Duke Humfrey's Library is the oldest reading room in the Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford. It is named after Humphrey of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Gloucester, who donated 281 books after his death in 1447. Sections of the libraries were restored and expanded in the 16th and 17th centuries, including the addition of a second storey, an east wing and a west wing. The library currently functions as a reading room.
Duke Humfrey's Library is named after Humphrey of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Gloucester, a younger son of Henry IV of England. He was a connoisseur of literature and commissioned translations of classical works from Greek into Latin. When he died in 1447, he donated his collection of 281 books to the University. This was considered a very generous donation, as the university at the time only had 20 books and all classes were taught via oral lectures; prior to Gutenberg's circa 1450 invention of the movable type press, books were hand-copied and were only for the very wealthy.
The library was constructed as a second storey to the Divinity School between 1450 and 1480 in order to house the collection. [1] In 1550, during the Reformation, the King's Commissioners despoiled the library in order to destroy the vestiges of Roman Catholicism in the country. The books were probably burnt, and in 1556 the furniture was removed by the university. Today, only three of Humfrey's original books remain in the library. [2]
The Library was refitted and restored from 1598 by Sir Thomas Bodley and between 1610 and 1612, the east wing (now the Arts End) was added. The west wing (now the Selden End) was built 20 years later. The books in the oldest part are in housed in oak bookcases at right angles to the walls, with integral desks. The ceiling consists of panels painted with the arms of the university. [3] Up until the opening of the new Weston Library in 2015, Duke Humfrey's Library functioned as a reading room for maps, music and pre-1641 rare books; it now serves as an additional reading room for users of the library. [4]
The Library consists of the original medieval section (1487), the Arts End (1612), and the Selden End (1637). It houses collections of maps, [5] music, Western manuscripts, and theology and art materials. It is the main reading room for researchers of codicology, bibliography and local history, as well as it containing the University Archives and the Conservative Party Archive.
The Library is on the first floor and forms an H-shape with the later parts as the uprights. The Arts End is above the Proscholium and is attached at two corners to the Old Schools Quadrangle. The medieval section is above the Divinity School and Selden End (named after John Selden a benefactor of the library) is above the Convocation House.
A drawing of the medieval section with the Divinity School below in isolation is used as the emblem of the Bodleian Library.
Duke Humfrey's Library was used as the Hogwarts Library in the Harry Potter films. [6]
The Bodleian Library is the main research library of the University of Oxford. Founded in 1602 by Sir Thomas Bodley, it is one of the oldest libraries in Europe. With over 13 million printed items, it is the second-largest library in Britain after the British Library. Under the Legal Deposit Libraries Act 2003, it is one of six legal deposit libraries for works published in the United Kingdom, and under Irish law it is entitled to request a copy of each book published in the Republic of Ireland. Known to Oxford scholars as "Bodley" or "the Bod", it operates principally as a reference library and, in general, documents may not be removed from the reading rooms.
The House of Lancaster was a cadet branch of the royal House of Plantagenet. The first house was created when King Henry III of England created the Earldom of Lancaster—from which the house was named—for his second son Edmund Crouchback in 1267. Edmund had already been created Earl of Leicester in 1265 and was granted the lands and privileges of Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester, after de Montfort's death and attainder at the end of the Second Barons' War. When Edmund's son Thomas, 2nd Earl of Lancaster, inherited his father-in-law's estates and title of Earl of Lincoln he became at a stroke the most powerful nobleman in England, with lands throughout the kingdom and the ability to raise vast private armies to wield power at national and local levels. This brought him—and Henry, his younger brother—into conflict with their cousin King Edward II, leading to Thomas's execution. Henry inherited Thomas's titles and he and his son, who was also called Henry, gave loyal service to Edward's son King Edward III.
John Selden was an English jurist, a scholar of England's ancient laws and constitution and scholar of Jewish law. He was known as a polymath; John Milton hailed Selden in 1644 as "the chief of learned men reputed in this land".
Mary de Bohun was the first wife of Henry Bolingbroke, Earl of Northampton and Hereford and the mother of King Henry V. Mary was never queen, as she died before her husband came to the throne as Henry IV.
Humphrey of Lancaster, Duke of Gloucester was an English prince, soldier and literary patron. He was "son, brother and uncle of kings", being the fourth and youngest son of Henry IV of England, the brother of Henry V, and the uncle of Henry VI. Gloucester fought in the Hundred Years' War and acted as Lord Protector of England during the minority of his nephew. A controversial figure, he has been characterised as reckless, unprincipled, and fractious, but is also noted for his intellectual activity and for being the first significant English patron of humanism, in the context of the Renaissance.
