Cambridge: Round Church to Clare College

The Round Church

We were in Cambridge for the St John's May Ball - the first time for 38 years! The idea was to do a city walk on the afternoon after the Ball and I had prepared a circular route to take in pretty much all the central colleges.

As it happened however we were tired having stayed up all night, hung over (for obvious reasons) and it was raining a bit, so we gave priority to having a substantial lunch, on the carbohydrate theory of hangover treatment. And then severely curtailed the planned walk. Nonetheless, we still followed our core principle of city walking: even if you know the city well, behave like an inquisitive stranger who is seeing it for the first time.

We started at the Round Church - Holy Sepulchre, to give it its correct name - and quickly learned from Pevsner that "round churches as a rule are connected with the Orders founded to guard the Holy Land and the Holy Sepulchre". This church was built by an otherwise unknown "fraternity of the Holy Sepulchre" not later than 1130 and the round part at least presents a wholly Norman appearance.

Here is the interior which now displays a series of panels telling the history of Cambridge.



We then walked a few yards down St John's street to enter by the magnificent main gate (1511-1520). Inside the cleaning up operation was in full swing and already much of the evidence of last night's ball had already vanished.



We left through the backs, intending to visit Trinity College next door, but we told that the College was closed on account of clearing up after its ball, also last night.

So instead we walked back into town along Garret Hostel Lane and turned into Caius College. I don't recall ever being here before so the inquisitive stranger role was easy to adopt. The most initially striking thing was the very pleasant trees in the first court - which is, rather wonderfully, named Tree Court. Cambridge colleges normally just have grass so this was a lovely departure from the norm.

Then in Caius court we saw the marvellous renaissance style Gate of Honour, one of three meant to symbolise the life course of a student. Pevsner again offers a fascinating insight: the Italian renaissance, he says, came to England as an ornamental fashion, rather than a serious architectural style. The Gate of Honour was completed in 1575 and, although ambitious in its conception, looks wrong because the actual entrance is extremely small.



Next we had a look at the Senate House, which can be seen in the background above. It dates from 1722-30 and in light of our relatively recent walk in Palladian London we were easily able to spot the Palladian influences, especially the alternating pediments over the ground floor windows.



We looked across to Great St Mary's, rebuilt from 1478-1536, in the late Perpendicular style of East Anglian wool churches. Sadly it too was closed, so our plan to see the elegant interior was frustrated.



Our final stop was Clare College where the gateway of the seventeenth century Great Court caught our eye.



Rating: Four stars. Short but full of interest.


Reflections

You can still discover new perspectives on familiar things, especially if you have as good a guide as Pevsner. On the other hand, the day after a ball is a daft choice for a challenging city walk. We hope to do it justice on another occasion.