As with so many great institutions, the origins of the University are hazy to say the least, but English scholars and teachers settled here between 1164 and 1169 when forbidden by Henry II to study at the University of Paris. It is characteristic of the Oxford approach that the University was not founded as such, but evolved, and continues to do so.

University College and Merton have the strongest claims to the distinction of greatest age. To this day they are kept apart at Matriculation ceremonies, as it is not unknown for more than one Dean to claim the right, as Dean of the oldest college represented, to make the address. Recent years have seen the establishment of three new graduate colleges: Wolfson, St Cross and Green (the last is for medics - nothing to do with conservation).

The relationship between the University and the City has always been somewhat uneasy, and there has been much friction over the centuries. The most famous occasion was the St Scholastica's Day Riot of 1354, which began with a brawl in the Swyndlestock Tavern at Carfax. The townsmen rang the bell of Carfax Tower (then St Martin's Church) to summon armed reinforcements, whereupon the Chancellor of the University ordered the ringing of St Mary's bell and the scholars mustered with bows and arrows. In several days of fighting, sixty-three students were killed - a fact remembered for the following five centuries. From this time, every 10th February, the Mayor and sixty-three citizens were obliged to process to St Mary's, where they paid a fine of a penny each to the Vice Chancellor.

During the Civil War, Oxford was selected as the Royalist capital. The King stayed at Christ Church, the Queen at Merton, and a passage was constructed to allow them to meet. Most of the citizens were violently anti-Royalist, but not the University. Its allegiance to the Monarch was a drain on its resources, and it did not fare well under the Parliamentarians.

Since the late eighteenth century, however, Oxford it has enjoyed an increasingly secure reputation as a centre of academic excellence, and its facilities for research, though somewhat haphazard, remain some of the best in the world.

In 1998, 141,600 people, including over 40,000 students, live in Oxford. There is a school of thought among long-standing residents, who begin to find a remarkable number of familiar faces in the places they frequent, that these figures are a myth - that in fact the same 200 people are going round and round. It is also interesting to note that the largest tower block on Canary Wharf in the London Docklands contains working space for 60,000 workers - in other words, three such towers could take the entire population of the city, with spare space for nearly another 40,000 people!

At Oxford University alone, there were 10,788 undergraduates in the academic year 1997-98 (of which 10,289 were reading for Honour Schools), 4,694 postgraduates, and 463 visiting students and others; 15,945 students in total.

Tim Lambert's Brief History of Oxford City adds a few more dates and facts to this short precis.