Current exhibitions
Women at Peterhouse: marking 40 years since the formal admission of women students
October 2024-March 2025
As part of the celebrations in College to mark 40 years since women first formally matriculated at Peterhouse in 1984 (graduate) and 1985 (undergraduate), the Library and Archives team have curated an exhibition exploring the history of women at Peterhouse from the foundation up to the present day.
The exhibition is mounted in the display cases at the far end of the reading room and in the flat display case in the Front Hall. On the shelves near the library front desk you will also find a diverse display of books by or about women Petreans; these books are available to borrow to current members.
For those who would like to view the exhibition but do not have access to the Ward Library, please contact library@pet.cam.ac.uk.
This exhibition is just part of the wider celebrations in College marking 40 years of women at Peterhouse with more still to come. For information about how to book for the Peterhouse Women in Geopolitics event on Wednesday 27 November, see booking information under Petrean Events. You will also find here details of the exclusive alumni event taking place on Saturday 14 December which will include a drinks reception and private viewing of the exhibition in full, plus additional materials which all alumni are welcome to attend.
Downloadable PDF of the exhibition: Women at Peterhouse.
Past exhibitions
Details of recent past exhibitions, exhibitions of Peterhouse materials mounted in the University Library, and of displays elsewhere in the College may be found on the Perne and Ward Libraries blog.
Printed catalogues of many past exhibitions are available on request from the Ward Librarian.
For our online Thomas Gray exhibition: https://www.thomasgrayexhibition.com/
Library news
Now available! ‘A descriptive catalogue of the Medieval Manuscripts in the library of Peterhouse, Cambridge’
Peterhouse is pleased to announce the publication of ‘A descriptive catalogue of the Medieval Manuscripts in the library of Peterhouse, Cambridge’, prepared by Professor R.M. Thomson. This is the first such catalogue since that of M.R. James (1899) and the first catalogue to modern standards of the medieval manuscript holdings of any Cambridge College. The book (272 pp. and 114 illustrations mostly in colour), published by Boydell and Brewer, is available to purchase from most academic bookshops. Students and Fellows may borrow the book from the Ward Library.
We have admitted women, and this is already an old story