Cambridge (England) -- History; University of Cambridge -- History
In writing in a previous chapter of the buildings of Queens' we drew
attention to the fact that the general plan of the College followed in
the main the lines of a large country house such as Haddon Hall. And in
degree this is true of the other college buildings in Cambridge. A mere
glance at a ground-plan of Jesus will show at once that the arrangement
of the buildings is entirely different from that of any other college at
Cambridge, and it is clearly derived from that of a monastery. This
accords with what we know of its history. However dilapidated the old
nunnery may have become through the poverty and neglect of the nuns, the
outward walls of solid clunch, which under a facing of later brick,
still testify to the durability of the Nunnery builders, were still
practically intact, and Bishop Alcock had too much practical skill as an
architect to destroy buildings which he could so easily adapt to the
needs of his college, and harmonise to fifteenth century fashions in
architecture.
In his conversion of the Nunnery buildings to the purposes of his
college, Bishop Alcock grouped the buildings he required round the
original cloister of the nuns, increasing the size of that cloister by
the breadth of the north aisle of the Conventual Church which he pulled
down. The hall was placed on the north side, the library on the west.
The kitchens and offices were in the angle of the cloister between the
hall and library. The master's lodge at the south-west corner was partly
constructed out of the altered nave of the church, and partly out of new
buildings connecting this south-western corner of the cloister with the
gate of entrance. This gateway, approached by a long gravelled path
between high walls, known popularly as "the chimney," is one of the most
picturesque features of the College. It is usually ascribed to Bishop
Alcock, but on architectural evidence only. It is thus described by
Professor Willis:--
"The picturesque red-brick gateway tower of Jesus College (1497),
although destitute of angle-turrets, is yet distinguished from the
ground upwards by a slight relief, by stone quoins, and by having
its string courses designedly placed at different levels from those
of the chambers on each side of it. The general disposition of the
ornamentation of its arch and of the wall above it furnished the
model for the more elaborate gate-houses at Christ's College and
St. John's College. The ogee hood-mould rises upwards, and the stem
of its finial terminates under the base of a handsome tabernacle
which occupies the centre of the upper stage, with a window on each
side of it. Each of the spandrel spaces contains a shield, and a
larger shield is to be found in the triangular field between the
hood-mould and the arch."
Professor Willis thus describes also the Conventual Church and the
changes which were made by the Bishop in his conversion of it into a
college chapel.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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