptation of edifices already existing. It remained one of the principal collegiate buildings until the xvi century and was successively enlarged by absorbing both Crouched and Gregory’s as students’ hostels.
Domus aula collegium.
As Peterhouse was called “the House-of-Scholars of S. Peter,” so was Michaelhouse called “the House-of-Scholars of S. Michael.” It will be seen thatdomusandaulawere the earliest appellations. Ashospitiaordiversoria literarumsignified the unendowed house, sodomusoraula scholariumsignified the endowed house. Such compound titles as “house of S. Peter or hall-of-scholars of the Bishop of Ely” precede, as they explain, the later titlecollege. A college denotes not a dwelling but a community: precisely the same distinction is tobe drawn betweendomusandcollegiumas betweenmonasteriumandconventus. Every universitydomuswas intended for a college of scholars, as every religious house was intended for a convent of religious; the transition was easy, though not logical, from “college of the hall of Valense-Marie” to Valence-Marie College, and to-day the word is used indiscriminately to mean both the building and the community.[115]
Clare Hall 1326-1338.
Clare Hall was erected on the site of University Hall, a house for scholars founded during the chancellorship of Richard de Badew who obtained the king’s licence for it on February 20 1326, when he was lodged at Barnwell.[116]In the next reign (1344, 18th of Edward III.) it is referred to as “the hospice belonging to Cambridge university.” This hall, like Peterhouse, originated in two hostels purchased for the university in the street running parallel to the High Street, from the present site of Queen’s to the back gate of Trinity.[117]Twelve years later Elizabeth de Burgh[118]sister and co-heiress of
CLARE COLLEGE AND BRIDGE FROM THE CAM—AUTUMN EVENINGCLARE COLLEGE AND BRIDGE FROM THE CAM—AUTUMN EVENING
Gilbert Earl of Clare founded her college and in 1340 she obtained possession of University Hall,[119]and decreed in 1359 that it should thenceforth be known as the “House of Clare.”[120]
The scheme of building of Clare Hall was quadrangular; but no college was longer in the building. A hall, combination room, and Master’s room were on the west, while the chapel at the north-east angle was not built till 1535.[121]The scholars had till then kept their prayers in the parish church of S. Zachary and in the south chancel aisle of S. Edward’s. The present chapel was not begun till 1764. As we see it now Clare is a homogeneous piece of work of the time of Charles I., and in its classical beauty is one of the finest in Cambridge. This complete rebuilding occupied twenty-six years—from 1635 to 1661. There is no record of the architect, though an unsupported tradition points to Inigo Jones.
When one pictures Clare Hall it is to recall “the Backs,” the characteristic feature of Cambridge scenery which rivals the beauty of “the gardens” in the sister university. The grounds of the succession of collegiatebuildings fronting the ancient High Street, with sloping lawns, bowling green, and fellows’ garden, extend along the backs of the colleges beyond the narrow river over which each college throws its bridge, and beyond again runs the well known road and the college playgrounds.
Clare is supposed to have been the “Soler hall” of Chaucer’s Tale.[122]It has enjoyed the reputation of a fashionable college, and indeed of a “sporting college.” It no doubt enjoyed the former reputation from the first, as a foundation under the patronage of the great house of Clare, and furnished some of the overdressed dandies who flocked to Cambridge in Chaucer’s time, as well as his “pore” Yorkshire “scolers” or others like them. Ralph Cudworth was Master of the college; Tillotson Archbishop of Canterbury, the martyr bishop Latimer, and Whiston the successor of Newton were its fellows; and Nicholas Heath primate of York, Sir George Downing, Cole the antiquary, Townshend, Chancellor of the Exchequer, the first Marquis Cornwallis, Brodrick Archbishop of Cashel, and Whitehead the laureate were itsalumni. It was founded for 20 fellows or scholars, 6 of whom were to be in priests’ orders. In 1634 there were 15 fellows and 32 scholars, in all 106 inmates. In the time of Caius there had been 129, and in the middle of the xviii century there were about 100. There are
CLARE COLLEGE AND BRIDGE FROM THE AVENUE King’s College Chapel is seen through the trees.CLARE COLLEGE AND BRIDGE FROM THE AVENUEKing’s College Chapel is seen through the trees.
now 18 fellowships and 31 scholarships ranging in value from £20 to £60.
