8
6
Introduction
The
British
College
on
the
Eve
of
American
Colonization
6 New College, Oxford. Fourteenthcentury quadrangle, as seen in a
drawing in the Chandler Manuscript, ca.
1465. In foreground are the fellows of
New College and its warden, or head.
(The Bodleian Library, and New
College, Oxford University)
At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the
universities of Oxford and Cambridge were at a
high point in their development. The political and
religious turmoil of the Reformation had disrupted
their medieval traditions, but they had emerged
revitalized. Their curricula were reformed and their
enrollments were larger than ever before, reflecting
a new popular enthusiasm for education. All of
this was to be significant for the colleges in colonial
America, which would be patterned on those of
Oxford and Cambridge and also to some extent
on the Scottish universities. Architecturally, too,
the English colleges were undergoing changes that
established models for America. 1
The sixteenth century saw the full development
of the English "collegiate" system of university
education. At their origins in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, Oxford and Cambridge had been
modeled on the University of Paris, both in their
curricula, based on the dialectical analysis of
Christian doctrine, and in their methods of operation. Students attended the lectures of chosen
teachers, but their living arrangements were their
own concern and, except for students attached to
monastic houses, there were few structured social
institutions. At first students generally lodged with
townspeople, but soon "halls" or "hostels" became more common; these were buildings rented
by groups of students, sometimes under the direction of a master, where the students slept and
took meals but in which there was little social or
educational structure. In the mid-fifteenth century
there were about seventy of these halls at Oxford.
But by then colleges had made their appearance:
permanent establishments endowed by benefactors, often expressly for poor scholars, with specific
regulations of discipline and study. The first was
probably Merton College at Oxford, founded in
1264 by the King's Chancellor, who drew up statutes regulating its government and discipline.
Merton and succeeding colleges for a century
provided lodging only for masters (those studying
for higher degrees), not for undergraduates. But
in 1379, William ofWykeham founded New College at Oxford, with emphasis on the education
and housing of undergraduates. A former Surveyor
of the King's Works, Wykeham took a special
interest in the physical planning of his college.2
The buildings formed an enclosed quadrangle,
containing all the major collegiate requirements:
9
10
lectures, and
other assemblies), scholars' and masters' chambers,
and quarters for the head of the college (Fig. 6).
In the next two centuries about eighteen more
colleges were founded at Oxford and Cambridge,
for the most part following the patterns laid down
at New College, both in their organization (with
teachers and undergraduates living together), and
in the quadrangular arrangement of their buildings.
There were several reasons for the use of the
enclosed quadrangle or courtyard at English colleges. 3 One was the tradition of the cloistered
monastery. Although English colleges were not as
thoroughly patterned on monastic models as is
sometimes supposed, the influence was strong and
several of the colleges were actually founded in,
or later took over, monastic structures. Simply
from an architectural point of view, the monastic
and collegiate "programs" were nearly identical:
the housing of a community of unmarried men
and boys, with spaces for sleeping, eating, instruction, and religious services. Furthermore, the enclosed quadrangle functioned as defense against
potential enemies, who included the townspeople
themselves as much as outside armies. The early
histories of Oxford and Cambridge abound in incidents of town-gown antagonism leading to
fighting, warfare, and murder on both sides. The
ability to close off a college at a few gate-points
also gave college authorities the advantage of
greater control over the students, a concern that
was a major factor in the growth of the collegiate
system. At Oxford in 1410, the desire to control
disorder and whoring produced an edict requiring
all students to reside in either a hall or a college.4
The fact that colleges provided more control than
halls was one of the reasons for the gradual dominance of the college.
Moreover, the quadrangular form made sense
simply in terms of planning and land use. In the
crowded towns of Oxford and Cambridge, colleges
made the best use of small lots by buildingaround
their perimeters, thus getting the maximum building space for the acreage. At first, this practice
often resulted in misshapen quadrangles (such as
the fourteenth-century Old Court of Corpus Christi
College, Cambridge), revealing in the builders of
the time little of the concern for architectural regularity that later ages would display (Fig. 7). As
new colleges were founded and existing ones exa chapel, a hall (used for dining,
7
7 Plan of Corpus Christi College,
Cambridge, as it evolved from the
fourteenth to the nineteenth centuries.
