On February 25th 1411 Bishop Henry Wardlaw established St Andrews as a university
This is not the official date for St Andrews inauguration there are a few dates I have found. Teaching began in the community of St Andrews in 1410, but the University wasn’t formally constituted by the issue of a papal bull in 1413, even the University’s own webpage says it was founded between 1410 and 1414, I’m simply putting today date down as a marker and definite significant date init’s history. Whatever the date, it is generally accepted that it is the third oldest University in the English speaking world and 19th in the whole of the world.
Bishop Henry Wardlaw was educated in Oxford and Paris and spent a lot of time on the continent of Europe, notably at Avignon during the time of division in the Catholic church. On Wardlaw’s return to Scotland he was made Bishop of St Andrews, he was a very important figure in Scotland at the time and was tutor to King James I, who he went on to crown in 1424.
He issued the University’s charter of foundation in February 1411, and the privileges of the new seat of learning were confirmed by a bull of the Avignon Pope Benedict XIII, dated 28 August 1413. The university was to be “an impregnable rampart of doctors and masters to resist heresy.”
With the declaration of St Andrews Priory on 4 February 1414, the University of St Andrews may be said to have come fully and formally into existence. There were six bulls included the bull of foundation and a bull confirming Wardlaw’s charter, although the text of all six is known, only the confirmation of Wardlaw’s grant survives in the original and still bears its bulla or lead seal, so again this is why February 25th is given as a date of it’s foundation.
Regardless of what date you believe the University of St Andrews is the oldest of the four ancient universities of Scotland and the third oldest university in the English-speaking world. Recently St Andrews was ranked 3rd in the British Isles and the only Scottish university in the top 20 of the 119 universities ranked. It was also ranked 92nd in the world. When size is taken into account, St Andrews ranks second in the world out of all small to medium-sized fully comprehensive universities.














