Did night climbers put Christmas tree on roof of the Senate House in Cambridge?

A fully-decorated Christmas tree has been spotted on the roof of the Senate House in the city centre, leading people to believe that it could be the work of the Cambridge night climbers.

The tree follows a proud Cambridge tradition, dating back to the 1930s, of decorating unlikely areas in the city. Last year, Father Christmas hats mysteriously appeared on carved statues and gargoyles outside St John’s College.

The climbers are students who defy the dangers to scale college buildings under cover of darkness, with the most famous example being the Austin Seven car which appeared on the Senate House roof in June 1958.

The 1937 book The Night Climbers of Cambridge by Whipplesnaith - the pseudonym of the author Noël Howard Symington - is the publication that is credited with inspiring generations of night climbers.

It describes in detail the routes up particular colleges, as well as the routes off them. The ‘Senate House leap’, for example, is achieved by jumping across the 6ft (1.8m) gap between the roof of Gonville and Caius College and Senate House.