In a few rooms in old buildings of the college, traces remain of ancient wall decorations, usually preserved under layers of later panelling.
Room H2
This room is on the ground floor at the northern end of the Walnut-Tree Building, erected 1616–19. The painted decorations probably date from shortly after the building was newly built.
This photograph shows the centre panel of the south wall, between a door to a gyp-room (left) and the entry door to the room (right).
The bare laths, lower right, show the location of the original entry door to the room from the ground-floor lobby: the present entry door is further to the right. These laths were probably added in 1909–10, when these painted decorations were rediscovered, and panelling erected in front of them. See The Dial, No. 8, pages 355–7.
Left: panel over door to gyp-room.
Right: panel over entry door.
Room G4
This room is on the first floor of the Walnut-Tree Building, erected 1616–19. The painted decorations probably date from shortly after the building was newly built.
This photograph shows the centre panel of the north wall, between a door to the bedroom (left) and a fake door-frame (right).
The upper arcade of false-perspective arches shows a strong family resemblance to the decorations in room H2 (above), but only of half the height. The lower arcade has a simpler design, and respects the natural divisions of the studwork, which the upper arcade does not.
In certain places, pages taken from a book printed in Latin have been used to paper over gaps in the plaster, and then painted over.
Part of the south wall of G4.
Around this room, the upper part of the arcade of arches has been over-painted by a border design of tassels in blue and gold. Immediately below the tassels are signs that a horizontal batten, painted in brown, was once present. It is possible that such a batten might have been used for hanging a later fabric decoration.
The old painted decorations were rediscovered in 1981–82, and new fielded panelling erected to cover them up, and preserve them for inspection. See the Record 1982, page 5.
The third photograph shows a corner of the same room G4, where the original arches and columns have not been over-painted by the blue border visible in the photographs above.
Room C3
This room is on the first floor of Old Court, in the part of the building first erected in 1449. It is decorated throughout in a simple geometric pattern characteristic of the 16th century, painted onto plaster.
A more elaborate version of the same pattern can be seen in the fragment preserved on the staircase of the War Memorial Library.
The timber battens overlaying the decorated plaster date from several different periods, the most recent being 1922.
The folding panels were installed in 1996, to permit viewing of the old decorations. See the Record 1997, page 8.
The east wall of room C3 backs onto a room on staircase B, and the folded panelling divides it into three bays.
Left: the north bay, closest to Old Court.
Right: the centre bay.
Left: the east wall south bay, closest to Queens’ Lane.
Right: the only surviving old decoration surviving on the west wall, adjacent to the entry door from the staircase landing. In the area lower left, various tradesmen have signed and dated on the plaster or timber.
The north wall has windows looking out onto Old Court.
Left: North wall, west side.
Right: North wall, between windows.
Room A1
Virtus non est immunis
In the bedroom of room A1, Old Court, in 1910, a batten-and-canvas wall finish was taken down to reveal this inscription behind on the raw plaster.
The wall (separating A1 bedroom from B2 bedroom) is ancient, but not original, as the studwork is too irregular and crude to be original: it must have an early extra internal partition.
The sense of the phrase is: Virtue does not shirk its duty
.
The inscription was destroyed after the photograph was taken. See The Dial No. 10, page 87.
Room A2
These decorations were discovered behind 18th century panelling in 1972. They were photographed, then demounted and sent away for conservation. They never returned. See the Record 1972–73.
