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The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the world's second-oldest university in continuous operation. It grew rapidly from 1167, when Henry II banned English students from attending the University of Paris. After disputes between students and Oxford townsfolk, some Oxford academics fled northeast to Cambridge, where they established the University of Cambridge in 1209. The two English ancient universities share many common features and are jointly referred to as Oxbridge.

The University of Oxford is made up of 43 constituent colleges, consisting of 36 semi-autonomous colleges, four permanent private halls and three societies (colleges that are departments of the university, without their own royal charter), and a range of academic departments which are organised into four divisions. Each college is a self-governing institution within the university, controlling its own membership and having its own internal structure and activities. All students are members of a college. The university does not have a main campus, but its buildings and facilities are scattered throughout the city centre. Undergraduate teaching at Oxford consists of lectures, small-group tutorials at the colleges and halls, seminars, laboratory work and occasionally further tutorials provided by the central university faculties and departments. Postgraduate teaching is provided in a predominantly centralised fashion.

Oxford operates the Ashmolean Museum, the world's oldest university museum; Oxford University Press, the largest university press in the world; and the largest academic library system nationwide. In the fiscal year ending 31 July 2023, the university had a total consolidated income of £2.92 billion, of which £789 million was from research grants and contracts.

Oxford has educated a wide range of notable alumni, including 31 prime ministers of the United Kingdom and many heads of state and government around the world. As of October 2022,^[update] 73 Nobel Prize laureates, 4 Fields Medalists, and 6 Turing Award winners have matriculated, worked, or held visiting fellowships at the University of Oxford, while its alumni have won 160 Olympic medals. Oxford is the home of numerous scholarships, including the Rhodes Scholarship, one of the oldest international graduate scholarship programmes. (Full article...)

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The university's position of Keeper of the Archives dates from 1634, although its records pre-date this, and Oxford claims to have one of the longest continuous record-keeping traditions in Britain. Records were initially kept in the Priory of St Frideswide, moving to the University Church of St Mary the Virgin in the 14th century. The archives were left in considerable disarray by a burglary in 1544, and remained in chaos until Brian Twyne was appointed the first Keeper of the Archives in 1634 as a reward for his work preparing new statutes for the university. Under Twyne and his successor as Keeper (Gerard Langbaine), the archives were moved into one of the rooms in the Tower of the Five Orders in the Bodleian Library; three of the wooden presses that were built at that time to store them are still in use. The third to hold the position, John Wallis (pictured), prepared an index of the collection that was still used in the 20th century. (Full article...)

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Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) was an Irish writer, poet, and prominent aesthete, remembered for his many epigrams, his plays, and the tragedy of his imprisonment and early death. Wilde proved himself to be an outstanding classicist, first at Trinity College, Dublin, then at Magdalen College, Oxford. After university, Wilde moved to London and into fashionable circles. Known for his biting wit, flamboyant dress, and glittering conversation, Wilde was one of the best known personalities of his day. He produced a series of dialogues and essays that developed his ideas about the supremacy of art. However, it was his only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray that brought him more lasting recognition. Wilde produced four society comedies in the early 1890s, culminating in his masterpiece The Importance of Being Earnest in 1895. At the height of his fame, Wilde sued his lover's father for libel. After a series of trials, Wilde was convicted of gross indecency with other men and imprisoned for two years. In prison he wrote De Profundis, a long letter which discusses his spiritual journey through his trials. Upon his release he left immediately for France. There he wrote his last work, The Ballad of Reading Gaol, a long poem commemorating the harsh rhythms of prison life. He died destitute in Paris at the age of forty-six. (more...)

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Brasenose College was established in 1509 and is located in the centre of the city on Radcliffe Square, near the Bodleian Library, the University Church of St Mary the Virgin and the Radcliffe Camera. It was founded by a lawyer, Sir Richard Sutton, and the Bishop of Lincoln, William Smyth, on the site of Brasenose Hall, one of the university's academic halls. The name is thought to derive from a "brazen" (i.e. bronze) door knocker in the shape of a nose. One such door knocker hangs above the high table in the college hall, and a replica is on display at Stamford School in Lincolnshire, where it is thought that the original was taken during the 1330s; the college repurchased it in 1890. There are three quadrangles in the main college site: the original Old Quad, a smaller second quad known as the Deer Park, and a larger New Quad designed by Thomas Graham Jackson and completed in 1911. Further buildings were added in the 1960s. Brasenose College Boat Club is one of the oldest boat clubs in the world, and participated in the first recorded inter-college race at Oxford, beating Jesus College Boat Club. There are approximately 550 undergraduate and postgraduate students, and notable former students include David Cameron (elected Prime Minister in 2010), the comedian Michael Palin, the supposed inventor of rugby football William Webb Ellis and the former Archbishop of Canterbury Robert Runcie. (Full article...)

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Credit: Arnaud Malon

All Souls College, seen from the tower of the University Church of St Mary the Virgin, was founded by King Henry VI in 1438. Uniquely at Oxford, the college does not have any students – only Fellows.

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Did you know

Articles from Wikipedia's "Did You Know" archives about the university and people associated with it:

... that before Charles Aitken installed electric lighting, the Tate Gallery (pictured) was cleared of visitors on dark and foggy days?
... that in 1964 J. N. L. Baker, Bursar of Jesus College, became the first member of the university to hold the post of Lord Mayor of Oxford?
... that although George Bernard Shaw called fellow Edwardian playwright St John Hankin's death "a public calamity," his work was largely neglected until the 1990s?
... that "many-sided" priest Father Patrick McLaughlin promoted links between the church and the world of literature by staging plays, and by commissioning lectures from T. S. Eliot and Dorothy L. Sayers?
... that in 1612 Jewish teacher Jacob Barnet was arrested and imprisoned by officials of the university for changing his mind about being baptized?