College statutes.
The statutes of Clare Hall were written by the founder in 1359, a year before her death. The statutes of Peterhouse[123]and of Pembroke do not exist in their original form—and those of Hervey de Stanton for Michaelhouse and of Elizabeth de Burgh for Clare must be held to be the two types of Cambridge college statutes. Of these the latter rank as the most enlightened original code framed for a Cambridge college. Stanton’s contain little more than directions for the conduct of a clerical seminary, and this type was followed by the framers of the statutes of Corpus Christi and in their general intention by Gonville in statutes afterwards modified by Bateman. The statutes of King’s Hall framed for Richard II. reverted to the Merton type; Henry VI.’s statutes for King’s follow, as we shall see, the type already laid down by William of Wykeham, while Lady Margaret Countess of Richmond, and John Fisher Bishop of Rochester framed statutes which contain some original elements.
Elizabeth de Burgh’s originality consists in her realisation of the value of learning and of general knowledge for all kinds of men and for its own sake. “In every degree, whether ecclesiastical or temporal, skill in learning is of no mean advantage; which although sought for by many persons in many ways isto be found most fully in the university where astudium generaleis known to flourish.”[124]Thence it sends forth its “disciples,” “who have tasted its sweetness,” skilled and fitted, to fill their place in the world. She wishes to promote, with the advancement of religious worship and the welfare of the state, “the extension of these sciences”; her object being that “the pearl of knowledge” “once discovered and acquired by study and learning” “should not lie hid,” but be diffused more and more widely, and when so diffused give light to them that walk in the darkness of the shadow of ignorance.[125]
The statutes of Marie Valence were written twelve years earlier and even in the form in which they have come down to us have a character of their own and conform to none of the three types of Merton, Michaelhouse, or Clare.[126]
Merton’s statutes were issued in 1264, 1270, and 1274, and the 1274 statutes exist in the university library in a register of the Bishops of Lincoln. Mr. J. Bass Mullinger has printed Hervey de Stanton’s in Appendix D. to his “History of the University of Cambridge”; they are contained in the Michaelhouse book in the muniment room of Trinity.
For King’s Hall, founded in 1337, see page 131.
THE HALL OF CLARE COLLEGE The notable features of this interior are the plaster ceiling and the large oak figures over the fireplace, the latter designed by Sir M. Digby Wyatt 1870-72.THE HALL OF CLARE COLLEGEThe notable features of this interior are the plaster ceiling and the large oak figures over the fireplace, the latter designed by Sir M. Digby Wyatt 1870-72.
Pembroke CollegeA.D.1347.
Pembroke Hall was founded in 1347 by Marie daughter of Guy de Chatillon comte de Saint-Paul and of Mary grand-daughter of Henry III. She was of the blood of that Walter de Chatillon who in the retreat from Damietta during the 7th crusade, held a village alone against successive assaults of the Saracen; and having drawn forth their missiles from his body after each sally, charged afresh to the cry ofChatillon! Chevaliers!—and the widow of Aymer de Valence Earl of Pembroke the inexorable enemy of Robert Bruce in Edward’s wars against the Scottish king. Pembroke stands opposite Peterhouse and several hostels were destroyed to make room for it. It was called by the founder the hall of Valencemarie, and in Latin documentsaula Pembrochiana.
Architectural scheme of a college.
