Itinerarium curiosum (centuria I) : $b or, an account of the antiquities, and remarkable curiosities in nature or art, observed in travels through Great BritainStukeley, William
History
Itinerarium curiosum (centuria I) : $b or, an account of the antiquities, and remarkable curiosities in nature or art, observed in travels through Great Britain
Stukeley, William
Great Britain -- Antiquities -- Early works to 1800; Great Britain -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800
The old gatehouse has a pretty cieling over it of stone; they say it
was the chamber of Harry the Vth’s uncle and tutor. Behind it is New
college; a large chapel, a good visto to the garden, in which is a
pleasant mount: this was the foundation of William of Wickham, bishop
of Winchester: it stands in an angle of the old city walls. At All
Souls a new court is building, but in the anachronism of the Gothic
degenerate taste: the new library is a spacious room, the legacy of
colonel Coddrington: the chapel is very elegant; the altar, entirely
of marble, was made at the charge of George Clark, esq. one of the
fellows. Christ church, the magnificent work of cardinal Wolsey: the
stone cieling over the entrance to the hall is very pretty; the new
quadrangle, designed by the learned Dr. Aldrich, is beautiful. St.
John’s college has two handsome quadrangles, the portico’s built by
archbishop Laud: two fine statues, in brass, of king Charles I. and his
queen, probably designed by Inigo Jones. But it is impossible for me
to run through the whole of this splendid university, which I leave as
a fitter task for some of her own learned sons. The school is a large
building: the Bodleian library, an immense store-house of most valuable
books and manuscripts, the donation of archbishop Laud, the earl of
Pembroke, O. Cromwell, Selden, Digby, Bodley, and other great names:
over it is a spacious gallery, adorned with pictures of founders,
benefactors, and others, and with the antique marbles which were the
learned part of the inexhaustible collection of the earl of Arundel:
these have been illustrated with the accurate comments of Selden and
Prideaux. Here are some of the most valuable Greek monuments now in the
world. Over the porch, upon a handsome pedestal of black marble, stands
the brass effigies of the earl of Pembroke, their noble and generous
chancellor, given by the present earl: this was moulded by Rubens. Here
is likewise a very large collection of Greek, Roman, British, Saxon,
English, and other coins, presented by several hands. The divinity
schools, finished by Humphry the good duke of Gloucester, have a very
curious stone roof. The Ashmolean repository, beside some good books,
papers and MSS. of the founder, has a large collection of rarities in
antiquity, nature and art, &c. such as original pictures of famous men,
marbles of old Egyptian carving in figures and hieroglyphics, a fine
marble inscription in Arabic, which was over the door of a school at
Tangier; an Egyptian mummy, being a man dressed like _orus Apollo_;
the cradle of Henry VI. the hat of Bradshaw plaited with steel within,
under which he sat in judgment upon king Charles I. a vast fund of
precious and other stones, &c. which it is impossible to enumerate.
Here is, beside, a choice apparatus of instruments for chymistry and
experimental philosophy under the direction of Mr. Whiteside. The
printing-house is a good building with a bold portico, but next the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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