Library Beginnings

John Milton
(1608-74)

A University Chest

The earliest books in the University’s - as opposed to the Colleges’ - possession were those deposited in chests, together with other valuables, as security against money loans. These chests were housed until the late 14th century in the tower of Great St Mary’s Church and thereafter in the newly completed north range of the ‘Schools’.

Built around the four sides of a courtyard in the centre of Cambridge from c.1347 to 1470, the Schools buildings contained most of the rooms then required for the public life of the University: lecture halls for students in theology and canon and civil law, a Chapel doubling as Regent House and, from 1420 onwards, three rooms specifically designated for a library.

600 years of
Cambridge
University
Library

8 October 2002 - 15 March 2003
Admission free

The rooms were fitted up for the storage and reading of books with wooden stalls or lectern cases bearing framed catalogues at their ends, and portable stools; the books being chained against theft.

The Book of Hours evolved from the monastic cycle of prayer which divided the day into eight segments, or 'hours'. From the fifteenth century, the text was personalised by wealthy lay patrons who incorporated splendid illustrations of religious subjects, heraldic devices, and occasional self-portraits. One of the earliest Flemish Hours produced for East Anglian patrons, this manuscript was part of the Library of John Moore, Bishop of Ely (d.1714) bought and presented to the University by King George I, 1715