|OXFORD is so naturally associated with the idea of a University, and
the Collegiate buildings which confront one at every turn have such an
ancient appearance, that a stranger might be excused for thinking that
the University is older than the town, and that the latter grew up as
an adjunct to the former. Of course, the slightest examination of facts
suffices to dissipate this notion. Oxford is a town of great antiquity,
which may well have been in existence in Alfred the Great's time, though
there is not a shred of documentary evidence to prove that he was,
as tradition so long asserted, connected with the foundation of a
university there: it certainly existed in the reign of his son
and successor, Edward the Elder, because--and this is the earliest
historical mention of the place--the English Chronicle tells us that
Edward took "Lundenbyrg and Oxnaford and all the lands that were
obedient thereto." That was in 912, a date which marks the first
authenticated appearance of Oxford on the stage of English history. .
There is a passage in Domesday Book which gives us a fair idea of the
size of the town in the Conquerors day. It contained over seven hundred
houses, but of these, so harshly had the Normans treated the place,
two-thirds were ruined and unable to pay taxes. William made Robert
D'Oily, one of his followers, governor of Oxford. D'Oily's is the
earliest hand (a heavy one, by the way, as the townsfolk learnt to their
cost) whose impress is visible on the Oxford of to-day. We may indeed,
if we please, attribute a certain piece of wall in the Cathedral to
a remoter date, but the grim old tower (which appears in the first
illustration) is the first building in Oxford whose author can with
certainty be named. It is all that remains of the Castle which Robert
D'Oily built in order to control the surrounding country; and he
built his stronghold by the riverside because he thereby dominated the
waterway, along which enemies were apt to come, as well as wide tracts
of land in every direction. No doubt the hands of the conquered English
laboured at the massive structure which was to keep them in subjection.
[Illustration: 0023]
[Illustration: 0024]
A queen was once besieged in the castle, Matilda, Henry I.'s daughter.
When food gave out she made her escape in a romantic manner, so the
story tells. The river was frozen and the ground covered with snow. The
queen was let down from the tower by night with ropes, clad in white,
the better to escape observation. Three knights were with her, clad in
white also, under whose guidance she reached Wallingford on foot, and so
escaped King Stephen's clutches.
To the period of the Norman Conquest belongs also the tower of St.
Michaels Church, in the Cornmarket. It has been usual to describe this
edifice as Saxon; but antiquaries incline to think that if Robert D'Oily
did not build St. Michael's tower, he at least repaired it. This tower
formed a part of the city wall, and from its narrow windows arrows
may have rained upon advancing foes. Adjoining it was Bocardo, the old
north-gate of the city, whose upper chamber was long used as a prison.
Nothing of Bocardo now remains; but Robert D'Oily's handiwork
is traceable, as many think, in the crypt and chancel of St.
Peter-in-the-East and in the chancel arch at Holywell.
In these buildings, then, the history of Norman Oxford is written, so
far as history can be written in stone; yet here and there about the
city are to be seen structures which, although two or three centuries
younger, have an appearance hardly less venerable. Year after year the
aged walls and portals are thronged with fresh generations of the youth
of England; and it is in this combination of youth and age that no
little of the charm of Oxford lies. We speak within the limitations of
mortality: but, could we escape them for a moment, "immortal age beside
immortal youth" might be her most appropriate description.
|WHEN did the University come into existence? That is a question which
many people would like to have answered, but which still, like Brutus,
"pauses for a reply." It is to the last degree improbable that we shall
ever know. There were teachers and learners in Oxford at an early date,
but so there were in many other English towns; the plant struck deeper
in Oxford than elsewhere, that is all that one can say. There are
various indications that in the twelfth century the town had acquired a
name for learning. In 1186, Giraldus Cambrensis, who had written a book
about Ireland and wanted to get it known, came and read his manuscript
aloud at Oxford, where, as he tells us, "the clergy in England chiefly
flourished and excelled in clerkly lore." That was fifty years after the
death of King Henry the Scholar, who--was it only a coincidence?--had
a residence in Oxford. It is pleasant to find Oxford students, even in
those early days, with ears attuned to hearing "some new thing."
