The University of Oxford has long ceased to claim the fabulous antiquity for which its mediæval champions had contended, as for an article of faith, and which found credit with so conscientious an historian as Anthony Wood. It is now admitted that nothing is certainly known of its origin, and that its alleged foundation by Alfred the Great rests upon a tradition which cannot be traced back to a period beyond the fourteenth century. There is no evidence whatever to show that any germ of a University, much less that any college, existed at Oxford in the reign of Alfred, who was born in the neighbouring town of Wantage. The very contrary may reasonably be inferred from the negative fact that Asser, in his contemporary biography of Alfred, makes no allusion to his supposed institution of ‘schools’ at Oxford, though he amply attests his paternal zeal for English education. The early chroniclers are, without exception, equally silent on the subject, which is noticed by no extant writer before the age of Edward III. In the next reign, the primary myth—for so we must regard it—was developed into a secondary myth, attributing to Alfred the foundation of University College, and this imaginary pretension was actually advanced by that college in the course of a lawsuit. Meanwhile, the simpler tradition of Alfred’s connection with the University Schools was repeated by author after author in days when the very nature of historical proof was unknown, and was reinforced in the sixteenth century by the insertion of a spurious passage into the work of Asser. It has been reserved for the present century to recognise the plain truth that we are entirely ignorant of the first stage in the growth of the University, and that its name is never mentioned in history before the Norman Conquest. [Sidenote: Early schools of Oxford]