This article will be permanently flagged as inappropriate and made unaccessible to everyone. Are you certain this article is inappropriate? Excessive Violence Sexual Content Political / Social
Email Address:
Article Id: WHEBN0000363897 Reproduction Date:
This is a list of the oldest existing universities in the world. To be included in this table, an educational institution must satisfy a traditional definition of university[Note 1] at the time of its founding.[1] Chronologically, it must have been founded before 1500 in Europe or be the oldest university derived from the medieval European model in a region. It must also be still in operation, with institutional continuity retained throughout its history, and so some early universities, most notably the University of Paris which was suspended from 1793 to 1896, are excluded.
The word university is derived from the Latin: universitas magistrorum et scholarium, roughly meaning "community of teachers and scholars". The term was coined by the Italian University of Bologna, which, with a traditional founding date of 1088, is considered the first university.[2][3] The origin of many medieval universities can be traced to the Christian cathedral schools or monastic schools which appear as early as the 6th century and were run for hundreds of years as such before their formal establishment as university in the high medieval period.[4]
Other institutions of higher learning, like those of ancient Greece, ancient Persia, ancient Rome, Byzantium, ancient China, ancient India and the Muslim world, are not included in this list due to their cultural, historical, structural and juristic dissimilarities from the medieval European university from which the modern university evolved.[Note 2][Note 3][7] In lists based on broader definitions, Al-Karaouine, founded in 859 as a madrasa and in 1963 as a university, is sometimes considered as the "oldest university".
The university as an institution was historically rooted in that medieval society which it in turn influenced and shaped:[7]
The university is a European institution; indeed, it is the European institution par excellence. There are various reasons for this assertion. As a community of teachers and taught, accorded certain rights, such as administrative autonomy and the determination and realisation of curricula (courses of study) and of the objectives of research as well as the award of publicly recognised degrees, it is a creation of medieval Europe, which was the Europe of papal Christianity...
From the early modern period onwards, the university gradually spread from the medieval Latin west across the globe, eventually replacing all other higher-learning institutions and becoming the preeminent institution for higher education everywhere. This process occurred in the following chronological order:[8]
The earliest and only universities before the colonisation of the Americas were established and run in medieval Europe.
The majority of European countries had universities by 1500. After 1500, universities began to spread to other countries all over the world. Oldest entity of each continent is indicated in bold:
nothing herein contained shall affect or interfere with the rights and privileges granted by charter or Act of Parliament to the University of Durham
that the Bishop of Durham do in future hold the castle of Durham in trust for the University of Durham
Henry VIII and Oliver Cromwell's attempts to formally establish a University for the North in Durham were subsumed by politics and North-South rivalries, and it was not until 1832, as the Prince-Bishopric declined lost his powers, was Durham finally endowed with the Castle and lands and granted degree awarding powers by the king as England's third University
The University of London was founded by Royal Charter on 28 November 1836 and is the third oldest university in England.
London offers a scene and status unrivalled by any other city. UCL, England's third oldest university, is at the heart of what has been described as 'the knowledge capital of the world'.
European Union, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Canada
Isle of Man, India, Canada, European Union, British Overseas Territories
Vienna, Middle Ages, Prague, Regensburg, Cologne
Berlin, North Rhine-Westphalia, Hamburg, France, United Kingdom
Madrid, Andalusia, Portugal, European Union, Barcelona
Berlin, Germany, Amsterdam, Czech Republic, Brussels
Nobel Prize in Literature, Second Spanish Republic, Albert Einstein, European Union, Madrid
University of Cambridge, United Kingdom, Oxford University Press, Colleges of the University of Oxford, Jesus College, Oxford
Mathematics, Medicine, Theology, Italy, Botany
Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Greifswald, Germany, University of Rostock, East Germany