A HISTORY OF GLOUCESTERSHIRE 



had now superseded Paris as the university of the English nation. Though 

 the ' English nation ' remained an integral part of the university of Paris, 

 it was no longer English, nor recruited from England, but a mixed tribe of 

 Scots, Germans, and Irish. Oxford had become the recognized resort for 

 instruction in the higher faculties. 



It has been alleged by Anthony Wood l that there was a Benedictine 

 house at Oxford in 1 175, but Wood was under the obsession of the monkish 

 theory, and thought the monks the pioneers of learning and promoters of the 

 university an entire delusion. No documentary authority is forthcoming in 

 support of his statement, which is wholly improbable in itself, and opposed to 

 all existing documents. 



It was not till a century later, after the administrative staff of Merton 

 College was moved from Merton to Oxford, where the students of Walter of 

 Merton's House of Scholars had already resided for ten years, that the 

 proposition of a Benedictine college was first broached. It is stated that at 

 the general chapter of the Southern Benedictines held at Abingdon in 1275 it 

 was decided 8 to erect a house in which ' the brethren of our order who are to 

 be sent from the various monasteries may live properly.' It is to be noted 

 that they were not there already, but to go there. Each Benedictine house in 

 the province of Canterbury was to contribute 2d. in every mark of its income 

 for the first year and id. in after years for the purpose. Till this was done a 

 lecturer was to be established. The proposal was repeated again at the next 

 chapter at Abingdon in 1279* in the same form. But both resolutions seem 

 to have remained mere resolutions.* The first definite mention of monastic 

 students at Oxford occurs in a letter from Godfrey Giffard, bishop of 

 Worcester, to the Chancellor and University of Masters at Oxford, on 8 April, 

 1283.' The preface suggests that the initiative in the matter had come from 

 the pope, and that the house was an offshoot of the abbey of Gloucester only. 

 It is probable that the whole proceeding arose from some suggestion made at 

 the Council of Lyons in 1274, attended by Abbot Reginald of Homme of 

 Gloucester, apparently as representative of Worcester diocese in the illness 

 of the bishop. For the bishop tells the university that 



the supreme vicar of Christ thought that the study of theology ought to be increased so that 

 it may by enlargement of the place of its tent make its ropes longer ; and we are informed 

 of the praiseworthy and God-inspired devotion of the brethren of the abbey of St. Peter, 

 Gloucester in our diocese, who now desire to depose ignorance the mother of Error and to 

 walk in the light of truth that they may become proficient in learning. 



The bishop, * being desirous to help such a wholesome design,' asks the 

 university 



that in the house they hold for this purpose in Oxford they may have a doctor in the divine 

 page (i.e. a D.D.) to attend them, that the way of learning may lie open to those thirsting 

 for wisdom, and so at last they themselves becoming learned may be able to instruct the 

 people to the honour of God and the church. 



1 Anthony Wood, City Documents (Oxf. Hist. Soc.). 



' So stated in Worcester College, p. 3, by C. H. Daniel and W. R. Barker (Univ. of Oxf. Coll. Hist.), 

 F. E. Robinson, 1900. It is perhaps doubtful whether the meeting was not at Reading. 



1 Chnn. Petroburgensc (Camd. Soc. 1849), 31; Reiner, Aposulatus Benedictinorum in dngtia (1626), fol. 58. 



4 It is possible that the passing of the Statute of Mortmain in this year put a stop for the moment to any 

 acquisition of land for the purpose. 



6 Wore. Epis. Reg. Giffard, fol. 206. 



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