Or, “Cambridge University: sexist bastards since 1209”.
Today we discovered the 800 sq metres of charming Cambridge. We joined a walking tour from the tourist information centre, it was a fun and informative way to spend a couple of hours and we’d highly recommend it. The University was started in 1209 with a bunch of students who fled Oxford after a misunderstanding over a woman saw a couple of youths executed. (Seems rather extreme but these weren’t called the dark ages for nothing I guess). Originally it was all just about teaching teenage boys how to become priests (Eds note: insert amusing but relevant paedophile joke here when I think of one), but over the years, the curriculum widened as the University and Colleges grew. Newton, for example, after having a dream about an apple, started the first agricultural college (Eds note – need fact check here). Everyone who was anyone donated huge amounts of money to setting up Colleges (all now rolling in dough), instead of wasting it on such things as charity for the poor, or social reform. Henry 6th started Kings as a place for the smart boys from his pauper school (Eton) to progress to higher education. Henry 8th started Trinity by just squashing two already established Colleges together and pretending it was all his idea in the first place (wouldn’t it be great to be a King?). Actually it was his 6th wife Katherine who came up with that idea – she had a good head on her shoulders, which she managed to keep there (Eds note: fact check required here – seems statistically unlikely). Anyway, centuries later and they finally decided to let women in to study. They had their own colleges (two, and far away), and could attend lectures and sit exams – hooray! Except they weren’t allowed to graduate and be awarded a degree until 1948!!! Can you believe it? Twelve years after my mother was born.
Look at this plaque here. A sad story of an academic who died in an avalanche with his 18 yo son. Except actually, he had two daughters who died in the same avalanche, one of whom had already been to Cambridge University to study. WTF, am I right?
And now this. This is a beautiful stained glass window in Kings College Chapel. It’s full of zillions of bible tales, because they liked to stick with the old stories that everyone knew and liked and/or they didn’t have much imagination. This one is an oldie but a goodie from the Old Testament, the original “woman goes off the rails, is to blame for everything” story: Adam and Eve. Except this time, there’s another woman to blame: the serpent that does the tempting is personified as a woman as well, a rather saucy brunette with a very low neckline on her gorgeous red dress. (Later to become the patron saint of agricultural colleges, and gravity, so it’s not all bad). This window dates to the fifteen hundreds, so I guess if you were a young man studying to be a priest then there’s nothing more dangerous than a young woman. “The plague be damned! Keep those womenfolk away from me!”