Christ Church Cathedral Oxford has a collection of more than nine thousand fragments of painted window glass. A large part of this collection are survivors of a huge glazing scheme that was put into the Cathedral in the seventeenth century. Commissioned by the Cathedral from the Dutch artists the Van Linge brothers, the scheme was only in place in the windows for a short period of time. This means that fragments of this glass can be dated to a relatively specific period of history. Samples from the collection were analysed with the aim of determining the provenance of the glass. The choice of raw materials used and the source from which those materials may have come, could tell us more about the Cathedral and its status during the seventeenth century.

Initial results have indicated the presence of some distinct groups with High Lime, Low Alkali (HLLA) compositions. These compositions have been compared with those of other glasses from across Europe. This has enabled an investigation as to whether similar groups exist and whether a common source for the raw materials could be determined. This presentation aims to give an overview of the work undertaken as well as addressing some of the issues concerning the provenancing of glass.