the thirteenth century is a question which cannot be answered. About seventy are specified by name in a list compiled nearly two centuries later, but we have no means of knowing how many ancient halls may have then become extinct, or how many new halls may have been founded. The evidence now in our possession does not enable us to identify more than about eighty as having ever existed, and it is certain that all these did not exist at any one time. Even if we suppose that several hundred students were housed in monastic buildings during the age preceding the foundation of colleges, and make a large allowance for those in private lodging-houses, we cannot estimate the whole number of University scholars at more than 2,000, or at the most 3,000. The loose statement of Richard of Armagh, so lightly repeated by Anthony Wood and others, that some 30,000 scholars were collected at Oxford in this age, not only rests upon no sure historical ground, but is utterly inconsistent with all that we know of the area covered by the city, and of the position occupied by the academical population. [Sidenote: Early University charters] It is well known that Henry III. frequently visited Oxford for the purpose of holding councils or otherwise, and his relations with the University were constant. Amongst the letters and charters issued by him in regard to University affairs three are specially notable. One of these letters, dated 1238, was addressed to the mayor and burghers, directing them to inquire into the circumstances of a riot at Oseney Abbey between the servants of Otho, the Papal Legate, and a body of disorderly students. This riot led to a struggle, lasting a whole year, between the Legate and the University, supported by the English bishops, and especially by Robert Grosteste. The Legate was ultimately appeased by the public submission of the University representatives in London to his authority, whereupon he withdrew the interdict which he had laid upon the Oxford clerks, some of whom had retired to Northampton, and others, it is said, to Salisbury. Meanwhile the conflicts between the students and townspeople were incessant. In 1244, after a violent attack of gownsmen on the Jewry, the chancellor of the University was given by a royal writ exclusive cognisance of all pleas arising out of contracts relating to personalty, and in 1248 the ‘mayor’s oath’ of fidelity to the privileges of the University was imposed by letters patent. By a similar charter, granted in 1255 to the city of Oxford, these privileges are incidentally confirmed, for it is there provided that if a ‘clerk’ shall injure a townsman he shall be imprisoned until the chancellor shall claim him, while, if a townsman shall injure a clerk, he shall be imprisoned until he make satisfaction according to the judgment of the chancellor. Two years later (in 1257) the liberties of the University were defended against the bishop of Lincoln himself before the king at St. Albans, on the ground that