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| Cambridge University Trinity College |
| The Great Court of Trinity College. |
| Trinity College was founded in 1546 by Henry VIII when two 14th Century colleges, Michaelhouse and King's Hall, were merged. Most of its buildings date from the 16th and 17th Centuries with the oldest having been built as part of King's Hall. There are of course more modern buildings. |
| Trinity College website. The college website, with a good history section, including lots about the Great Court Run. |
| A lovely old postcard of the Gateway to Trinity. |
| A 1957 postcard of the Great Court. |
| The Great Court Run. It is a tradition of Trinity for the more athletic minded members of the college to attempt the Great Court Run on the day of the Matriculation Dinner. The run involves covering the 367 metre course around the court in less time than the College Clock takes to chime noon - roughly 43 seconds, although this can vary depending on how tightly the clock is wound ! The Run is a part of the 1981 David Putnam film "Chariots of Fire", but was not filmed at Trinity. The clock, located naturally enough in the clock tower (1726), is unusual in that it strikes the hours twice, once in a low note and again in a higher one. Wordsworth wrote how the clock "told the hours twice over with a male and female voice", whilst another legend says that the clock chimes once for Trinity and once for St John's. |
| Trinity Bridge - a postcard mailed in 1910. |
| Three postcards of the Great Gate, none of which we can date accurately but all early to mid 20th Century. There is a statue to Henry VIII in a niche on the gate - it can be seen in the postcards in the centre and on the right, which are from the outside looking in. Henry's sceptre was replaced by a chair-leg as a prank - the leg has remained there ever since, and when, in 1980, it was replaced by a bicycle pump, the college authorities replaced the leg ! |
| Trinity is the largest of Cambridge's Colleges and has a correspondingly large number of notable alumni, amongst whom are 14 Prime Ministers and 32 Nobel Prize Winners. Here are just a few: John Dee, alchemist; Francis Bacon, poet; Andrew Marvell, poet; John Dryden, poet; Isaac Newton, physicist; Spencer Perceval, Prime Minister (assassinated); Earl Grey, Prime Minister; Lord Melbourne, Prime Minister; Lord Byron, poet; Charles Babbage, mathematician; William Henry Fox Talbot, inventor of photography; Alfred, Lord Tennyson, poet; William Thackeray, novelist; William Waddington, French Prime Minister; James Clerk Maxwell, physicist; Henry Campbell-Bannerman, Prime Minister; King Edward VII; Arthur Balfour, Prime Minister; A E Housman, poet; Stanley Baldwin, Prime Minister; Erskine Childers, author; Ralph Vaughan Williams, composer; Prince Ranjitsinhji, cricketer; Charles Rolls, co-founder of Rolls Royce; A A Milne, novelist; King George VI; Vladimir Nabokov, Russian novelist; George "Gubby" Allen, cricketer; Nicholas Monsarrat, author; Rajiv Gandhi, Prime Minister of India. |
Trinity is believed to maintain extensive wine cellars, the size and value of which is the subject of rumour.
Trinity is also reputed to be a very rich college with a substantial income from its lands.
| The Mallard. Another Trinity tradition concerns a duck which inhabits the rafters of the Great Hall. The duck occasionally changes its position in the rafters with the help of a student who is of course photographed with the bird as proof. This task is difficult as the rafters are so high, and in addition access to the Hall other than at meal-times is prohibited. In 2005 the Mallard was knocked off its perch by some pigeons who got in through the windows in the pinnacle. It is currently in the custody of the College catering staff. |
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| Christ's Clare Corpus Christi Downing Emmanuel Fitzwilliam Girton Gonville and Caius Homerton Hughes Hall Jesus King's Magdalen New Hall Newnham Pembroke Peterhouse Queen's St Catherine's St Edmund's St John's Selwyn Sidney Sussex Trinity Hall Home Africa Asia Australasia Europe North America Cambridge (City) Oxford Advertising Gift Shop |
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| Reproductions of postcards with a (Z) following the description are available to buy from Zazzle - just click on the (Z) ! |
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| There's a rather rude Limerick about a young fellow from Trinity (could also be Oxford I suppose !). It's on our "Limericks" page - don't go there if it might offend. |