Close Menu
Honi Soit
    Facebook X (Twitter) Instagram
    Trending
    • UTS elects new Chancellor
    • Out of the Deep: The Story of a Shark Kid Who Dared to Question Fear
    • Prima Facie: Losing faith in a system you truly believed in
    • Jason Clare seeks replacement for ANU Chancellor Julie Bishop after $790,000 expense report
    • ‘If you silence someone or shush someone, you can get out’: SISTREN is an unabashed celebration of black and trans joy. Is Australia ready?
    • Mark Gowing waxes lyrical on aesthetics, time, language, and his new exhibition ‘This one is a song’
    • NTEU wins wage theft case against Monash University
    • Turning Kindness Into Strength in ‘A Different Kind of Power’
    • About
    • Print Edition
    • Student Journalism Conference 2025
    • Writing Comp
    • Advertise
    • Locations
    • Contact
    Facebook Instagram X (Twitter) TikTok
    Honi SoitHoni Soit
    Thursday, July 10
    • News
    • Analysis
    • Culture
    • Opinion
    • University
    • Features
    • Perspective
    • Investigation
    • Reviews
    • Comedy
    • Student Journalism Conference 2025
    Honi Soit
    Home»University

    Stained history: the University’s great glass hall

    On a symphony of light.
    By Sam Eames and Shania O'BrienOctober 21, 2021 University 4 Mins Read
    Image credit: G. A. Bremner
    Share
    Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Email

    We walk through the university in the fading afternoon light and watch the sun set fire to the stained-glass windows in the Quadrangle. We sit there long after the colours pale and look at the windows, irradiant splendour morphing into something muted. 

    The Great Hall has sixteen stained-glass windows. They were originally commissioned by Sir Charles Nicholson in 1858, a graduate of Edinburgh University. The windows hark back to the ancient traditions of Oxford and Cambridge, those at the East and West ends of the hall depicting the colleges and their founders along with their respective courts of arms. An alcove beside the dais is adorned with royal windows consisting of a large central panel on the north wall, and smaller ones high up on the eastern and western walls. These great windows paint portraits of the colleges of Oxbridge and the figures traditionally associated with their founding, though there are multiple discrepancies between fact and fiction. For instance, under the ‘University College’ section, the date and person listed are of the 9th century, the time of King Alfred the Great, though the college was actually founded in 1249 by William of Durham.

    The production of stained glass is time-honoured. Coloured glass amulets and beads uncovered in Egypt and Mesopotamia trace the practice back to 2500 BC. The artform flourished in medieval times, with the Christian Church re-popularising the practice with ecclesiastic imagery.  

    To make a plate of stained glass, an almost-alchemical reaction is undertaken. Crushing soda ash, sand, and limestone inside a forge, a molten mixture of transparent glass is produced. By introducing metals into the cauldron, colour is infused within the glass. The combinations and interactions of these materials are esoteric. Adding gold will give you a deep ruby, but too little will leave you with a weak cranberry-red. Nickel alone can offer a clear blue, however when further combined with lead the glass takes on a purple glow. The art of producing different shades was historically kept secret, with glass forges having specialised clandestine practises. 

    Until recently, there has been no physical answer to the difference in colours of stained glass. Optical microscopes are unable to detect any difference in structure between similar sets of glass, and so the secrets of glassmaking have remained obscured. In 1981, microscopists finally caught up to the elusive glass artisans, with top-of-the-line equipment capable of measuring individual atoms. It was finally revealed that the source of the colours were tiny nanoscale shapes, particles of different metals a thousandth of the size of human cells.

    In The Gothic Buildings of the University of Sydney by Bertha McKenzie, a detailed account of each window is provided. The motto of the Colony of New South Wales is above the Oxford Window — Sic fortis Etruria crevit, or ‘thus strong Etruria prospered’ — but that is hardly surprising considering the remaining windows immortalise the likes of James Cook, Edmund Burke, and the British monarchy. The Cambridge Window, donated by Sir Daniel Cooper, has a motto that reads couper fait grandir — ‘cutting down makes for growth.’ 

    Yet despite the colonial bent, like that on display in the Hall, the beauty of stained glass comes from something deeper than the motifs on their surface. Countless nanoparticles work in concert to produce a symphony of light, brought alive not by its cold surface and stone-walled frame, but by the rays of the sun which shine through it day-in and day-out. This glass gallery is more dynamic and vibrant than a series of paintings, being innately tied to the natural world that lies outside the silent walls of the Hall. As we sit and watch the light fade, we are buoyed by the knowledge that this gallery of light will open tomorrow at daybreak, and the splendour of the windows will come alive once again.

    stained glass The Great Hall

    Keep Reading

    It’s Vending Machines All The Way Down

    Time Machines: The Architecture on Campus

    No Changes to USU Governance: A Rundown of the SGM

    The Smallest Council That Ever Lived: May 2025 SRC Council

    Before the solution stands a doorkeeper: Kafkaesque Bureaucracy at University 

    Closed Door Policy

    Just In

    UTS elects new Chancellor

    July 8, 2025

    Out of the Deep: The Story of a Shark Kid Who Dared to Question Fear

    July 8, 2025

    Prima Facie: Losing faith in a system you truly believed in

    July 8, 2025

    Jason Clare seeks replacement for ANU Chancellor Julie Bishop after $790,000 expense report

    July 7, 2025
    Editor's Picks

    Part One: The Tale of the Corporate University

    May 28, 2025

    “Thank you Conspiracy!” says Capitalism, as it survives another day

    May 21, 2025

    A meditation on God and the impossible pursuit of answers

    May 14, 2025

    We Will Be Remembered As More Than Administrative Errors

    May 7, 2025
    Facebook Instagram X (Twitter) TikTok

    From the mines

    • News
    • Analysis
    • Higher Education
    • Culture
    • Features
    • Investigation
    • Comedy
    • Editorials
    • Letters
    • Misc

     

    • Opinion
    • Perspective
    • Profiles
    • Reviews
    • Science
    • Social
    • Sport
    • SRC Reports
    • Tech

    Admin

    • About
    • Editors
    • Send an Anonymous Tip
    • Write/Produce/Create For Us
    • Print Edition
    • Locations
    • Archive
    • Advertise in Honi Soit
    • Contact Us

    We acknowledge the traditional custodians of this land, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. The University of Sydney – where we write, publish and distribute Honi Soit – is on the sovereign land of these people. As students and journalists, we recognise our complicity in the ongoing colonisation of Indigenous land. In recognition of our privilege, we vow to not only include, but to prioritise and centre the experiences of Indigenous people, and to be reflective when we fail to be a counterpoint to the racism that plagues the mainstream media.

    © 2025 Honi Soit
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms
    • Accessibility

    Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.