Originally built of timber or wattle and thatch, from the time of the great fire of 1190 all but the humblest hospitia were constructed, partly at least, of stone. Not a few belonged to religious houses; but the majority were originally owned by laymen, and were, after 1214, let to the clerks at rents fixed by a board of eight assessors, four being Masters and four townsmen, though even before this rents were not uncommonly fixed by a jury of Masters and citizens, called Taxers. Any building used for the reception of scholars was called aula, the term domus being usually reserved for a religious or semireligious establishment. The University aimed at securing for its students the permanent and exclusive use of certain houses, and the proprietors of academic halls were not suffered to apply them to any other purpose than the reception of students, nor demise them without the proviso, 'in case the University had no occasion for the same.' That they might not become ruinous, the principal of each hall was to give notice to the landlord of necessary repairs, which were to be defrayed out of the rent. If the principal omitted to do so, the dilapidations fell on himself.

Unlike the Colleges, which were not originally establishments for instruction but eleemosynary houses of religion, and whose fellows, till the end of the fifteenth century, had no other duties than those of religion prescribed by the College statutes, and those of study prescribed by the University 1, and unlike the Inns, which were mere lodging-houses, Halls were distinctly teaching institutions. Either a teacher gathered scholars round him, or students associated themselves in one house and elected a head or moderator who usually was their teacher. They might migrate from hall to hall at pleasure, but could not, from the middle of the thirteenth century, be turned out. The University took steps to prevent the landlords from evicting scholars arbitrarily.

It was at this time that the idea of corporate college life-with its community of worship, organized study, and domestic orderfor the training of lay Churchmen and secular clergy took shape in the House of the Scholars of Merton, the House of Balliol, and the Mickle Hall of the University in High Street. This same feeling of the desirability of discipline and domestic supervision led to the establishment of the Halls under a more settled rule. This vigorous common life was the one great difference between Oxford and Paris, intensifying corporate consciousness and bringing about the eventful influence of Oxford on the national fortunes. About the time that

1 Huber, vol. i. § 115.

the scholars were secured from capricious turning adrift, the University forbade principals to sell their office, to hold two halls at once, and to be absent for more than a year. But it was not till 1420 that 'unattached' students were abolished, and every scholar or scholar's servant obliged to dwell in a hall governed by a responsible principal. In the first year of Henry V a statute was enacted against those 'called by the wicked name chambur-dekenys' (camera degentes, Wood 1), who occupied unlicensed lodgings and were a disorderly element. These 'Irish and Welsh vagabonds' would often, in the habit of poor scholars, disturb the peace of the University, live under no government of principals, keep up for the most part in the day, and in the nighttime go abroad to commit spoils and manslaughter, lurk about taverns and houses of ill repute, commit burglaries and the like.' Like the limitours, they were frequently licensed to beg, singing Salve Regina at rich men's doors.'

It was further, in the early fifteenth century, decreed that principals. should be graduates, and should apply before the Chancellor every year for the renewal of their licence; that they should reside in their halls, keep a list of members, report disorderly conduct, and admit no student expelled from elsewhere. They took an oath to maintain discipline. The students were bound to attend lectures unless graduates. The principal was elected by his aularians; but after Leicester's chancellorship, about 1570, they were obliged to elect the person nominated by the Chancellor. When any vacancy occurred, an inventory was made of the common stock of goods and chattels pertaining to the Hall, and a cautionary deposit was given to the University by the newly admitted principal.

The principal's profits arose from tuition fees. He did not cater for the aularians. This was done by an upper servant or manciple, 'wise in buying of vitaille,' who was sometimes a scholar. These purveyors acquired so much consequence that a statute was passed forbidding any manciple to become principal of a Hall. Purveyance for twenty miles round Oxford was secured by grant of the Crown to the scholars. There was in every Hall a common table, and what each contributed to the common purse of the Hall was called 'Commons,' about eightpence to eighteenpence a week. Additional fare for private consumption could be obtained from the manciple and was called batells.' The rent of a single room was from 7s. 6d. to 13s. 4d. a year.

1 Rather, chamber-servants-in a large house the lowest class.

CHAPTER IV.

HALLS ON THE SITE OF THE PRESENT COLLEGE.

No College stands within more natural boundaries than Pembroke College. Yet it is an almost accidental agglomeration of ancient tenements in two parishes, belonging formerly to a number of different owners. By the purchase in 1888 of the Wolsey Hospital the process of gradual expansion became complete. Except a minute strip of land' outside its western wall the College covers the whole quasirectangular area formed by the city wall on the south, St. Ebbe's Street on the west, Beef Lane and St. Aldate's churchyard on the north, and St. Aldate's Street on the east. The extreme length is 540 feet; the extreme breadth 130.

The academic tenements which once covered this area were as follows, beginning from the east:-'Segrim's Houses' (the Wolsey Almshouse), New College Chambers, Abingdon Chambers, Broadgates Hall, Cambey's Lodgings, Minote or St. John's Hall, the double Hall of SS. Michael and James, Beef Hall, Wyld's Entry, and Dunstan Hall. For all of these lands, except the Almshouse (which belonged to Christ Church) and Cambey's, the College paid rent till recent times.

I have already spoken of 'Segrim's Houses,' and will hereafter treat of the Almshouse upon this site. It was divided by a wedgeshaped strip of ground (averaging 17 feet broad, belonging also to the Priory, and forming part of the butt-yard) from the neighbouring New College land. Until 1866 the College leased this strip of Christ Church for a shilling yearly, collected by one of the almsmen and kept by them. In the accounts in the time of the Commonwealth, 12d. for ye Almesmen in christ church Hospitall,' 'for a little ground.' In Agas's map there is something which may answer to the present double gates opening on to this slice of ground, but Dr. Ingram and 1 The City are about to sell this to the College.

