The library of Trinity Hall is thoroughly medieval in plan, being a long narrow room on the first floor of the north side of the second court, 65 feet long by 20 feet wide, with eight equidistant windows in each side-wall, and a window of four lights in the western gable. It was built about 1600, but the fittings are even later, having been added between 1626 and 1645 during the mastership of Thomas Eden, LL.D. They are therefore a deliberate return to ancient forms at a time when a different type had been adopted elsewhere.
There are five desks and six seats on each side of the room, placed, as usual, at right angles to the side-walls, in the inter spaces of the windows, and in front of the windows, respectively. Their arrangement, and the details of their construction, will be understood from the general view ([fig. 65]), and from the elevation ([fig. 66]).
Fig. 67. Lock at end of book-desk. Trinity Hall.
These lecterns are of oak, 6 feet 7 inches long, and 7 feet high, measured to the top of the ornamental finial. There is a sloping desk at the top, beneath which is a single shelf ([fig. 66], A). The bar for the chains passes under the desk, through the two vertical ends of the case. At the end farthest from the wall, the hasp of the lock is hinged to the bar and secured by two keys ([fig. 67]). Beneath the shelf there is at either end a slip of wood ([fig. 66], B), which indicates that there was once a moveable desk which could be pulled out when required. The reader could therefore consult his convenience, and work either sitting or standing ([fig. 65]). For both these positions the heights are very suitable, and at the bottom of the case was a plinth ([fig. 66], C), on which he could set his feet. The seats between each pair of desks were of course put up at the same time as the desks themselves. They shew an advance in comfort, being divided into two, so as to allow support to the reader's back.
Similar desks occur in a beautiful miniature ([fig. 68]) from a manuscript (now in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge[330]) written in France about 1480. They appear to be solid—possibly fitted with cupboards for books under the sloping portion. No seats are shewn, and, as a reader is standing between them consulting a book, it may be concluded that they could only be used by students in that position.
Lastly, I reproduce ([fig. 69]) a print by Jan Cornelis Woudanus, shewing the library of the University of Leyden in 1610[331]. The bookcases were evidently contrived with the view of getting the largest number possible into the room. Each contained a single row of books, chained to a bar in front of the shelf; and, also for the purpose of saving the space usually occupied by a seat, readers were obliged to consult them standing. There are eleven bookcases on each side of the room, each containing from 40 to 48 volumes. At the end of the room are two cupboards, probably for manuscripts; and to the right of the spectator is a third press, marked Legatum Josephi Scaligeri. He died in January, 1609. Further, as an illustration of the usual appliances for study found in libraries at this period, and often mentioned in catalogues and account-books, I would draw attention to the globes and maps.
I present these bookcases at this point of my researches with some diffidence, for they can hardly be said to represent the lectern-system. On the other hand, they do not exactly represent any other; and I therefore submit that they may be looked at here, as transitional specimens, bridging over the interval between the desks we have lately been considering, and those which we shall have to consider in the next chapter.