The Book of Trinity College Dublin 1591-1891Trinity College (Dublin, Ireland)
History
The Book of Trinity College Dublin 1591-1891
Trinity College (Dublin, Ireland)
Trinity College (Dublin, Ireland)
The front of the Chapel, designed by Sir William Chambers, and
erected between 1787 and 1789, at a cost of £22,000, is similar
to that of the Theatre that stands opposite. Facing due south, it
is ninety-six feet wide, with a deep and very handsome tetrastyle
portico, forty-eight feet wide, of the Roman Corinthian order,
immediately within which is a narthex or ante-chapel, in which is
the main doorway of the building. The interior of the Chapel is
eighty feet in length, exclusive of a semicircular apse six feet in
diameter, at the north end. It is forty feet wide and forty-four
feet high, having an organ loft and semicircular gallery over
the entrance, of good carved oak. In the choir are four ranges
of seats, rising gradually from the aisle to the side walls. The
back row of stalls at the west and east sides are appropriated to
the Fellows and Professors. The walls are wainscoted with finely
polished oak panels to the height of twelve feet, over which is a
broad surbase, from which spring the plain round-headed windows.
The woodwork is elaborately carved, and cost over £5,300. The
piers between the windows are ornamented with coupled pilasters,
fluted, of the Ionic order, surmounted by an ornamented frieze and
cornice. From the latter springs the coved and groined ceiling,
which is painted and enriched with florid stucco ornaments of
Italian design, similar to those employed in the same position
in the Theatre. The ceiling of the Chapel is, however, somewhat
more elaborate in design. In the year 1817, the number of students
resident within the walls of the College increased to such an
extent, that to afford accommodation for the necessarily increased
attendance at Chapel, an iron gallery was put up along the east
and west walls of the building. This was removed in 1872, when the
floor of the Chapel was laid in black and red tiles of good design,
and the marble steps and rails before the Communion Table were
presented by the Provost, Dr. Humphrey Lloyd. At the same time,
the oil lamps that were fitted to the fine brass chandeliers that
hung from the east and west walls were replaced by gas burners. In
the apse are three large round-headed windows, without tracery or
ornamentation, which have recently been filled with painted glass.
That on the north-west, representing the Recapitulation of the Law
by Moses, and the Restoration under Solomon, was erected in memory
of Dr. Richard Graves, by his son and other relations, in 1865. The
window facing north-east was erected in memory of the great Bishop
Berkeley by the Right Hon. R. R. Warren, when Attorney-General for
Ireland, in 1867.
[Illustration: THE CHAPEL.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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