With Pembroke the first college foundation stone was laid in Cambridge. Here for the first time we have a homogeneous collegiate house and not a mere adaptation of pre-existing buildings, and may therefore enquire what was the architectural plan of a college. The principle of the quadrangle, although it underwent considerable architectural development, was recognised with the first attempt at college architecture.[127]The special collegiate buildings at first occupied one side of the court only. Here, facing the gateway, were to be found the hall with its buttery and kitchen, above the hall the Master’s lodging, with perhaps a garret bedroom above it—thesolarium. The combination room attiguousto the hall makes its appearance in the next century, and at right angles or parallel to this main block stretch the students’ chambers and studies. A muniment room or treasury is over the gate; the library, occupying a third side,[128]and the chapel, come later; and last of all the architectural gateway is added.[129]Meadows and fields and the Master’s plot of ground are soon developed into the Master’s garden, the fellows’ garden, the bowling green, and tennis court. By the xv century the buildings round a courtyard easily assume the plan of the new domestic dwelling of that epoch, of which the type is Haddon Hall Derbyshire and, in Cambridge, Queens’ College: the collegedomusof the xiv century becomes the quadrangular manor-house of the xvth and xvith. In such a scheme of public buildings only a few scholars could be lodged in the main court, and smaller quadrangles for their accommodation were therefore added. University Hostel formed one side of such a second court in Pembroke; Clare and Queens’ had also second courts, and their example was followed at Christ’s and S. John’s.
Here then we have a scheme of building which is neither monastic nor feudal. It may with propriety be called scholastic but it is also essentially domestic architecture. The college quadrangle as we see it evolved in Cambridge is the earliest attempt at devisinga dwelling which should resemble neither the cloister nor the castle, should suggest neither enclosure nor self-defence—a scholastic dwelling. The college is the outcome of that moment in our history when feudalism had played its part and monasticism was losing its power; it represents what the rise of the universities themselves represents and its architectural interest is unique. No monastic terms are retained; the hall is not a refectory, the one constant monastic and canonical feature, the church, has no part at all in the scheme—the scholars were men not separated from their fellows and they used the parish church.
The first collegiate dwelling houses, like the English manor-house, consciously or unconsciously followed one of the oldest house-plans known to civilisation—the scheme of dwelling-rooms round a court was that of the Roman house. Theaula seu domus scholariumhad moreover as its starting point—like the earliestdomus ecclesiae—a hall in a house; the hall is the nucleus of the college.[130]
The site of Pembroke.
Marie de Saint-Paul, like her predecessor Elizabeth de Burgh, purchased university property for the site of her college. “University hostel” which stood here formed one side of the narrow quadrangle the building of which was at once begun, and a messuage of Hervey de Stanton’s formed theother. Within five years the complete area had been acquired, and it is probable that the south side was also partly built before the founder’s death in 1377. On the west were the hall and kitchen, on the east, abutting on the street, was the gate with students’ chambers on either side of it. With the hostel the founder bought an acre of meadowland which she converted into an orchard—“the orchard against Pembroke Hall” it is called in her lifetime. She also obtained permission from two of the Avignon popes—Innocent VI. and Urban V.—to erect a chapel and bell tower, and these were built, after the middle of the xiv century, at the north west corner of the closed quadrangle. This interesting site was used later as a library and is still a reference library and lecture room. Traces of fresco remain under the panelling, and the chaplain’s room with its hagioscope for the altar is on the east. The lower part of the bell tower also still exists.
In 1389 the college acquired Cosyn’s Place, and later Bolton’s, and in 1451 a perpetual lease of S. Thomas’s hostel. University hostel retained its name till the last quarter of the xvi century, and it was only pulled down in 1659 to make room for the Hitcham building which now forms the south side of the second court. There is nothing left of the xiv and xv century structures. The present lodge, hall, and library and the other new buildings in stone and red brick have all been erected since 1870. The chapel occupies part of the site of S. Thomas’s hostel, and was built by Matthew Wren, Bishop of Ely and Master of
THE OLD COURT, PEMBROKE COLLEGE The Dining Hall is seen on the right of the picture.THE OLD COURT, PEMBROKE COLLEGEThe Dining Hall is seen on the right of the picture.
