All Souls College (in full:
The Warden and College of the Souls of all Faithful People
deceased in the University of Oxford) is one of the
constituent
colleges of the University of Oxford
in England.
Unique to All Souls, all of its members automatically become
Fellows, i.e., full members of the College's governing body. It has
no undergraduate members.
Every year, the top finalists of the University in the humanities
are invited to sit the examination in Classics, English, Economics,
History, Law, Philosophy and Politics for fellowship of the
College. About two are elected to fellowship each year. These
Fellows are known as Prize Fellows, their term of office is seven
years and roughly a dozen are at the college at any one time. Other
categories of fellowship include Senior Research Fellows,
Post-Doctoral Research Fellows, Fifty-Pound Fellows (open only to
former Fellows no longer holding posts in Oxford) and Distinguished
Fellows. There are also many Professorial Fellows who hold their
fellowships by reason of their University post.
It is one of the wealthiest colleges with a
financial endowment of £236m (2007) but
because the College's only source of revenue is its endowment, it
ranks nineteenth among Oxford colleges with respect to total
income.
The
college is located on the north side of the High
Street
and also adjoins Radcliffe Square
to the west. To the east is The Queen's
College
and to the north is Hertford
College
.
History
The
College was founded by Henry VI of
England and Henry Chichele
(fellow of New
College
and Archbishop
of Canterbury), in 1438. The Statutes provided for the
Warden and forty fellows — all to take Holy Orders; twenty-four to
study arts, philosophy and theology; and sixteen to study civil or
canon law.
The College's Codrington Library
was built with the bequest of Christopher Codrington, sometime
governor of the Leeward
Islands. Today the College is primarily an academic
research institution.
There are now no undergraduate members, but All Souls did once have
them, especially around the early 17th century, introduced by
Robert Hovenden (who was Warden of
the college from 1571 to 1614) to provide
servientes. The
downside of this soon appeared, and the college decided to get
along without them again, although four Bible Clerks remained on
the foundation until 1924. One such was the Rev.
Thomas Forster Rolfe (born 1855), an
undergraduate at All Souls from 1874–1878.
Joseph Keble (1632-1710) was another
undergraduate of the college.
Customs
Every hundred years there is a commemorative feast after which the
fellows parade around the College with flaming torches, singing the
Mallard Song and led by a
"Lord Mallard" who is carried in a chair, in search of a legendary
mallard that supposedly flew out of the foundations of the college
when it was being built. The last mallard ceremony was in 2001 and
the next will be held in 2101.
Fellows
Past and current fellows of the College have included:
Chapel
All Souls College at twilight
Built between 1438 and 1442 it remained largely unchanged until the
Commonwealth - Oxford having been a Royalist stronghold, suffered a
certain amount of the Puritans' wrath.
The 42 misericords date from the Chapel’s building, and
show a family resemblance to the misericords at Higham Ferrers
as they were, also, possibly carved by Richard
Tyllock.
Sir Christopher Wren was a Fellow from 1653 and in 1658 produced a
very fine sundial, which was placed on the South wall of the
Chapel, until it was moved to the quadrangle in 1877. During the
1660’s a screen was installed, which was based on a design by Wren,
however this screen needed to be rebuilt by 1713. By the mid-19th
century, much work was needed and so, today’s chapel is heavily
influenced by Victorian ideals.
References
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