Note 232 — Chapter II · THE COLLEGES (continued 2)

This is the largest college library but it is not the most ancient. Peterhouse led the way in the xiii century with divinity and medicine books of Balsham’s. In 1418, 380 volumes were catalogued, containing “from six to seven hundred distinct treatises.” Here were to be found books on law, medicine, astrology, and natural philosophy, as well as the preponderating theological tomes. Trinity Hall was another famous xiv century library, and Pembroke has a catalogue of books in that and the next century amounting to 140 volumes. In the xv century Queens’ had 224, and S. Catherine’s 137 (in 1472 and 1475). In 1571 the French ambassador to this country deemed the library at Peterhouse “the worthiest in all England” Cf. the university library, p. 98.