Peterhouse, at his own charges; the architect being his nephew Christopher Wren. The bishop had already built Peterhouse chapel and this new work was undertaken in fulfilment of his intention to make some pious offering if he were ever liberated from the Tower, where the Parliament kept him between the years 1642 and 1658. The fine combination room is panelled with the oak from the xvii century hall. The portrait of Marie de Saint-Paul presides in the present hall with that of Henry VI. flanked by busts of Pitt, Gray, and Stokes.
Two spiritual relationships were bequeathed by the founder to the college. One with the Franciscan friars, the other with the Minoresses of Denney. The former connexion ceased almost as soon as it was devised, for the existing edition of the statutes (made after the founder’s death) omits all mention of it.[131]
No college but Trinity outshines Pembroke for the fame of its scholars and none for the antiquity of its fame. Henry VI. in a charter granting lands speaks of it as “this eminent and most precious college, which is and ever hath been resplendent among all places in the university.”[132]The king so favoured it that it was called his “adopted daughter”; and when Elizabethrode past it on her way to her lodging at King’s she saluted it with one of those happy phrases characteristic of the Tudors: “O domus antiqua et religiosa!” words which sum its significance in university history.
Pembroke is thealma materof Edmund Spenser,[133]of Gray,[134]of the younger Pitt,[135]of Thixtil, fellow in 1519, whose extraordinary erudition is praised by Caius, of Wharton the anatomist, Sydenham the xvii century physician, Gabriel Harvey the “Hobbinoll” of theShepherd’s Calendar,[136]Sir George Stokes the mathematician, and Sir Henry Maine.[137]*Grindal and *Whitgift[138]of Canterbury, *Rotherham and *Booth of York, *Richard Fox Master of the college, Bishop of Winchester, and founder of Corpus Christi Oxford, the two Langtons Bishops of *S. David’s and Winchester, *Ridley the martyr Bishop of London, *Lancelot Andrewes Bishop of Ely, then of Winchester, with
A COURT AND CLOISTERS IN PEMBROKE COLLEGE This represents the First or Entrance Court of the College. Beyond the Cloisters is the Chapel designed by Sir Christopher Wren and completed in 1664.A COURT AND CLOISTERS IN PEMBROKE COLLEGEThis represents the First or Entrance Court of the College. Beyond the Cloisters is the Chapel designed by Sir Christopher Wren and completed in 1664.
Felton and *Wren of Ely, are on its honour roll. The second Master was Robert Thorpe of Thorpe-next-Norwich, knighted by Edward III. and afterwards Lord Chancellor.[139]The old college garden, loved by Ridley, is much despoiled, but “Ridley’s walk” remains. Pembroke gave two other martyrs for their religious opinions, Rogers and Bradford.[140]Two fellows of the college[141]in the reign of Edward III. died in Rome where they had gone to obtain from Innocent VI. possession of part of the original endowment of the college; a statute prescribes that mass shall be said for them each July.
In the library are Gower’sConfessio Amantisand theGolden Legend, printed by Caxton. It is this last book which brought him the promise of “a buck in summer and a doe in winter” from the Earl of Arundel, for its great length had made him “half desperate to have accomplished it.” There, too, is Gray’s MS. of the “Elegy.” The college also possesses Bishop Andrewes’ library. Matthew Wren is buried in the chapel, and his staff and mitre are preserved in the college, the latter being a solitary specimen of a post-reformation mitre; it was worn over a crimson silk cap.
The college was founded for 30 scholars, if the revenues permitted.[142]In the time of Caius it housed 87 members; in Fuller’s time 100 (including 20 fellows and 33 scholars); in the middle of the xviii century the number of students averaged 50 or 60.There are now 13 fellowships and 34 scholarships of the value of £20 to £80.
Founders of Cambridge colleges.
