New stained-glass window celebrates Dame Sally Davies’ medical and public service career

Trinity College has installed a striking stained-glass window featuring the Master Dame Sally Davies’ new coat of arms, with heraldic dolphins and blue and gold sickles dripping blood, in the College’s dining hall.

The colourful modern design sits alongside decorative glazing in the oriel windows depicting a variety of figures and coats of arms of British royalty, nobility, and leading political and religious figures, dating from the fifteenth to the twenty-first century.

The new stained-glass window is installed as Trinity searches for the next Master, after Dame Sally – the first woman to hold this prestigious role – announced she would step down, in 2026, following seven years of service.

Dame Sally was made Dame Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath for services to public health and research in the New Year Honours 2020. This honour comes with the requirement for a personal coat of arms, which is granted by the College of Arms, the official heraldic authority for England, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Commonwealth.

Trinity saw this as an opportunity to celebrate Dame Sally as a scientist, public servant and first female Master in the College’s 479-year history.

Artist Petri Anderson transformed the coat of arms into a stained-glass window to offer a clever visual insight into Dame Sally’s medical and public service career, from consultant haematologist and Chief Medical Officer to her current roles as UK Special Envoy on Antimicrobial Resistance and the Master of Trinity College since 2019.

Dame Sally Davies said:

It is a privilege to see my career and passions reflected in this beautiful design. The dolphins, sickles, pelican and John Snow’s pump, tell a story not just of science, but of service, and I hope it inspires future generations at Trinity.

Petri Anderson, an Associate of the British Society of Master Glass Painters, said the project had been ‘a delight from start to finish.’

We decided to design in a fairly contemporary style while also ensuring that the new glass related well with its more historic neighbours. I really enjoyed the challenge of trying to strike that balance. By borrowing the proportions of the other heraldry and loosening up the rigidity of the linear background lead matrix with more organic fluid shapes, I think I was able to hit that sweet spot of design.

Vice Master of Trinity Professor Louise Merrett paid tribute to Dame Sally’s Mastership.

On behalf of the College I would like to thank Dame Sally for her dedication and insightful stewardship of the College during the last seven years. During this time, we have increased student support, instigated new PhD funding, pushed ahead with exciting new facilities for Trinity and connected with increasing numbers of alumni around the world.

I look forward to working with the new Master as Trinity embraces the opportunities and rises to the many challenges the world faces today. Central to Trinity’s mission is maintaining one of the world’s best environments for learning and research and supporting Collegiate Cambridge in that endeavour.

The Master of Trinity – a Crown appointment – acts as ambassador for the College and Chair of its Council, which is the executive arm and trustees of the organisation. Among the Master’s responsibilities are chairing weekly Council meetings, overseeing operational and policy matters, engaging with students and supporting Trinity’s alumni relations activity worldwide.

About the stained-glass window 

The Master’s coat of arms is combined with the Trinity shield and emblazoned with the motto: ‘Dux Femina Facti’, which roughly translates as ‘A woman was the leader of the deed’, a quotation from Virgil’s The Aeneid.

The stained-glass window incorporates the Latin phrase ‘Tria Juncta in Uno’, translated as ‘Three joined in One’ – the motto of the Order of the Bath, referencing Dame Sally’s appointment as Dame Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath.

The striking design features:

Blue and gold sickles dripping with blood represent Dame Sally’s research as one of the first medical practitioners to specialise in sickle cell disease.

Heraldic dolphins containing healthy and sickle red blood cells also refer to Dame Sally’s expertise in this disease.

The dolphins’ blue dorsal fins and the blue glass elsewhere in the design reflect the official colour of the global antimicrobial resistance awareness campaign.

The pelican, associated with blood transfusion, is touching a water pump. Dr John Snow’s Pump, a replica of which is in Soho, pays tribute to the doctor who identified the source of the 1854 cholera outbreak in the capital, thereby proving that the disease was transmitted by water, not air. Dr Snow’s work changed how epidemics were investigated and laid the foundations of epidemiology.

The pelican features in the heraldic badge below the motto of the coat of arms. This heraldic badge will be installed in the Chapel of the Order of the Bath in Westminster Abbey, in due course.

The new window is installed in the West Oriel window of the College’s dining hall and joins those of five other Trinity Masters. The only other women currently represented in stained glass here are Queen Anne and Anne Mantell, the mother of Thomas Nevile, Master of Trinity (1593-1615), who created Great Court and Nevile’s Court.