Eighth College: Gonville and Caius College

I never really perceived Gonville and Caius (or just Caius as they call it here) as a college. I think the main reason is its proximity to King's College and the fact that it is located at the beginning of the old town center. This is also the cause for us not finding the door and literally walking around it twice, before getting in (we'd still be there if a guy had not just walked out the door the moment we were passing it).

It is impressive how you never expect these huge lawns behind the walls. I have actually walked quite often on the street that is on the other side of the gate on the picture above and it's such a tiny alley that you'd rather expect the wall to be the back of some small shop...

Caius is the 4th oldest college and apparently pretty wealthy. Due to it's super central location the lawn part is not as interminable as Jesus College for example, but it is till surprisingly big.

Of course they have their beautiful chapel (who doesn't, duh!).

Ok, I took this picture because I liked the architecture and did not know that the guy was an important English academic named Stephen Perse. As a matter of fact, Caius has a lot of famous alumni such as: Francis Crick (the guy from the DNA structure), John Venn (the one from the Venn diagrams (surprise!)), Sir James Chadwick (Discoverer of the Neutron) and Stephen Hawking (who is a fellow there, not an actual alumni). Not too bad...

At first I thought that they were making publicity for Chanel (just like the street lamps in London) but then I noticed it was a C and a G.Clever..

Ok, one last thing about Caius. Yes, caius. Are you reading it? CAIUS!

Well, chances are you are not pronouncing it right in your head (or aloud if you are reading this out for some reason). The name is (inexplicably) pronounced like the word "keys". So it's Gonville and keys.This is a classic "We don't care how you spell it, let's say it this way"-case of the English language. A guy told me on the street that John Caius was born John Kays and changed his name to Caius to sound latin (who does not want that). But apparently he insisted on the old pronunciation (which is kind of cheating, you either change your name or you don't) so this is why everyone is mispronouncing it, but I still do and always will pronounce it "Kah-ee-ouz", because there are things that one can simply not get away with...