The Cambridge colleges are remarkable for the large proportion of them founded and endowed by women. Of the 16 colleges built between the xiii and xvi centuries, now in existence, 6 are due to the munificence of women—Clare, Pembroke, Queens’, Christ’s, S. John’s, and Sidney Sussex. Next as college builders come the chancellors of England, the bishops, and the kings who have each endowed the university with three colleges. Hervey de Stanton, Chancellor of the Exchequer in the reign of Edward II., Thomas Lord Audley chancellor to Henry VIII., and Sir Walter Mildmay Chancellor of the Exchequer to Elizabeth, all founded colleges, two of which still remain—Magdalene and Emmanuel.[143]Hugh Balsham of Ely, Bateman of Norwich, and Alcock of Ely founded three existing colleges—Peterhouse, Trinity Hall, and Jesus.[143a] The kings of England account for some of the finest work in the university, King’s Hall, King’s College, and Trinity College.[144]
The early series of colleges.
In the series of Cambridge colleges the 3 foundations of the early xiv century which followed Peterhouse were all merged in other colleges. Pembroke which was the sixth foundation was the first piece of collegiate building to be carried through in Cambridge, and Corpus Christi must rank as the second.
The colleges from Peterhouse to Pembroke:—
Michaelhouse and King’s Hall went to swell the greatness of Trinity; University Hall became the foundation stone of Clare: and all of them, with Gonville and Trinity Hall, were incomplete adaptations of earlier buildings at the time when Pembroke and Corpus were finished.
We now come to two colleges which formed an East Anglian corner in the university.
Gonville Hall 1348.
Within a month of the licence granted to Marie de Saint-Paul, Edmund Gonville obtained his for the erection of the hall which is called after him. Gonville was an East Anglian parson, rector of two Norfolk parishes and sometime vicar-general of the diocese of Ely. In one of these parishes his elder brother Sir Nicholas Gonville of Rushworth had already established a college of canons, andEdmund Gonville himself was a great favourer of the Dominicans. Edward III.’s licence enabled him to found a hall for 20 scholars in Lurteburgh (now Free school) Lane, between S. Benet’s and great S. Mary’s, in 1348. In 1352 this site was exchanged with Benet College for another on the other side of the High Street,[145]the present site of Gonville and Caius. The Hall was dedicated in honour of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and enjoyed a great reputation among East Anglians and various proofs of papal favour up to the eve of the Reformation.[146]Like Corpus its object was the education of the clergy and theology was to be their study. Alexander VI. (1492-1503) licensed annually two of its students to preach in any part of England, apparently a unique permission.[147]Humphrey de la Pole—who resided for many years—and his brother Edward, sons of the second Duke of Suffolk, were students here; so was Sir Thomas Gresham. Gonville was refounded as Gonville and Caius by Doctor Keys (Caius) two hundred years later.[148]
Trinity HallA.D.1350.
Edmund Gonville left William Bateman Bishop of Norwich his executor in the interests of his new foundation. Bateman, a notable
TRINITY HALL The nearer building seen in the picture is the old Library, and beyond it are the Latham Buildings.TRINITY HALLThe nearer building seen in the picture is the old Library, and beyond it are the Latham Buildings.
figure in the xiv century, set forth as Edward’s ambassador to the King of France in the month that the Black Death made its appearance in East Anglia (March 1350), and died at Avignon on an embassy from the king to the Pope. In 1350 on his return from France,[149]he founded Trinity Hall, near Gonville, on the site of the hostel of the monks of Ely[150]which he obtained for that purpose.[151]
If Gonville’s foundation was intended for the country parson, Bateman’s was intended for theprete di carriera. Both were designed to repair the ravages in the ranks of the clergy left by the plague, but while Gonville’s clerks were to devote their time to the study of theology Bateman’s were to study exclusively civil and canon law. The college was built round a quadrangle,[152]and the religious services were kept in the church of S. John the Baptist (or Zachary) and afterwards in the north aisle of S. Edward’s church; these two churches being shared with the students of Clare. Indeed it was owing to Gardiner’s policy and Ridley’s advice that Trinity Hall escaped incorporation with Clare College in the reign of Edward VI. The library remains as it was in the early years ofElizabeth’s reign, and was founded by Bateman with the gift of his own collection. The Norfolk men were famous litigants. Doctor Jessopp has shown that neither the Black Death nor any lesser tragedy could hold them from an appeal to the law on every trivial pretext. That the first college of jurists should have been founded by a native of Norwich is certainly therefore a fitting circumstance.
