and, as was usual for Academicians then to do, all the scholars removed to other places, where they could have civiller usage, and greater privileges allowed them, as the Oxonians had done in King John’s time, when three thousand removed to Reading and Maidstone (and as some say to Cambridge also). It appears that the English king, Henry III., was not blind to the advantages which would accrue to his country from an influx of scholars, and therefore published Letters Patent on the 14th July, of that very year, to invite the masters and scholars of the University to England; and foreseeing they would prefer Oxford before any other place, the said king sent several Writs to the Burgers of Oxon, to provide all conveniences, as lodgings, and all other good Entertainment, and good usage to welcome them thither.[3] Among other Englishmen who left Paris in consequence of these dissensions, was Master William of Durham, who repaired at first to Anjou only. But we may well suppose that his attention was drawn by the fostering edicts of the English king to Oxford as a centre of schools. It is certain that when he died, at Rouen, on his way home from Rome, twenty years later, in 1249, “abounding in great Revenues, eminently learned, and Rector of that noble Church of Weremouth, not far from the sea,” he bequeathed to the University of Oxford the sum of three hundred and ten marks, for purchase of annual rents, unto the use of ten or eleven or twelve, or more Masters, who should be maintained withal.
The above information is derived from a report drawn up in 1280, by certain persons delegated by the University of Oxford to enquire into the Testament of Master William of Durham; which report is still kept among the muniments of the College, and constitutes our earliest statutes.
In the thirteenth century there was not the same choice of investments as to-day. The best one could do was to lend out one’s money to the nobles and king of the Realm, or to purchase houses therewith. The former security corresponded to, but was not so secure as, the consolidated funds of a later age. Nor was house property entirely safe. For in an age when communication between different parts of the country was slow and insecure, it was not of choice, but of necessity, that one bought house property in one’s own city; since farther afield and in places wide apart one lacked trusty agents to collect one’s rents; but in a single city a plague might in one year lay empty half the houses, and so forfeit to the owners their yearly monies.
In laying out William of Durham’s bequest, the University had recourse to both these kinds of security. As early as the year 1253, a house was bought for thirty-six marks from the priors and brethren of the hospital of Brackle; perhaps for the reception of William of Durham’s earliest scholars. This house stood in the angle between School Street and St. Mildred’s Lane (which to-day is Brazenose Lane), and corresponded therefore with the north-east corner of the present Brazenose College. Two years later, in 1255, was purchased from the priors of Sherburn, a house in the High Street, standing opposite the lodge of the present college, where now is Mr. Thornton’s book-shop. For this piece of property the University paid, out of William of Durham’s money, forty-eight marks down.
This house, the second purchase made out of the founder’s bequest, after belonging to the College for upwards of six hundred years, was lately sold to Magdalen College instead of being exchanged as it should have been, if it was to be alienated at all, with a house belonging to Queen’s College, numbered 85 on the opposite side of the street. And at the same time, all properties and tenements, not already belonging to us, except the aforesaid No. 85, intervening between Logic Lane and the New Examination Schools, were purchased, to give our College the faculty of some day, if need be, extending itself on that side.
The third house bought out of the same bequest adjoined (to the south) the former of the two already mentioned, and fronting on School Street, was called as early as A.D. 1279, Brazen-Nose Hall. It cost £55 6s. 8d. sterling, and on its site stands to-day Brazen-nose College gate and chapel. The purchase was completed in 1262. The last of the early purchases made by the University for the College consisted of two houses east of Logic Lane on the south side of the High Street. (The old Saracen’s Head Inn on the same side of Logic Lane only came to the College in the last century by the bequest of Dr. John Browne, who became master in 1744.) These two houses paid a Quit Rent of fifteen shillings, for which the University gave, A.D. 1270, seven pounds of William of Durham’s money, proving, as Mr. Smith notes, that in the thirteenth century houses were purchased in Oxford at ten years’ purchase, so that you received eleven per cent. interest on your money.
The rents of all these houses, so we learn from the Inquisition of the year 1280 already mentioned, amounted to eighteen marks. As to the rest of the money bequeathed, the Masters of Arts appointed by the University in 1280 to enquire found, “That the University needing it for itself, and other great men of the Land that had recourse to the University; the rest of the money, to wit, one hundred Pounds and ten Marks, had been made use of, partly for its own necessary occasions, and partly lent to other persons, of which money nothing at all is yet restored.”
The barons to whom the University thus lent money had long been at strife with King Henry for his extortions, and in May of 1264 won the Battle of Lewes against him. With them the University took side against the king, so far at least as to advance them money out of William of Durham’s chest. It is not certain—though it seems probable—that some few scholars were as early as 1253 invited by the University to live together, as beneficiaries of William of Durham, in the Hall which was in that year purchased out of his bequest. If it be asked how were they supported, it may be answered: with the interest paid by the nobles upon the hundred pounds lent to them; for, since the capital sum was afterwards repaid, it is fair to suppose that the interest was also got in year by year from the first. Although the University drew up no statutes for William of Durham’s scholars till the year 1280, yet his very will—which is now lost—may have served as a prescription ruling their way of life, even as it was made the basis of those statutes of 1280. Perhaps, however, his scholars were scattered over the different halls until 1280, when, after the pattern of the nephews and scholars of Walter de Merton, they were gathered under a single roof for the advancement of their learning and improvement of their discipline. Even if they lived apart, the title of college can hardly be denied to them, for—to quote Mr. William Smith—“taking it for granted and beyond dispute, that William of Durham dyed A.D. 1249, and that several purchases were bought with his money shortly after his death, as the deeds themselves testifie; all the doubt that can afterwards follow is, whether William of Durham’s Donation to ten, eleven, or twelve masters or scholars, were sufficient to erect them into a society? and whether that society could properly be called a college?” And the same writer adds that a college “signifies not a building made of brick or stone, adorned with gates, towers, and quadrangles; but a company, or society admitted into a body, and enjoying the same or like privileges one with another.” Such was a college in the old Roman sense.
We will then leave it to the reader to decide whether University College is or is not the earliest college in Europe, even though its foundation by King Alfred is mythical, and will pass on to view the statutes made in the year 1280. In that year at least the Masters delegated by the University “to enquire and order those things which had relation to the Testament of Master William of Durham,” ordained that “The Chancellor with some Masters in Divinity, by their advice, shall call other masters of other Faculties; and these masters with the Chancellor, bound by the Faith they owe to the University, shall chuse out of all who shall offer themselves to live of the said rents, four Masters, whom in their consciences they shall think most fit to advance, or profit in the Holy Church, who otherwise have not to live handsomely without it in the State of Masters of Arts. … The same manner of Election shall be for the future, except only that those four that shall be maintained out of that charity shall be called to the election, of which four one at least shall be a Priest.
“These four Masters shall each receive for his salary fifty shillings sterling[4] yearly, out of the Rents bought. …
“The aforesaid four masters, living together, shall study Divinity; and with this also may hear the Decretum and Decretalls, if they shall think fit; who, as to their manner of living
