Oxford Inscriptions: Weston (formerly New Bodleian) Library
AEDIFICII NOVI BODLEIANI
HUNC PRIMUM LAPIDEM
POSUIT MARIA REGINA
REGIS GEORGII VI MATER
DIE XXV MENS. IUN. A.D.MCMXXXVII
[Queen Mary, mother of
King George VI,
laid this first stone
of
the new Bodleian building
on the 25th day of the
month of June A.D.1937]
This inscription was set low on the wall of the New Bodleian Library (now renamed the Weston Library) on the corner of Parks Road and Broad Street.
The side entrance has the year 1939 inscribed over the door.
When King George VI came over three years later on 23 October 1940 to open the library,, the key unfortunately broke in the lock.
Jan (then James) Morris said of the original building (right) in 1965: “If you are in your fifties, nothing will reconcile you to the Bodleian extension at the end of Broad Street, which looks like a well-equipped municipal swimming bath, and replaced a nice corner of jostling old houses in the late 1930s.” None the less, it is was awarded Grade II listed status.
In 2016 HRH the Duke of Cambridge (now Prince of Wales and the great-great-grandson of Queen Mary and great-grandson of King George VI) opened the Weston Library:
THIS STONE MARKS THE OPENING OF THE
WESTON LIBRARY
BY HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE DUKE OF CAMBRIDGE KG KT
11 MAY 2026
BODLEIAN LIBRARIES
UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD