Francis Trigge Chained Library

Located in the parvise, over the south porch of St Wulfram's Church, it has been claimed to be the first English public library.

[1] In 1598 Francis Trigge, Rector of Welbourn, near Leadenham in Lincolnshire, arranged for a library to be set up in the room over the south porch of St Wulfram's Church, Grantham for the use of the clergy and the inhabitants of the town and Soke.

[5] The library has always been in the parvise over the south porch, originally the dwelling chamber of one of the vicars, with a fireplace, a small sink and an oriel window that provides a view of the nave of the church.

Many of the volumes, which at that date were in a poor condition, were repaired locally between 1893 and 1894; but since the Second World War a number have been carefully renovated and rebound by professional conservators.

Canon Hector Nelson, who retired as Principal of the Lincoln Training College (now Bishop Grosseteste University) and came to live in Grantham until his death in 1896, directed the 1893 restoration.

14th-century legal cases under Roman law decided in central Italy and printed in Venice before 1500 cannot have been of much use to a provincial vicar in the Soke of Grantham in the early 17th century, although such works are now among some of the rarest items.