An introduction to the ten oldest colleges of Oxford University

[Music] rob's oxford channel presents an introduction to the 10 oldest colleges of oxford university welcome to rob's oxford and this presentation on the older colleges of oxford colleges what are they for in oxford colleges are where the students eat and sleep and play and pray and have their tutorials the universities where they go to for their lectures and also to take exams there are no holes mentioned in this particular presentation they're a different kettle of fish and there are no women mentioned and that's not surprising these colleges are very old they were for men only right up until about 50 years ago change over time well obviously they have changed enormously they have got bigger they have been rebuilt and so on inevitably town and city you will hear me mention town a lot in this presentation oxford was a town for much of its life it wasn't until 1542 that it became a city for the first time the colleges are covered very briefly we whip through them quite quickly don't worry if you want to get more details of some of the colleges then go to some of my other videos where we look at them in much more detail and don't forget to subscribe below with that here we go because the colleges are old or pre 1500 it's sensible to use an old map so what better than peter speed's map of 1605 as you look at it first thing to note is that oxford was a walled town two of the colleges still have part of the old town walls within them second thing is that maudlin is shown on the left hand side it should be on the right ah the map is upside down i can soon fix that but then we can't read it so let's do it the old way south at the top let's take a closer look for fear of losing anyone on this trip around medieval oxford i'm going to lay down a black dot a marker which represents the location of the red cliff camera nowadays we start with the oldest of oxford's 39 colleges university college this is where it was founded back in 1249 and it's still there here's a glimpse of the college from the air you can actually see the red buses going along the high street in front of it here's the frontage today many students have become famous after attending university college here's two bill clinton the politician and stephen hawking the famous scientist next in time is balear college actually outside of the old city walls as you can see let's take a look from the air it's a big one and here's the frontage two famous men studied here one of them is boris johnson who's the current prime minister and the other is graeme greene the writer what's next we've got merton college founded in 1264. on the map you can see it sits right on the southern edge of central oxford looking over as you can see in the aerial photograph the christchurch meadows and out to the river thames oh look at this tower that's the tower of the chapel and we're looking into the two main quads of merton here tolkien was a fellow at this college and andrew wiles the famous mathematician was a student here okay moving quickly on we've got exeter founded in 1314 and as you can see on the other side of the city looking down on it from the air we get a quite a good glance at its chapel there it actually faces two streets so here's a frontage in turl street and then the other one in broad street tolkien was a student here also philip pullman a writer in the same vein oriole college was founded back in 1326. it's set quite far back from the high street as you can see on the map when you look at it from the air you see a large quad that's the main quad and that quad is pretty much in the position of the original college and neurofrontage actually faces the high street and this you can see that was paid for by a rather well-known ex-student called cecil rhodes another student from way back in time is the elizabethan so water rally right oh whoops i've got the map upside down or have i let's put it right the next college is just down the high street and it's called the queen's college it was founded back in 1341 and then much altered in the 17th century when it was rebuilt along classical lines um you can see from the frontage it's classical and two of the famous people from here one is tim berners-lee said to be the inventor of the web and the other is mr bean who's said to be rowan atkinson and so the seventh oldest of oxford's colleges new college actually new college isn't new but it was back in 1379. as we zoom in we get a very good picture of its very tall chapel and dining hall and then when we look inside that quad we see the quad that proved to be the model for most of the quads that followed in oxford two rather famous people from here hugh grant the actor and john foles the wonderful writer here we can see the location of exeter's neighbor that's lincoln college founded back in 1427. we're actually viewing it from a tower the university church tower and we can see another church that church is all saints and it is now part of lincoln college in fact it's its library and we can now see the beautiful main quad with its lovely lawn and its creeper encrusted walls people who have been students here and done well rishi sunak is the kovid chancellor and john le carre the famous spy author now for a rather special college this one is called all souls and it began in 1438 it's located right next to the university church actually and you can see from the aerial photograph that it runs alongside radcliffe square this photo was taken from rightly square and it features in the foreground the chapel of the college and a little more distantly the library no students from this college as such but two very famous fellows one is christopher wren the famous architect and the other is t e lawrence as in lawrence of arabia the final college in this video and to my mind the most beautiful is maudlin it began in the year 1458 and as you can see on the map it was outside of the city wall alongside the river charwell taking a look in the air then you can see there's a lot of greenery around it it owns a lot of land in fact we're approaching over the botanic gardens which maudlin owns let's have a look at the frontage on the high street and there you see it's wonderful and memorable tower and then we're going to have another look inside because i really wanted to share with you the very beautiful cloister and beyond it what is usually called the new building famous people from here well i've just selected two one of them is oscar wilde famous playwright of course and the other one is andrew lloyd webber the composer okay there you have it the 10 oldest colleges of oxford aren't they beautiful and there's a test at the end of this which is the oldest college in oxford if you can't answer then you must watch the whole video again if you've not subscribed please do so below otherwise thanks for watching and bye bye foreign

Channel: Rob's Oxford

Views: 2,555

Rating: 4.9466667 out of 5

Keywords: Oxford Colleges, Oxford University, Magadelan College, Balliol College, Merton College, Exeter College, Oriel College, Queen's College., New College, Lincoln College, All Souls College, University College

Id: 75l4hnLkAjI

Length: 10min 16sec (616 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 04 2021