(Thomas D. Atkinson, Cambridge
Described and Illustrated, London,
1897, p. 344)
8 Portion of David Loggan's map of
Oxford, from Oxonia Illustrata, 1675.
Collegiate quadrangles shown include
those of University College (1), Merton
College (3), Oriel College (5), Queen's
College (6), New College (7), All Souls
College (9), and Christ Church College
(13).
Introduction. The British College
11
8
12
panded, space became scarcer whilethe desire grew
for larger quadrangles and more uniform architecture. Maps and aerial views, such as David Loggan's seventeenth-century engraving of Oxford,
show the colleges vying with each other for space
within the confining medieval walls of the city
(Fig. 8). 5 At Cambridge, the land-use pattern of
many ofthe early colleges was somewhat different,
with narrow frontages on the main street and
lengthy gardened "backs" extending down to the
River Cam behind. But the buildings themselves
were generally arranged around quadrangles as at
Oxford.
In the mid-sixteenth century, an innovation in
the quadrangular form appeared that would be
important for later collegiate planning in America
as well as in England. When Dr. John Caius, a
graduate of Gonville Hall at Cambridge who had
studied medicine in Italy and become court physician after returning to England, endowed and
refounded his old school as Gonville and Caius
College in 1557, he had a new court built adjacent
to the old one (Fig. 9). Unlike earlier quadrangles,
the new Caius Court was open on one side,
bounded only by a wall and a monumental gate.
The doctor's ostensible reason for leaving the
courtyard open was health. He expressly forbade
buildings on the open side "lest the air, from being
confined within a narrow space, should become
foul." 6 But, as Nikolaus Pevsner has pointed out,
there was also probably a more formal motive for
this design, as the three-sided courtyard was typical
of the fashionable new chateaux in France, such
as those of Bury and Anet. 7 Whatever practical
advantages it may have had, Caius's open quadrangle created an architectural impression very
different from that ofthe medieval enclosed court
and represented a new, Renaissance notion of
planning. It created the possibility of focal points
and axial organization not inherent in the closed,
equilateral cloister. And its openness suggested a
more sympathetic and less defensive attitude toward the world outside the college.
In the late sixteenth century, two more colleges
were founded at Cambridge (the last new foundations there until 1800): Emmanuel in 1584 and
Sidney Sussex in 1596, both of which followed
the open-courtyard pattern established by Dr.
Caius (Fig. 10). Both also were centers of Puritanism, and Emmanuel had special links with New
England and Harvard College in the following
century. The three-sided courtyard was to play an
important role in American college planning, and
Emmanuel was probably the transmitter of this
form to the New World.
Oxford, during this period, was more conservative than Cambridge, theologically, politically,
and architecturally. It resisted the reforms of Protestantism and Puritanism more tenaciously than
did its rival, and it was disrupted more seriously
by the civil war in the 16405. In its physical planning, Oxford perpetuated the enclosed quadrangle,
using it in virtually all of its newly founded colleges:
St. John's, 1555; Trinity, 1555; Jesus, 1571; Wadham, 1610; and Pembroke, 1624. In terms of architectural style, it isremarkable how long Oxford
resisted the Renaissance and persisted in building
in the Gothic manner—well into the seventeenth
century —although much of this seems to be a
consciously antiquarian "revival" rather than a true
continuation of the Gothic tradition. 8 But despite
the retention of Gothic detailsand enclosed quadrangles, Oxford revealed a new architectural mentality. Courtyards were now planned
symmetrically, with axes emphasized by prominent
entry gates placed at the midpoints of the ranges,
9 Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge.
View from Loggan's Cantabrigia
Illustrata, 1688. Open courtyard in
foreground
was constructed ca.
1560-1580. Behind it is older
quadrangle of Gonville Hall. Extreme
right: Perse and Legge buildings
(dormitories, built 1617-1619), to
which extensions later were made that
created another quadrangle.
