How old is cambridge university

This ancient institution later merged with Marischal College to become the University of Aberdeen as we know it today. The city and University have a long-standing reputation for literature, with many prizes and awards being founded at Edinburgh. As a member of the famed Russell Group of universities, Manchester has always been an institution of high regard.

Before , it was the Victoria University of Manchester and had existed since A merger with the Royal School of Medicine and Surgery made Manchester one of the most successful institutions in the North of England. John Harvard enters Emmanuel College as an undergraduate. William Harvey of Gonville and Caius College, publishes his celebrated treatise, 'De motu cordis et sanguinis in animalibus', On the Motion of the Heart and Blood in Animals , describing his discovery of the mechanism of blood circulation.

Isaac Newton publishes 'Principia Mathematica', establishing the fundamental principles of modern physics. Wordsworth goes down from St John's, later to become Poet Laureate. Viscount Palmerston is elected to Parliament three years after entering St John's, beginning a distinguished lifetime's career in Government, much of it as an MP for the University.

Charles Babbage, while an under-graduate at Peterhouse, has his first ideas for a calculating machine and later starts work on his 'difference engine', which he never completed but which heralds later inventions leading to the modern computer. Alfred Tennyson, Trinity under-graduate, is awarded the Chancellor's medal for his poem, 'Timbuctoo'. Prince Albert, Consort of Queen Victoria, is elected Chancellor and becomes an influential voice for reform. Thomas Babington Macaulay, Fellow of Trinity, publishes volumes one and two of his immensely popular 'History of England'.

The Natural Sciences Tripos is first examined, loosening the stranglehold of mathematics and classics on the syllabus, and opening the door to modern studies of the arts and sciences. Emily Davies and others found Girton College, the first residential university-level institution of higher learning for women.

William Cavendish, seventh Duke of Devonshire, endows the University's new Cavendish Laboratory for the study of experimental physics. Lytton Strachey, Leonard Woolf and Thoby Stephen meet as under-graduates at Trinity and form the nucleus of what was to become known as the Bloomsbury Group. Ludwig Wittgenstein arrives in Cambridge from Vienna to study philosophy with Russell. During a walk on the Backs, the young Lawrence Bragg has an idea that will lead to his discovery of the mechanism of X-ray diffraction.

George 'Dadie' Rylands becomes a Fellow of King's. The atom is split for the first time. Professor Paul Dirac receives his Nobel prize for Physics. The first aeroplane to be powered by one of Frank Whittle's revolutionary new jet engines takes to the air. Women are admitted to formal membership of the University and permitted to graduate in the same manner as male students.

Francis Crick and James Watson discover the structure of DNA, unlocking the secret of how coded information is contained in living cells and passed from one generation to the next - the secret of life. Dr Joseph Needham, Master of Gonville and Caius and already eminent in biochemistry, publishes the first volume of his 'Science and Civilisation in China', the start of a massive enterprise, vastly expanding our knowledge of China and its civilisation. Sylvia Plath, Marshall Scholar at Newnham, continues correspondence to her mother, later to be published in the book, 'Letters Home'.

Frederick Sanger of the University's Department of Biochemistry, wins the first of his two Nobel prizes for Chemistry for determining the specific sequence of the amino acid building blocks which form the protein insulin.

Sir Charles Oatley, Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University's Department of Engineering, leads a team which develops the first scanning electron microscope, arguably the most important scientific instrument to be developed in the last 50 years. Max Perutz establishes and directs the Medical Research Council's Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, a notable example of close working relations between the University and other leading research establishments.

Its reputation for outstanding academic achievement is known worldwide and reflects the intellectual achievement of its students, as well as the world-class original research carried out by the staff of the University and the Colleges.

Many of the University's customs and unusual terminology can be traced to roots in the early years of the University's long history, and this section of our website looks to the past to find the origins of much that is distinctive in the University of today. Start by discovering the earliest written records of the University. Postgraduate Why Cambridge?

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