Of the changes which have been brought about in the College since the days of Routh, of its transformation from a small society of Fellows and Demies into one of the larger among the Colleges in Oxford, it is hardly possible to speak as of history. They are changes of the present day. But it is a matter of history, which ought not to be forgotten, that the College, which has owed much to its Presidents in the past, owes much in this matter to its last President, who governed it during the trying times of two University Commissions, and of the changes which resulted from them. By his own example of the loyal acceptance of what was necessary, even when it was uncongenial to his tastes, and by the kindly sympathy which enabled him to reconcile conflicting interests, he did more to preserve the peace of his College, and to promote its progress, than he would himself have thought possible, or than those to whom he was less well known than to the members of his own College would have been inclined to imagine.
XI.
BRASENOSE COLLEGE.
(Aula Regia et Collegium de Brasenose, Collegium Aenei Nasi.)
By Falconer Madan, M.A., Fellow of Brasenose.
I. THE KING’S HALL OF BRAZEN-NOSE.
(Aula Regia de Brasinnose.)
Professor Holland has given a clear account[212] of the three stages through which a University passes, first as scholae, where there is “a more or less fortuitous gathering of teachers and students”; next as a studium generale, when the teachers become “a sort of guild of masters or doctors,” with control over the admission by a degree to their own body; and lastly as a Universitas, when the society “acquires a corporate existence,” with a well-defined constitution and privileges. The first and second of these stages were attained by Oxford in the twelfth century, and the third early in the thirteenth century. It is early in this latter century that we also find the earliest associations of students among themselves. The system of Halls was due to the desire of the poorer class of students to live for economy’s sake in a common house with common meals, under the charge of a Principal whose duty was quite as much to manage household affairs as to superintend the studies of his scholars.[213]
The existence of the house which became Brasenose Hall may be carried back with certainty to the second quarter of the thirteenth century, the earliest facts at present known being that it belonged, in or before A. D. 1239,[214] to one Jeffry Jussell, and that it passed into the hands of Simon de Balindon, who sold it in about 1261 to the Chancellor and Masters of the University, for the use of the scholars enjoying the benefaction of William of Durham. Soon after this purchase the occupier, Andrew the son of Andrew of Durham, was forcibly ejected by Adam Bilet and his scholars, and no doubt at this time, if not earlier, the tenement acquired the name of Brasenose, and was used as schools, for in 1278 an Inquisition[215] says, “Item eadem Universitas [Oxon.] habet quandam aliam domum que vocatur Brasenose cum quatuor Scholis … et taxantur ad octo marcas, et fuit illa domus aliquo tempore Galfridi Jussell.” The transition from these Scholae or lecture-rooms to a Hall cannot now be traced, but no doubt took place within the same century.
In the early part of 1334 a striking incident occurred in the history of the Hall. Under stress of internal faction, and not on this occasion, it would seem, from excesses on the part of the citizens, there was a migration of a large number of the students of the University from Oxford to Stamford, fulfilling the (later!) prophecy of Merlin—