The Colleges of Oxford: Their History and Traditions: XXI Chapters Contributed by Members of the Colleges
History
The Colleges of Oxford: Their History and Traditions: XXI Chapters Contributed by Members of the Colleges
University of Oxford -- History
To the north of this quadrangle lay the cloister, a small square,
two of whose sides were formed by an arcade with open perpendicular
windows, much like New College cloister; the third by the chapel; while
the fourth was occupied by the College hall, an unpretentious building
standing exactly at right angles to the site of the modern hall. The
cloister-quadrangle’s size may be judged from the fact that the chapel
formed one entire side of it. It took up not more than a quarter of
the present back-quadrangle, and was surrounded to north and east
by the garden and orchard of which we have already spoken. For many
generations it formed the burial-ground of the Fellows, and on several
occasions of late years, when trenches have been dug across the turf
of the new quadrangle, the bones of fifteenth and sixteenth century
members of the College have been found lying there undisturbed. To
conclude the account of Chichele’s buildings, it must be added that on
the east side of the hall the kitchen and storehouses of the College
made a small irregular excrescence into the garden; their situation is
now occupied by that part of the present hall which lies nearest the
door.
All Chichele’s work was on a small scale save his chapel, on which he
lavished special care. His reredos, preserved for two centuries behind
a coat of plaster, still remains to witness to his good taste; but its
original aspect, blazing with scarlet, gold, and blue, must have been
strangely different from that which the nineteenth century knows. Of
the figures which adorned it a part only can be identified: at the
top was the Last Judgment, of which a considerable fragment was found
_in situ_ when the plaster was cleared away, with its inscription,
“Surgite mortui, venite ad judicium” still plainly legible. Immediately
above the altar was the Crucifixion; the cross and the wings of the
small ministering angels of the modern reproduction being actually
parts of the old sculpture. The carver, Richard Tillott, who executed
the work, mentions, in his account of expenses sent in for payment
to Chichele, “two great stone images over the altar”; these may very
probably have been the founder and King Henry VI.; and the restorers of
our own generation ventured to fill the two largest niches with their
representations. How the central and side portions of the reredos were
occupied is unknown; but it would seem that the founder did not leave
every niche full, as fifty years after his death, Robert Este, a Fellow
of the College, left £21 18_s._ 4_d._ for the completing of the images
over the high altar.
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