Stephen Gardiner Bishop of Winchester and Chancellor of England was Master of Trinity Hall in the reign of Edward VI. and again in the first year of Mary. He used to say “if all his palaces were blown down by iniquity, he would creep honestly into that shell”—the mastership of Trinity Hall. Other distinguished Masters were Haddon,[153]Master of the Requests to Elizabeth, and Sir Henry Maine who had been fellow and tutor. Bishop Sampson, a pupil of Erasmus, Thirlby, Glisson,[154]Bilney, one of the early reformers, Lord Chesterfield, Bulwer Lytton, and Leslie Stephen were all members of Trinity Hall, which is still the college of the larger number of Cambridge law students. There are 13 fellowships, and about 12 scholarships varying in value from £80 to £21 a year, besides exhibitions of the same value.
In the middle of the xiv century there were two important guilds in Cambridge, the one under the invocation ofCorpus Christi“keeping their prayers in S. Benet’s church,” the other dedicated to the
ST. BOTOLPH’S CHURCH AND CORPUS COLLEGE FROM THE STEPS OF THE PITT PRESS, TRUMPINGTON STREET King’s College is seen in the distance.ST. BOTOLPH’S CHURCH AND CORPUS COLLEGE FROM THE STEPS OF THE PITT PRESS, TRUMPINGTON STREETKing’s College is seen in the distance.
Blessed Virgin “observing their offices in S. Mary’s church.” These guilds or confraternities—which existed all through the middle ages as they had existed in classical Rome with precisely similar features—were to be found, as we know, especially among the artisan class, and took the place of our modern trades unions and mutual insurance societies. Like every enterprise of the ages of faith they had a semi-religious character, were usually attached as its “sisters and brethren” to some church, and owed their members not only material assistance but spiritual, paying for masses to be offered for the repose of the souls of all deceased brethren.
Corpus ChristiA.D.1352.
It was two such guilds which forgetting their differences and laying aside all emulations, joined together in the middle of the xiv century in order to found and endow a college in their town. The brethren of the guilds had been planning this enterprise since 1342, and in the following years those who possessed contiguous tenements in the parishes of S. Benet and S. Botolph pulled them down “and with one accord set about the task of establishing a college there.”[155]“By this meansthey cleared a site for their college square in form.”[156]Here then, as in the case of King’s Hall and Pembroke, the earliest collegiate buildings designed as such, the plan wasquadrangular. Sometimes, as in the case of Trinity Hall, the adjacent buildings for completing the court could not be at once obtained, in others, as at Corpus itself and Clare, the courts are irregular, owing to the same difficulty of getting the foursquare space. Corpus Christi college presents us, indeed, with the unique and perfect example in Cambridge of the ancient college court. By March 1352 a clear space, 220 feet long by 140 wide, had been cleared, and the guilds worked with so much good will that they had nearly finished the exterior wall of their college in the same year. “The building of the college as it appears at the present day,” writes John Jocelyn, “with walls of enclosure, chambers arranged about a quadrangle, hall, kitchen, and Master’s habitation, was fully finished in the days of Thomas Eltisley, the first Master [1352-1376] and of his successor” [1376-1377]. This original court is what we see also to-day: the buildings are in two floors, the garrets were added later. The hall range contains the Master’s lodging with asolariumabove it, a door and passage leading thence to the hall. The three other sides were devoted to scholars’ chambers. S. Benet’s served as the scholars’ church, and the gate was on this side of the court.
Before the reign of Henry VIII. there was but little glass or panelling in either story of the building. But in Jocelyn’s time the Master’s and fellows’ rooms were “skilfully decorated” with both. The fellows and scholars together panelled, paved, decorated, plastered, and glazed the public rooms of the college, in one case