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Cambridge through the Centuries

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  • 1209

    1209

    Groups of scholars congregate at the ancient Roman trading post of Cambridge for the purpose of study, the earliest record of the University.
  • 1284

    1284

    Peterhouse, the first college at Cambridge, is founded by the Bishop of Ely.
  • 1446

    1446

    Henry VI, founder of Eton and of King's College, Cambridge, lays the first stone of King's College Chapel.
  • 1511

    1511

    Lady Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII, founds St John's College.
  • 1533

    1533

    Thomas Cranmer ends his career in Cambridge to become the first post-reformation Archbishop of Canterbury. While in the post, he annuls Henry VIII's marriages to Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn and divorces him from Anne of Cleves. He is also largely responsible for the Book of Common Prayer, the official directory of worship of the Church of England.

  • 1584

    The Cambridge University Press, the world's oldest-established press, begins its unbroken record of publishing every year until the present.

  • 1625

    John Milton enters Christ's, where he studies until 1632. Five years later, on the death of his friend, Edward King, he writes Lycidas, recalling in pastoral terms their days together.

  • 1628

    William Harvey of Gonville and Caius College, publishes his celebrated treatise, 'De motu cordis et sanguinis in animalibus', (On the Motion of the Heart and Blood in Animals), describing his discovery of the mechanism of blood circulation.

  • 1687

    Isaac Newton publishes 'Principia Mathematica', establishing the fundamental principles of modern physics.

  • 1711

    Richard Bentley, Regius Professor of Divinity from 1717, completes his edition of the Latin poet, Horace. His editing and interpretation of classical texts inspires all later generations of classics scholars.

  • 1776

    Cambridge graduates, Thomas Nelson, Trinity and later of Virginia; Arthur Middleton, St John's and later of South Carolina and Thomas Lynch, Gonville and Caius and also of South Carolina, are among the signatories of America's Declaration of Independence.

  • 1829

    Alfred Tennyson, Trinity under-graduate, is awarded the Chancellor's medal for his poem, 'Timbuctoo'. In 1850, he publishes his major poetic achievement, 'In Memoriam', the elegy mourning the death of his friend, Arthur Hallam, also of Trinity, and succeeds Wordsworth as Poet Laureate.
    1829 also sees the staging of the first Boat Race between Cambridge and Oxford, won by Oxford.