“Lambeth, envy of each band and gown,” has been for more than 700 years the residence of the Archbishops of Canterbury, tho the site of the present palace was only obtained by Archbishop Baldwin in 1197, when he exchanged some lands in Kent for it with Glanville, Bishop of Rochester, to whose see it had been granted by the Countess Goda, sister of the Confessor.  The former proprietorship of the Bishops of Rochester is still commemorated in Rochester Row, Lambeth, on the site of a house which was retained when the exchange was made, for their use when they came to attend Parliament.  The Palace is full of beauty in itself and intensely interesting from its associations.  It is approached by a noble Gateway of red brick with stone dressings, built by Cardinal Moreton in 1490.  It is here that the poor of Lambeth have received “the Archbishops’ Dole” for hundreds of years.  In ancient times a farthing loaf was given twice a week to 4,000 people.

Adjoining the Porter’s Lodge is a room evidently once used as a prison.  On passing the gate we are in the outer court, at the end of which rises the picturesque Lollards’ Tower, built by Archbishop Chicheley, 1434-45; on the right is the Hall.  A second gateway leads to the inner court, containing the modern (Tudor) palace, built by Archbishop Howley (1828-48), who spent the whole of his private fortune upon it rather than let Blore the architect be ruined by exceeding his contract to the amount of L30,000.  On the left, between the buttresses of the hall, are the descendants of some famous fig trees planted by Cardinal Pole.

The Hall was built by Archbishop Juxon in the reign of Charles II., on the site of the hall built by Archbishop Boniface (1244), which was pulled down by Scot and Hardyng, the regicides, who purchased the palace when it was sold under the Commonwealth.  Juxon’s arms and the date 1663 are over the door leading to the palace.  The stained window opposite contains the arms of many of the archbishops, and a portrait of Archbishop Chicheley.  Archbishop Bancroft, whose arms appear at the east end, turned the hall into a Library, and the collection of books which it contains has been enlarged by his successors, especially by Archbishop Seeker, whose arms appear at the west end, and who bequeathed his library to Lambeth.  Upon the death of Laud, the books were saved from dispersion through being claimed by the University of Cambridge, under the will of Bancroft, which provided that they should go to the University if alienated from the see; they were restored by Cambridge to Archbishop Sheldon.  The library contains a number of valuable MSS., the greatest treasure being a copy of Lord Rivers’s translation of the “Diets and Sayings of the Philosophers,” with an illumination of the Earl presenting Caxton on his knees to Edward IV.  Beside the King stand Elizabeth Woodville and her eldest son, and this, the only known portrait of Edward V., is engraved by Vertue in his Kings of England.