John of Lancaster, Duke of Bedford KG was a medieval English prince, general, and statesman who commanded England's armies in France during a critical phase of the Hundred Years' War. Bedford was the third son of King Henry IV of England, brother to Henry V, and acted as regent of France for his nephew Henry VI. Despite his military and administrative talent, the situation in France had severely deteriorated by the time of his death.
John Beaufort, 1st Duke of Somerset, 3rd Earl of Somerset, KG was an English nobleman and military commander during the Hundred Years' War. He was the maternal grandfather of Henry VII.
Humphrey Stafford, 1st Duke of Buckingham, 6th Earl of Stafford, 7th Baron Stafford, of Stafford Castle in Staffordshire, was an English nobleman and a military commander in the Hundred Years' War and the Wars of the Roses. Through his mother he had royal descent from King Edward III, his great-grandfather, and from his father, he inherited, at an early age, the earldom of Stafford. By his marriage to a daughter of Ralph, Earl of Westmorland, Humphrey was related to the powerful Neville family and to many of the leading aristocratic houses of the time. He joined the English campaign in France with King Henry V in 1420 and following Henry V's death two years later he became a councillor for the new king, the nine-month-old Henry VI. Stafford acted as a peacemaker during the partisan, factional politics of the 1430s, when Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, vied with Cardinal Beaufort for political supremacy. Stafford also took part in the eventual arrest of Gloucester in 1447.
Sir William Tresham JP was an English lawyer who served as Speaker of the House of Commons until 1450.
Anne of Gloucester, Countess of Stafford was the eldest daughter and eventually sole heiress of Thomas of Woodstock, 1st Duke of Gloucester, by his wife Eleanor de Bohun, one of the two daughters and co-heiresses of Humphrey de Bohun, 7th Earl of Hereford, 6th Earl of Essex (1341–1373) of Pleshey Castle in Essex.
Eleanor Cobham was an English noblewoman, first the mistress and then the second wife of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, who in 1441 was forcibly divorced and sentenced to life imprisonment for treasonable necromancy, a punishment likely to have been politically motivated.
The Radcliffe Science Library (RSL) is the main teaching and research science library at the University of Oxford in Oxford, England. Being officially part of the Bodleian Libraries, the library holds the Legal Deposit material for the sciences and is thus entitled to receive a copy of all British scientific publications.
The Treaty of Tours was an attempted peace agreement between Henry VI of England and Charles VII of France, concluded by their envoys on 28 May 1444 in the closing years of the Hundred Years' War. The terms stipulated the marriage of Charles VII's niece, Margaret of Anjou, to Henry VI, and the creation of a truce of two years – later extended – between the kingdoms of England and France. In exchange for the marriage, Charles wanted the English-held area of Maine in northern France, just south of Normandy.
The Divinity School is a medieval building and room in the Perpendicular style in Oxford, England, part of the University of Oxford. Built between 1427 and 1483, it is the oldest surviving purpose-built building for university use, specifically for lectures, oral exams and discussions on theology. It is no longer used for this purpose, although Oxford does offer degrees in Theology and Religion taught by its Faculty of Theology and Religion.
Events from the 1390s in England.
Humfrey Wanley was an English librarian, palaeographer and scholar of Old English, employed by manuscript collectors such as Robert and Edward Harley. He was the first keeper of the Harleian Library, now the Harleian Collection.
Henry Grey, 2nd Earl of Tankerville, 7th Lord of Powys was an English peer. He was the son of John Grey, 1st Earl of Tankerville and his wife Joan Charleton, co-heiress and 6th Lady of Powys.
Convocation House is the lower floor of the 1634–1637 westward addition to the University of Oxford's Bodleian Library and Divinity School in Oxford, England. It adjoins the Divinity School, which pre-dates it by just over two hundred years, and the Sheldonian Theatre, to its immediate north.
Antigone of Gloucester was an English noblewoman and the illegitimate daughter of Humphrey of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Gloucester (1390–1447). She was the granddaughter of King Henry IV. She has been thought to have been born between 1425 and 1428 but as her first child, Richard Grey, 3rd Earl of Tankerville, was born in November 1436 it is likely that she was born by 1424 at the very latest and possibly earlier. Her date of death is not known, but it was later than 1450.
The Selden Carol Book is a medieval carol manuscript held by the Bodleian Library in Oxford. Along with the Trinity Carol Roll, with which it shares five contemporaneous carols and texts, it is one of the main sources for 15th century English carols, and like the Trinity Roll contains the music as the well as the texts. The inclusion of Deo Gracias Anglia referencing Henry V's victory at Agincourt in 1415 gives an indication of the date of composition of the carols.
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