All Souls College, Oxford
“they tested fellowship candidates by serving them cherry pie and seeing what they did with the stones”
Founded by Archbishop Henry Chichel, 1438
All Souls is, in a sense, Oxford’s most exclusive college, unique in having no undergraduate students. The exam for electing fellows is allegedly “the world’s hardest exam.”
Founded when colleges were to pray for souls, All Souls fellows were to do masses for all the departed souls of the 100 years war between the English and the French, and the sovereign of Henry VI and his family of course.
Architecturally, it is a masterpiece of the great Nicholas Hawksmoor, a hugely important baroque architect. He designed an expansive addition to the medieval Front Quad in the early 18th century. The dramatic twin towers have a fairytale quality about them and may well have inspired the vision of the quidditch pitch.
Its library is one of the most majestic of the University. Views inside the Codrington Library are only possible at certain times of the year. If this is a priority for you please plan tour visit well in advance.
Notable Fellows include Christopher Wren, T. E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia), historian A. L. Rowse, philosopher Isaiah Berlin, and many leading judges, diplomats, and scholars. The College is associated with high scholarship and public service.
The photographs of ducks refer to an eccentric tradition that lurks beneath the college’s famously serious reputation. Only happen in Oxford!
You may include All Souls on any weekday, afternoon of the following tours.
Harry Potter Lite.
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