Oxford

The following is a timeline of the history of the city, University and colleges of Oxford, England.

Dead Man's Walk (or Deadman's Walk) is a footpath running east–west in central Oxford, England, situated immediately to the south of Merton College and just outside the old city wall, with Corpus Christi College at the western end. To the north, Grove Walk connects with Merton Street through a gateway. Immediately to the south is Merton Field with Merton Walk connecting to the wide tree-lined Broad Walk, which runs parallel with Dead Man's Walk. Beyond that is Christ Church Meadow.

The University of Oxford Botanic Garden is the oldest botanic garden in Great Britain and one of the oldest scientific gardens in the world. The garden was founded in 1621 as a physic garden growing plants for medicinal research. Today it contains over 5,000 different plant species on 1.8 ha (4+1⁄2 acres). It is one of the most diverse yet compact collections of plants in the world and includes representatives from over 90% of the higher plant families.Professor Simon Hiscock became Director of Oxford Botanic Garden in 2015.

St Alban Hall, sometimes known as St Alban's Hall or Stubbins, was one of the medieval halls of the University of Oxford, and one of the longest-surviving. It was established in the 13th century, acquired by neighbouring Merton College in the 16th century but operated separately until the institutions merged in the late 19th century. The site in Merton Street, Oxford, is now occupied by Merton's Edwardian St Alban's Quad.

The Examination Schools of the University of Oxford are located at 75–81 High Street, Oxford, England. The building was designed by Sir Thomas Jackson (1835–1924), who also designed several other University buildings, such as much of Brasenose College. The designs for the building were prepared in 1876 and it was completed in 1882, in Clipsham stone. The Examination Schools building is Grade II listed.During the First World War, the Examination Schools together with Somerville College and other Oxford buildings were requisitioned by the War Office to create the 3rd Southern General Hospital, a facility for the Royal Army Medical Corps to treat military casualties. The headquarters of the hospital were at the Examination Schools.The main purpose of the Schools is for the organisation and administration of the university examinations. Many of the final and other examinations for the University's students take place in the building, especially during Trinity Term. There is access to the building from both the High Street and Merton Street. Traditionally there have been parties in the street by students who have finished their exams, although the University tries to take measures to prevent this. At their height, traffic has been disrupted in the High Street. In Michaelmas Term, the Examination Schools are host to the university's Freshers' Fair. The building provides a major lecturing facility for the University and is also used as a meeting and conference venue outside term time. It is one of the largest buildings owned by the University. The Ruskin School of Drawing & Fine Art is located at 74 High Street to the east of the Examination Schools and University College is to the west.

The Florey Building is a modernist student accommodation building by James Stirling in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the third and last building of “The Red Trilogy” (together with the Leicester Engineering Faculty building and the Cambridge History Faculty building), all of which are now listed.

Merton College (in full: The House or College of Scholars of Merton in the University of Oxford) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. Its foundation can be traced back to the 1260s when Walter de Merton, chancellor to Henry III and later to Edward I, first drew up statutes for an independent academic community and established endowments to support it. An important feature of de Merton's foundation was that this "college" was to be self-governing and the endowments were directly vested in the Warden and Fellows.By 1274, when Walter retired from royal service and made his final revisions to the college statutes, the community was consolidated at its present site in the south east corner of the city of Oxford, and a rapid programme of building commenced. The hall and the chapel and the rest of the front quad were complete before the end of the 13th century. Mob Quad, one of Merton's quadrangles, was constructed between 1288 and 1378, and is claimed to be the oldest quadrangle in Oxford, while Merton College Library, located in Mob Quad and dating from 1373, is the oldest continuously functioning library for university academics and students in the world.Like many of Oxford's colleges, Merton admitted its first mixed-sex cohort in 1979, after over seven centuries as an institution for men only. Merton's second female warden, Irene Tracey, was appointed as Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford in 2022, and Professor Jennifer Payne was subsequently elected as acting warden.Alumni and academics past and present include five Nobel laureates, the writer J.R.R. Tolkien, who was Merton Professor of English Language and Literature from 1945 to 1959, and Liz Truss, who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in September and October 2022. Merton is one of the wealthiest colleges in Oxford and held funds totalling £298 million as of July 2020. Merton has a strong reputation for academic success, having regularly ranked first in the Norrington Table.

Merton Street is a cobbled street in central Oxford, England. It joins the High Street at its northeastern end, between the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art (together with the Examination Schools) and the Eastgate Hotel at the historic east gate of the city. It then runs east–west, parallel and to the south of the High Street for most of its length.

The Mercure Eastgate Hotel (aka The Eastgate locally) is a hotel located in the historic university city of Oxford, England. It is located on the south side of Oxford's High Street near to the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art and the Examination Schools of Oxford University.

