The
clockmakers
Joseph Knibb (1640–1711) and
John Knibb (1650–1722) traded from a tenement on the south side of Holywell Street that they rented from
Merton College. Joseph moved to London in 1670 but John Knibb stayed in Oxford for the rest of his life and was
Mayor of Oxford in 1697 and 1710. The composer
George Frideric Handel (1685–1759) performed at the Holywell Music Room.
Jane Burden (1839–1914), the muse of the
Pre-Raphaelites and subject of many of their pictures, lived in a cottage in St Helen's Passage, at the back of Bath Place off Holywell Street. At the time of her birth, her father, Robert Burden, was a
stableman and lived here with his wife, Ann (née Maizey, Jane's mother). The site is now marked with a
blue plaque. At the time of Jane Burden's marriage to
William Morris at
St Michael's Church, Oxford, on 26 April 1859, her father was described as a
groom in stables at 65 Holywell Street. The academic and author
J. R. R. Tolkien lived at 99 Holywell Street between 1950 and 1953, between residences in
Manor Road and
Sandfield Road,
Headington. ==Gallery==