Oxford Inscriptions was originally produced in typescript in 1990, and a copy was lodged with the Centre for Oxfordshire Studies, Oxford. The original text has been updated in the present electronic version.

I record my thanks for help and advice received from Dr Malcolm Graham and his staff at the Centre for Oxfordshire Studies, from Mr John Ashdown, now retired from his post as City Conservation Officer, and from the late Eric English.

For the translations from Latin I am indebted to Mr Maurice Pope who also read my manuscript, pointed out errors, and made valuable suggestions. Any remaining errors and omissions in the text are of course my own.

Oxford

November 2001 Michael Popkin

Introduction

What is attempted in the pages that follow is a commentary on inscriptions that are to be found on stones and plaques in the city of Oxford. Where inscriptions refer to people, reference is also made to any portraits and statues. As a general rule, only those-inscriptions that are accessible to the public have been noted, and inscriptions on property that cannot be visited without permission have not been included. Only occasional references are made to epitaphs on church monuments and gravestones, and almost all such references are to people who are also commemorated elsewhere in the city.

It would be rash to speculate too deeply on the motives of those who cause inscriptions to be displayed in public places. While the endowment of a building might be admired by some as an act of pure philanthropy, it is bound to be interpreted by others as a desire by the donor for self-aggrandisement or as an attempt to purchase immortality. The motives of local authorities who mark historic sites with modern inscriptions are similarly open to interpretation either as a genuine desire to remind people of their heritage or as a canny device to promote tourism. But whatever the motives of the inscribers, inscriptions do bring us a message from the past. "This place, this person, this event" they say "we considered to be worth remembering."

A city with strong royalist traditions like Oxford has so many inscriptions and statues pertaining to royalty that a special chapter has been devoted to the royal connection. For the purposes of this book, statues of royalty have been granted the honorary status of inscriptions, whether or not they are labelled with the name of the subject.

Streets named after people are referred to only if those concerned are mentioned on other inscriptions in Oxford. Explanations of the origins of the city's street-names may be found in P.J.Marriott's useful booklet Oxford street names explained (1977).

There can hardly be an institution in Oxford that has not carried out a building programme since the end of the Second World War. New college buildings, laboratories, student hostels, municipal buildings, blocks of flats, hospitals, residential homes and housing developments have sprung up all over the city. Many of these new buildings have both an inscribed foundation-stone and a plaque recording the opening ceremony. To have listed all such recent inscriptions would have produced a tedious catalogue, and the number of references has therefore been curtailed for the sake of readability.

The walls of Oxford, like those of other British towns, are targets for phantom scribblers, and the graffiti to be found thereon reveal occasional flashes of sophisticated wit; but during the last few decades, the advent of the aerosol spray and a rise in the fortunes of Oxford United Football Club have transformed what what once a tolerable peccadillo into a public nuisance which disfigures some of the finest buildings in the world. Only two examples of graffiti have been quoted, both of which come from the nineteenth century.

An English translation of Latin inscriptions has been provided for the benefit of the overwhelming majority who today have no Latin. Some of these inscriptions would probably have been better left in the obscurity of Latin anyway, since they consist mainly of sycophantic eulogy; but the maxim of speaking no evil of the dead is surely preferable to the current fashion of denigrating them. Besides, as Samuel Johnson remarked when asked to write an epitaph, "ln lapidary inscriptions, a man is not upon oath."