There is historical evidence of Vacarius, a professor from Bologna, having commenced lectures in civil law at Oxford, under the patronage of Archbishop Theobald, about 1149, in the reign of Stephen, by whom they were prohibited for a while at the instance of teachers interested in philosophy and theology. This is the earliest well-ascertained event in the academical life of Oxford, but it may safely be inferred that if Vacarius came from Italy to lecture in the schools of Oxford, those schools had already attained something like a European reputation, and were fitted to become the germ of an University.[1] We have the positive testimony of John of Salisbury, who had studied at Paris, that Oxford, just before the accession of Henry II., was engrossed by logical controversies about the nature of Universals. Yet this concourse of eager students apparently possessed no chartered rights. There is no sufficient ground for the assertion that Henry I. was educated at Oxford, and granted some important privileges to the so-called ‘University;’ but we know that he lived much both at Oxford and at Woodstock, that he built the palace of Beaumont on the north of the city, and that he demised to its corporation the fee farm of the city for the annual rent of sixty-three pounds. Nor can it be proved, as it has been alleged, that, having sunk again to a low ebb under Stephen and Henry II., it was revived by the judicious patronage of Richard I., himself born at Beaumont. On the other hand, starting from the fact that the Oxford schools attracted a professor from Italy in the reign of Stephen, we are justified in believing that they could scarcely have escaped the notice of Henry I., who earned a name for scholarship in that unlettered era, and is said to have ‘pleased himself much with the conversation of clerks;’ or of Stephen, who twice held Councils at Oxford; or of Henry II., who, like his grandfather, constantly resided in the immediate neighbourhood. Without the encouragement of the Crown as well as of the Church, they could not have attained the position which they clearly occupied before the end of the twelfth century. By this time Oseney Abbey had been founded, and had annexed the church of St. George within the Castle. Both of these religious houses served as lodgings for young scholars, who contributed to swell the number of Oxford students. It is true that we have no trace of academical endowments, or of royal charters recognising the Oxford schools, in the twelfth century. But we are informed on good authority that Robert Pullen (or Pulleyne), author of the _Sententiarum Libri Octo_, and for some years a student at Paris, delivered regular courses of lectures on the Scriptures at Oxford some years before the visit of Vacarius. More than a generation later, in the year 1186 or 1187, Giraldus Cambrensis, having been despatched to Ireland by Henry II. as companion of Prince John, publicly read at Oxford his work on the Topography of Ireland.