Wren Library
Christopher Wren's library at the end of Nevile's Court, finished in 1695, with Newton's notes and the Pooh manuscripts on the shelves.
The library of Trinity College stands at the end of Nevile's Court. Christopher Wren drew up the design in 1676, and building work was finished in 1695. It is Grade I listed.
The room
Inside, one large reading room sits above an open colonnade at ground level. Its tall windows were unusual for the period, and the building is credited as one of the first libraries designed to give readers comfortable daylight. Between the windows, the book stacks stand at right angles to the walls, each ending in a limewood carving by Grinling Gibbons with a plaster bust of a writer above it. Marble busts of college figures, many by Louis-Francois Roubiliac, stand on plinths. Thorvaldsen's statue of Lord Byron, originally offered to Westminster Abbey, ended up here after the Abbey declined it. At the south end, a stained-glass window designed by Giovanni Battista Cipriani and completed by William Peckitt in 1775 shows Isaac Newton being presented to George III. Four statues by Gabriel Cibber stand on the roof balustrade.
The books
Trinity's collection includes Newton's first-edition Principia with his handwritten notes for the second edition, about 1,250 medieval manuscripts and the manuscripts of A. A. Milne's two Pooh books. Also here are several notebooks of Ludwig Wittgenstein and Ramanujan's "lost notebook". Since 2014 the library has been digitising its medieval manuscripts, and more than 1,100 are free to read online.
Visiting
Visits are free of charge, but the hours are restricted. Confirm current times with the college before you go.
Nearby
Within a few minutes' walk