10 Emmanuel College, Cambridge. View
from Loggan's Cantabrigia Illustrata,
1688. Most of these buildings were
constructed soon after the founding of
the college in 1584. Main entrance,
through gate at the left in this view, led
into three-sided courtyard opening to
the left. Central courtyard also was
originally open on one side, but was
closed, about 1670, by the erection of
the chapel, designed by Christopher
Wren (seen at top in this view).
Introduction. The British College
13
9
10
14
11
12
13
11 Wadham College, Oxford, constructed
1610-1613. View from Loggan's
Oxonia Illustrata, 1675.
12 King's College, Aberdeen. View from a
map of 1661 by James Gordon.
(Peter J. Anderson, cd., Studies in the
History and Development of the
University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen,
1906, opp. p. 369)
13 Trinity College, Dublin. View from a
map of 1610.
Qohn W. Stubbs, The History of the
University of Dublin, Dublin, 1889,
frontispiece)
Introduction. The British College
as in the quadrangle of Wadham College, constructed about 1610, and the Canterbury Quad
of St. John's College of the 1630s (Fig. II). 9 The
new formal treatment of the enclosed quadrangle
also is found at Cambridge, most strikingly in the
series of axially aligned courtyards of St. John's
College.
Despite the religious and political turmoil of the
late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, Oxford and Cambridge came through the period educationally strengthened. Their curricula were reformed, with the introduction of some science
and the suppression of medieval scholasticism. 10
The reformers also had social goals. They reminded the universities that many of the colleges
had been founded originally for the education of
poor children and that they had a responsibility
to train greater numbers of them. Toward the
other end of the social scale, the aristocrats, gentry,
and affluent merchant class began sending more
of their sons to the universities, reflecting a widespread enthusiasm for educationthat was unknown
earlier. The early seventeenth century saw a greater
proportion of the English population receiving
higher education than ever before—greater, in fact,
than at any later time until the twentieth century. 11
This popular enthusiasm for education was exported to the American colonies, and became an
important force in the early establishment of colleges there.
Thus, both educationally and architecturally,
the English college underwent major transfor-,
mations just before and during the first wave of
American colonization. In some ways the architectural developments can be seen as expressions
of the educational ones. Particularly at Cambridge,
the three-sided courtyard, open to the community
and the world, reflected the new intellectual ideals
and the rejection of the medieval monastic
tradition.
Higher education in Scotland was different from
that in England in a number of ways that may
have influenced colonial America. 12 In contrast to
the two centralized English institutions, Scotland
had four relatively small universities (founded between 1411 and 1582): St. Andrews, Glasgow,
Aberdeen, and Edinburgh. Typically, these had
only two or three colleges each, and Aberdeen
had only one until 1593. Consequently there was
some confusion in Scotland between "college"
and "university," which was to be true also in
America. There was also a difference between the
geographical settings of English and Scottish universities, the latter being generally located in or
near the main town of a region. 13 That fact, combined with their smaller size, made Scottish universities more urban in character, or at least less
dominant over their urban environments. Partly
as a result of this (and also because of a greater
reliance on European models of education), the
Scottish schools were less collegiate than the English, in that the English ideal of a tightly regulated
college community did not hold sway. Scottish
students were freer to live in town rather than at
their colleges, and in this way their lives were more
like those of continental students. Architecturally,
this meant that fewer collegiate buildings were
required. But the form of Scottish colleges was
not very different from the English form; normally
it was an enclosed, or nearly enclosed, quandrangle
of buildings (Fig. 12).14
Another school of higher education in the British
sphere during the period before American colonization was Trinity College in Dublin, founded
in 1591. 15 In a number of ways, it was similar to
the American colleges that would follow. It was
small; it was originally not a university, but just
a single college; and its location was in effect colonial. Furthermore, at its foundation it had a strong
Puritan bias and was run by Cambridge alumni,
as Harvard was to be. Despite this, there is no
evidence that the architecture or planning of Trinity College was influential in America. The original
Trinity buildings, though humble in comparison
with contemporary construction at English colleges, were arranged in the traditional enclosed
quandrangle, a form that was to find little favor
in colonial America (Fig. 13). From its start, the
American college would devise new physical forms
suitable to its own special needs.
15