Editing St John's College, Cambridge (section)

===First Court===
First Court is entered via the Great Gate and is highly architecturally varied. First Court was converted from the hospital on the foundation of the college, and constructed between 1511 and 1520. Though it has since been gradually changed, the front (east) range is still much as it appeared when first erected in the 16th century.<ref>'A History of St John's College', produced by Tim Rawle Associates, Cloister Press, p. 3</ref> The south range was refaced between 1772 and 1776 in the Georgian style by the local architect, [[James Essex]], as part of an abortive attempt to modernise the entire court in the same fashion. The most dramatic alteration to the original, Tudor court, however, remains the Victorian amendment of the north range, which involved the demolition of the original medieval chapel and the construction of a new, far larger set of buildings in the 1860s. These included the chapel, designed by Sir [[George Gilbert Scott]], which includes in its interior some pieces saved from the original chapel. It is the third tallest building in Cambridge. The alteration of the north range necessitated the restructuring of the connective sections of First Court; another bay window was added to enlarge the college's hall, and a new building was constructed to the north of Great Gate. Parts of the First Court were used as a prison in 1643 during the [[English Civil War]]. In April 2011, [[Queen Elizabeth II]] visited St John's College to inaugurate a new pathway in First Court, which passes close to the ruins of the Old Chapel.