St Edmund Hall Blog
Library, Arts & Archives
The St Edmund Hall blog brings you the latest thought in academic research and interesting artefacts from our archive and library.
Please note that any opinions or views expressed by blog contributors are not shared or held by St Edmund Hall.
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“A Library is a thing that will universally please”: The donations of Thomas Smith, Bishop of Carlisle and the earliest image of the Old Library
28 Feb 2024
Officers and Gentlemen? An Aularian ‘actor’ & architect, Evelyn Waugh and the Bride of Frankenstein
22 Jan 2024
Celebrating Marriage
1 Aug 2023
Staff members at Teddy Hall are celebrating multiple weddings in 2023! An Old Library Exhibition was created to mark the occasion.
“Ye sight was very splendid & great”: Teddy Hall witnesses and celebrations of Coronations past
2 May 2023
As the Coronation of Charles III on 6 May 2023 approaches, Librarian James Howarth investigates connections between Aularians and the Coronations of the last 350 years.
‘Bought out of Mr Churchill’s study’: John Mill, the Old Library and the Churchill Family
14 Feb 2023
What a list of books in the Hall’s oldest record reveals about the construction of the Old Library collection, the beginnings of postgraduate study and a Principal’s attempts to ingratiate himself with an aristocr…
Celebrating International Day of Women and Girls in Science through the Library
10 Feb 2023
This International Day of Women and Girls in Science, the Library is exploring our collections to celebrate some of the women who have led the way through the male-dominated field of climate science.
Where there’s a will….
28 Oct 2022
How a bequest by Principal Rawlinson in his will of 1631 still pays out today
Making and receiving impact in Nepal
28 Oct 2022
When I considered projects in my application for the Matt Greenwood Travel Scholarship, I worried I might not fully embrace Matt’s gifts of adventure, courage, and concern for others.
“He was my bridge to Oxford and beyond”: Kevin Crossley-Holland and Bruce Mitchell
24 Oct 2022
Aularian Kevin Crossley Holland is a poet, translator and re-teller of medieval poetry, romance, and folklore for all ages. However, his relationship with Old English got off to a rocky start until a sympathetic tutor and an ag…
Celebrating International Day of Women and Girls in Science 2022
9 Feb 2022
Using the Library to celebrate and showcase St Edmund Hall’s own Women in Science.
Teddy Hall’s self-proclaimed Bishop of Dorchester
13 Oct 2021
A recent arrival in the Hall Archives is a scrapbook on the life of Dr Frederick George Lee, Aularian and Victorian “character”. He was a clergyman, an antiquarian, a Jacobite and the founder of the Order for Corp…
‘For books in the Library’ or the uncertain fate of £10: An account of donations by Francis Cherry and Henry Partridge
16 Jun 2021
‘For books in the Library’ or the uncertain fate of £10: An account of donations by Francis Cherry and Henry Partridge
Remembering Aularian Sidney John Heath Smith
11 Nov 2020
I would say at the majority of enquiries that I get relating to the Hall Archives are from family historians; one of the many that I found on my return from furlough related to an Oxford man, who had come to the Hall in 1938 bu…
Whose Hall is it Anyway? Annotation, Mutilation and a Mystery in our copy of 'The History of the University of Oxford'
4 Nov 2020
Annotation, Mutilation and a Mystery in our copy of The History of the University of Oxford
Update: A Coastal Mystery No More
24 Jun 2020
When the blog on the Hall’s painting by Edward Seago was published last month, I received numerous suggestions for its location.
‘The same Sad Calamyties’: Oxford in a time of Plague
2 Jun 2020
One of the things about being a more than 700-year-old institution, as Teddy Hall is, is that we have faced many trials before. This is not the first time the Hall and the University have had to cope with the effects of a deadl…
Don’t Stop! Your Reading! Hold on to that Fielding!
13 May 2020
Our Assistant Librarian, Sophie, updates us on the lengths the library team are going to ensure as comprehensive a service as possible is provided during ‘the weirdest Trinity Term most of us can remember’
A Coastal Mystery
6 May 2020
One of the best loved pictures in the college’s art collection is a coastal scene by the English landscape artist Edward Seago. However, despite many suggestions, the precise location of the scene is unknown. Can an…
A May Morning Portrait
1 May 2020
On one day in any given year (other than this), tens of thousands flock to the roads and gardens surrounding Magdalen College, Oxford, at six o’clock in the morning to hear the choir sing.
340 Years of the Chapel and Old Library
19 Apr 2020
At the start of this most odd of terms, it’s nice to be able to celebrate something – the birthday of the Chapel and the Old Library.
You Shall Not reveal the Secrets of It: The St Edmund Hall Copy of the University Statutes of 1634
19 Feb 2020
A rather guilty pleasure whenever I have to fetch a book from the Old Library is to examine those on either side on the shelf, which is how, when looking for one of the early catalogues of the Old Library last summer, I first c…
RE: Search
12 Feb 2020
How much do you know about how to find things in the library? Do you know your section like the back of your hand? Do you do your browsing in person or on SOLO? Do you stick to your reading list like a baby sloth to a tree or b…
A History of Teddy Hall Silver
29 Jan 2020
During John Mill’s principalship, students were encouraged to leave to the Hall either a book for the library or an item of silver.
Johannes Kepler on Snowflakes or what to give someone who has everything
4 Dec 2019
As Christmas approaches I find myself again, as every year, wondering rather desperately what to give friends and family. This is also the dilemma that led to the writing of one of the rarest examples of early scientific writin…
Triptych – our connection to the medieval Hall
20 Nov 2019
The college is fortunate to own a late medieval triptych which, after a number of years hidden from view, has returned to permanent display in the Ante-Chapel. The triptych originates from the southern Netherlands and dates fro…
King Arthur & St Edmund: An Exhibition Summary
5 Nov 2019
Partly for the challenge. One of the fun things about putting together a display of books in the Old Library is thinking of ways that different books, and their illustrations, bindings, annotations and previous owners illustrat…
Charity begins at home
14 Oct 2019
Rob Petre, College Archivist at St Edmund Hall delves into life into the oldest record at the Hall.