OF THE MIDDLE AGES. bl 



129 feet long, 31 feet in breadth, entirely ceiled with wainscot, with 

 twenty-eight wainscot desks and eight double settees. The cost of 

 famishing it with books was £5oG. 10s., four hundred pounds of which 

 (equal to £4000. of our pi-esent money) was subscribed by Whittiug- 

 ton. Tliis edifice still remains in tolerable preservation, and forms 

 the north side of the great cloister of Christ's Hospital, having, in two 

 places, an escutcheon, with the arms '' of Whittington." Pennant 

 says * that " in three years it was filled with books, that Whittington 

 contributed £400. and Dr. Thomas Winchelsej^, a frier,* supplied tho 

 rest; " and this, he adds, was "about thirty years before the invention 

 of printing," when of course books must have been proportionately rare' 



h The arms of TThittington* upou this building and upon the Ordinances of 

 his Hospital arc identical -with those used by the ancient family of "Whittington 

 of Gloucestershire, viz., Azure, a Fess, chequy Or and Aziu'e, and in the ri^ht 

 comer of the shield an Annulet Or. t Pennant's London, p. 183. 



k The order of the Grey Friers appears to have received the especial patronage 

 of the Mercers. John Twyn, citizen and mercer, gave them the land in the parish 

 of St. Xicholas in the Sliarables, where they erected their original building. The 

 foundation of ^Vhittington's Library is thus described in a note to the preface of tho 

 Chronicle of the Grey Friers, edited by the Camden Society, p. 13, "Anno Domini, M°- 

 cccc° xxj° venerabilis vir Eicardus "NVyttyngton, mercer, et maior Lond' incepit 

 novam librariam posuit que primum lapidem fundalem xsj" die Octobris, in festo 

 sancti Hillarionis Abhatis. Et anno sequente ante festum Xativitatis Christi fuit 

 domus erecta et coperta. Intribus annis sequentibus, fuit terrata, dealbata, vitrata, 

 ambonibus scannis et cellatura omata, et libris instaurata, et expensaj factae circa 

 praidicta se extendunt ad ccccc,lvj.li. 16s. 8d. de qua summa solvit praedictus 

 Ricardus "Wliytyngton cccc et residuum solvit Reverendus pater frater Thomas 

 "Wynchelsey et amici sui, quorum animabus propicietur Deus." 



I The Ivings of England were not so well provided with books. Henry Y.. who 

 had a taste for reading, borrowed several books which were claimed bv their 

 owners after his death. — Dr. Henry's Hist, of Great Brit., vol. 10, p. 11.5. 



" The great scarcity and high price of books continued to obstruct the progress 

 of learning. Xone hut great kings, princes, and prelates, universities aud monas- 

 teries could have libraries, and the libraries of the gi-eatest kings were not equal 

 to those of many private gentlemen or country clergymen in the present age." — 

 Dr. Henry's Uist. Great Brit., vol. 10, p. 115. 



• The Anns of the "NMiittingtons, of Whittington, in Derbyshire, were Sable, a 

 Cross Engrailed Argent between four Pomegi-anates Or. — Lysons's Jfaff)?a Britan- 

 nia, Berb'jshirc, p. cxi. The arms of the Statfordshire and Somersetshire families 

 of the same name will he seen at page 10 of this Memoir. 



