To see: the columns made of stacked books. Founder of Oxford's Bodleian Library, Sir Thomas Bodley (died January 1613) was given this wall monument by Nicholas Stone in 1615, in the chapel of Merton College. At the centre a man's bust sits in an oval niche; on either side the framing pilasters are no plain columns but stacks of carved books — Stone even rendered the ribbons and brass clasps that once held the volumes shut. Around the bust, four seated figures personify Music, Arithmetic, Grammar and Rhetoric: the whole monument is an allegorical library, a tribute to the bibliophile who gave his library back to the University. Pale alabaster and black marble form a knowing play of contrasts, at eye level.
Did you know?
Nicholas Stone, one of the greatest English sculptors of the seventeenth century, had been apprenticed to Isaac James — the master now credited with Francis Vere's tomb in Westminster — before training in Holland under Hendrik de Keyser.
Info
Merton College Chapel, Oxford. Wall monument: bust in an oval niche; pilasters built of carved books (ribbons, clasps); four seated allegories (Music, Arithmetic, Grammar, Rhetoric). Alabaster and black marble. Nicholas Stone, 1615.