Broad Walk is a wide walkway running east–west on the north side of Christ Church Meadow and south of Merton Field in central Oxford, England.The walkway runs between St Aldate's though the Christ Church War Memorial Garden at the western end and the River Cherwell to the east at the southern end of the University of Oxford Botanic Garden. To the north at the western end is Christ Church, one of the Oxford colleges. The tower of Merton College Chapel dominates the view north from Broad Walk across Merton Field, beyond Dead Man's Walk and the old city wall which run parallel to Broad Walk, connected via Merton Walk. Broad Walk used to be lined with large elm trees, but has been denuded due to Dutch elm disease.The Meadow Building of Christ Church, in an imposing stone-faced Venetian Gothic style, is immediately to the north of Broad Walk. Opposite to the south, the tree-lined Poplar Walk, laid out in 1872 by Henry Liddell, Dean of Christ Church, leads down to the River Thames. Views of some of the spires and towers of Oxford include (west to east) Tom Tower, the spire of Christ Church Cathedral, Merton College Chapel Tower, and Magdalen Tower. The first hot air balloon ascent in Britain was made by James Sadler (1753–1828) from Merton Field on 4 October 1783, to the north of Broad Walk.Postwar development planned for central Oxford included a relief road passing through the Christ Church Meadow along the route of Broad Walk and joining the district of St Ebbe's. The proposal was defeated after strong opposition.

Logic Lane is a small historic cobbled lane that runs through University College in Oxford, England, so called because it was the location of a school of logicians. It links the High Street at the front of the college with Merton Street to the rear, which is also cobbled. Logic Lane covered bridge is a short covered bridge over the lane at the High Street end. To the west of the lane are the Radcliffe Quad and the Master's Lodgings. To the east are the 1903 Durham Buildings (on the High Street) and the Goodhart Quad. The lane is locked at night (usually at a time earlier than that advertised on the signs at either end of the lane), with gates at each end. It is mainly used by pedestrians, but vehicular access is possible. During July and August 1960, an archaeological excavation was undertaken to the east of Logic Lane before the construction of the Goodhart Building. Evidence of Bronze Age ditches were found, as well as Saxon remains.

Mob Quad is a four-sided group of buildings from the 13th and 14th centuries in Merton College, Oxford, surrounding a small lawn. It is often claimed to be the oldest quadrangle in Oxford and elsewhere, although Merton's own Front Quad was actually enclosed earlier (albeit with a less unified design) and Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, says that its own Old Court is the oldest structure of its type in either Oxford or Cambridge. The quadrangle pattern has since been copied at many other colleges and universities worldwide. It was built in three distinct phases. The oldest part is the college's Treasury or Muniment Room that stands above and behind the arch in the north east corner. The roof of this part is strikingly steep and is made of stone in order to protect it (and its contents) from fire. The steep pitch of the roof is necessary to support the weight of the stone. The present roof was restored with new Purbeck stone in 1966. The upper floor has always been used to store the college muniments, while the ground floor was probably the original bursary. It is not known exactly when the building was completed, but there are references to it in the college accounts for 1288 and 1291. The Muniment Room being built above a vaulted arch is suggested as evidence that the range of buildings to the south was either planned at the time of the original design or was replacing an existing building. This range to the south of the Muniment Room (the East side) was complete by about 1310–1320. The matching North side is probably slightly earlier and apparently stands on the site of the former church of St John, which was no longer needed once the new chapel was complete. The college accounts indicate that the old church was being used as rooms by 1308, and it is possible that parts of its structure were incorporated into the new building.These buildings were designed, and are still used, as accommodation for members of the college. They consist of three storeys of rooms, the third being built in the steeply-pitched attics. The rooms are arranged in sets on either side of central wooden staircases. The walls are thick and faced in rag-finished Cotswold stone. There are no chimneys and although all the rooms had fireplaces and chimneys by about 1600, they have been removed in modern times as the coal fireplaces have been replaced with electric heating. The south and west ranges which complete the quadrangle were built in 1373–1378. They were built to provide more accommodation (on the ground floor) and to house the expanding college library (on the upper floor). The old part of the library is still there, and, still expanding, it also now occupies most of the ground floor as well (and other parts of the college). The large dormer windows were added as part of Warden Savile's rebuilding work which began in 1589. The origin of the name "Mob Quad" is obscure. On older plans and accounts the quad is called variously Little Quadrangle, Old Quadrangle, Bachelors' Quadrangle (that is, B.A. Fellows), Postmasters' Quadrangle, and Undergraduates' Quadrangle (at least after the construction of Fellows' Quadrangle). The word "mob", derived from the Latin mobile vulgus (the fickle crowd) does not appear in English until the late 17th century, and was not commonly used for Mob Quad until the end of the 18th century. It was possibly originally a humorous description of the occupants. The lawn is a 20th-century addition.