D

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NEW COLLEGE BUILDING.

Ollier (1843) can hardly be correct in stating that the broad gates which gave the Hall its name were here' opposite the south-east corner of St. Aldate's churchyard.' In Burghers' engraving (1700) there are on this slip a few trees (represented at the present day by two limes), and grass with formal walks, which have now disappeared. In Loggan's (1675) there are only trees and grass.

Next to this, where the Old Quadrangle now begins, stood New College Building or Chambers, and between them and Broadgates Hall were Abingdon Chambers. 'For the enlargement of the said Hall a certain tenement adjoining (on the east side, as it seems) was added to it, and so also was another on the east side of that which belonged to New College, and was rented by the Principal of Broadgates in the reign of Hen. VII for 6s. 8d. yearly New College Building is first found rented by a principal of Broadgates in 1498, the fourteenth year of Henry VII. In 1510 Mr. John Noble had succeeded Doctor Brian [Hygden] as tenant, paying 6s. 8d.2, ' eo quod scholares abunde fuerint absentes per magnum tempus propter periculum infirmitatis". Mr. Darbyshire and Mr. Greene, principals of Broadgates, appear as tenants in 1556 and 1564 respectively. Before Darbyshire another tenant, Dr. Gilbert, appears. 'New College hath a tenement between brodgates ō ye west and ye Almeshouse on ye East, someties in ye tenure of Dr. Gilbt. In the 20th of Henry VIII (1528), however, it has another name, connected perhaps with the trade which flourished close by-Brewers tenement pulled downe by ye cardinal. This is the same as 'Brewer's tenement belonging to New College wch stood iuxta ecclam Sti Aldati et iuxta Brodyates"," mentioned under 1495, and apparently identical with New College Building. If so, did Wolsey rebuild it, for there is a building next the Almshouse in Agas? Another entry in the New College bailiffs' accounts, which Wood hesitatingly assigns to the 20th of Henry VII (1504), is this: Will. plomer oweth lately ye ten. by Brodgates".

Before its annexation to Broadgates in (as it seems) 1498 there are 1 Gutch's Wood, iii. 614. The brothers Robert and Gilbert gave to Abingdon Abbey not only their moiety of St. Aldate's advowson, but 'terram et domus infra civitatem.' These were probably the Abingdon building.

2 Wood MS. D. 2, fol. 283.

3 Ibid. fol. 284.

Ibid. fol. 284.

Ibid. fol. 288.

Ibid. fol. 282.

Ibid. fol. 283. In 1529 William Plummer was surety in £10 for John Harvey, late warden of the Minorites, that he would appear to answer charges laid against him. In 1537 he witnessed the will of a widow who left to the four ordres of fryers four nobles to singe dirige and masse at Allhallows church at the buryall and moneth mynde.' (Little's Grey Friars, pp. 110, n. 1, and 319.)

ABINGDON CHAMBERS.

35

scholars found in it in 1495. The house was then rented by Mr. Parson Agar, 'called afterwards Dr. Akers1. At an earlier date the famous prelate Thomas Bekynton was principal there.

THOMAS BEKYNTON was fellow of New College, 1408-1420. While Dean of Arches he tried the heretic Taylor. He was also Prolocutor of the Lower House. As an eminent canonist he was one of three lawyers appointed to draw up articles of procedure against the Wycliffites, and— having been tutor to Henry VI-wrote a learned work in opposition to the Salique law. Bekynton was advanced to be Secretary of State, Keeper of the Privy Seal, and Bishop of Bath and Wells (1443). Together with Bishop Langton and Sir John Fastolf, he was dispatched, in 1432, as ambassador to the Court of France, to negotiate a peace, and was also a member of the great embassy sent to Calais in 1439. In 1442 Bekynton went on a fruitless embassy to Armagnac to arrange a marriage between Henry VI and one of John IV's daughters. He died Jan. 14, 146, and was laid in a noble tomb built by himself. It was opened in 1850 and his skeleton found-that of a tall man with a well-formed skull. Bekynton's chief fame rests on his princely encouragement of men of letters and his architectural works. Besides rebuilding the palace at Wells, he erected a public conduit and fountain, the Vicars' Close, and other edifices there. His rebus-a tun and a flaming bekyn or beaconis to be seen on the walls of Wells, of Winchester, and of Lincoln College, of which the Rector's Lodgings are due to him. He also promoted the College at Eton, where he was himself consecrated.

A rent of 20s. was paid for this land to New College from 1545 till April 16, 1866, when it was redeemed. In 1544 it was rented at 30s. 'Anno Henrici 8vi 35o ad 36m:—super doctorem Parre [=Apharry], principalem de Broadegates pro redditu suo hoc anno 30s.2'

At what date Abingdon Chambers came to be leased by the Principal of Broadgates we do not know, except that it must have been before the renting of the New College tenement, and before 1485, for the New College tenement is then said to be 'by Brodgates". Wood says the building contained 'two or four chambers'; the area was half a rood. It was quit-rented of Christ Church, to which this Abbey property passed, for 6s. 8d.

These two tenements and Broadgates Hall adjoining seem to be represented in Agas's large map in Bodley (1578) by an irregular string of unimposing houses, together with a fairly large building at about the middle of the south side of the present Old Quadrangle, and

1 MS. D. 2, fol. 281. But perhaps this was John Akars, one of the 'scholars of ripe wits and abilities in Cambridge' who were among the first students of Cardinal College. (Strype, Parker, i. 10.)

2 City, i. 607.

3 Wood MS. D. 2, fol. 281.

Ralph Agas's map however was made about 1550, though not published till 1578.