"Doctors of the different faculties," we are told, were among Giraldus'
auditors: a fact which shows that learning was already getting
systematised. A little later it has clothed itself in corporate form,
and possesses a Chancellor. That official (when, and by whom appointed,
is the mystery) is first mentioned in 1214, and we can henceforth look
upon the University as a living body. He is named in connection with the
first recorded "town and gown" row, when the citizens of Oxford took
two clerks and hung them. The papal Legate (this was in the evil days of
King John) intervened, and the citizens were very properly rebuked and
fined.
A century passed before "The Gown" had a building set specially apart
for the transaction of their affairs. Then, in 1322, Bishop Cobham of
Worcester added a chapel to the north-east corner of St. Mary's, and
gave it to the University as a House of Congregation. The office of
Proctor had already been instituted, and that functionary had plenty of
students to employ his time--30,000 one writer assures us, but him we
cannot credit. A fourth of that number is a liberal estimate. They lived
in Halls and lodgings, a hard and an undisciplined life, preyed upon
by the townsfolk and biting their thumbs at them in return (whence
collisions frequently ensued) until Walter de Merton devised the College
system, to the no small advantage of all concerned.
[Illustration: 0031]
Benefactions poured in upon the several Colleges, but the greater
institution was not forgotten. In the Divinity School, within whose
walls Latimer and Ridley defended their opinions, and Charles II.'s
Parliament debated, the University possesses, as is fit and proper, the
most beautiful room in Oxford and one of the most beautiful in England.
The style is Perpendicular and the ceiling is particularly admirable.
Together with the fine room above it, in which Duke Humphrey's
manuscripts were housed, the Divinity School was completed in 1480.
Those six hundred manuscripts of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, which he
bestowed on the University, had a sad history. They were dispersed by
Edward vi.'s Commissioners, who judged them to be popish in
tendency, and only four of them were ever restored to their old home.
Nevertheless, Duke Humphreys gift was the origin of the Bodleian
Library. One does not like to think what the Library was like in the
days which followed, when its manuscripts were scattered abroad and its
shelves sold; but in the last years of the sixteenth century there arose
a man who took pity upon its desolation. This was Sir Thomas Bodley,
Fellow of Merton, a man of travel and affairs, who devoted the last
years of his life to the creation of what is now one of the most famous
libraries in existence. It has ever been the delight of scholars since
the days of James I., who wished he might be chained to the Library, as
some of the books were.
[Illustration: 0032]
The original chamber did not long suffice to contain the volumes; an
east and then a west wing were added, the latter over Archbishop Laud's
Convocation House (1640) which superseded Cobham's Chapel. From these
the books overflowed into various rooms in the Old Schools Quadrangle,
which had been rebuilt in James I.'s reign. Further space was gained in
1860, when the Radcliffe, set free by the removal of its collection of
scientific works to the New Museum, was lent to the Bodleian; and again
in 1882, on the opening of the New Examination Schools (sketched by Mr.
Matthison), when the Old Schools were rendered available for the uses of
the Library.
[Illustration: 0035]
[Illustration: 0036]
The various public buildings belonging to the University erected during
the nineteenth century, such as the Taylor Institution, the University
Art Galleries, the New Museum, and the Indian Institute, can hardly
escape attracting the attention of visitors to Oxford. It remains to
say a word of two older structures, which appear side by side in Mr.
Matthison's next drawing--the Clarendon Building and the Sheldonian
Theatre.
[Illustration: 0039]
The Clarendon Building was designed by Vanbrugh, and completed in 1713.
It is named after the author of the _History of the Rebellion_, and was
partially built out of the profits of the copyright of that work, which
Clarendon's son presented to the University. It was the home of the
University Press until 1830, and is now occupied by the offices of
various University Boards.
The Sheldonian Theatre, designed by Sir Christopher Wren, is associated
with less tranquil occupations. It is here that honorary degrees are
conferred and the Encænia held; here the _Terrce Filius_, a licensed
jester, used to hurl his witticisms at whomsoever he pleased; and
here, in later times, the occupants of the Undergraduates' Gallery have
endeavoured to keep up his tradition. Here, too, Convocation sometimes
meets, when a burning question is to be discussed and Masters of Arts
assemble in their hundreds. On such occasions the Sheldonian has
been known to be as full of clamour as at the Encaenia. It is perhaps
pleasanter to view Wren's stately building when it is void alike of
undergraduate merriment and of graduate contention.