Talk:New College, Oxford

roof beams

The Notre Dame fire reminded me of the story of trees for Oxford roof beams being planted 100s of years in advance. That turns out to be a myth.[1] but might be worth mentioning anyway. New College is the location in question. 67.164.113.165 (talk) 08:24, 21 April 2019 (UTC) [2] This is the kitsch version. 67.164.113.165 (talk) 08:36, 21 April 2019 (UTC)

Agreed. I'll add it one of these days....

Some sources:

• New College, "Trivia" page: http://www.new.ox.ac.uk/archives/trivia.html
• Long Now Foundation, https://longnow.org/ideas/humans-and-trees-in-long-term-partnership/
• Stewart Brand, How Buildings Learn

--Macrakis (talk) 15:16, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for speedy deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for speedy deletion:

• Tony-benn.jpg

You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 22:53, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:New College, Oxford/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Robminchin (talk · contribs) 14:37, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

---

I'm willing to do this review. On an initial read over, there are no banners or inline tags and the prose looks okay (with a few issues that I will expand on below). At an initial glance, referencing looks a bit sparse, but I've not done a thorough check to see what each reference verifies yet. Robminchin (talk) 14:37, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

Many thanks! Chiswick Chap (talk) 14:47, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

Extended content

Lead "One of the oldest" gives the impression that there are maybe two or three older colleges, when according to the Colleges of the University of Oxford page there are six or eight older surviving colleges (depending on how Hertford and St Edmund's are counted). "One of the older" would be a more accurate phrasing. I've taken that out of the lead, but "one of the older" doesn't really work in British English, just sounds peculiar. The claim is in the citation, and is true both in years (where it's 7th of 39, the two you mention not becoming actual colleges until much later) and with respect to being an undergraduate college (pretty much what most people think a university college is, actually), where it was the first. I've therefore left the claim in "History", and put the supporting text in the ref. The academic performance of the college is not mentioned in the body of the article, so should not be in the lead. The claim that the college "has a reputation for the exceptional academic performance of its students" is unsourced. It should make it clear among whom the college has this reputation, i.e. whose opinion this is that is being reported. The claim that the college ranked first in 2020 is sourced to an article from 2017. The claim that the college "has the 2nd-highest average Norrington Table ranking over the previous decade" needs to specify the years being referred to. The source cited does not verify the claim (the 2017 source cited earlier looks like it would for the decade 2008–2017, but that's getting rather outdated to have in the lead). Removed the ratings material. The claim that the choir is "one of the leading choirs of the world" needs to be stated as opinion rather rather than fact. Removed that part, the claim to fame is 100 albums and 2 grammys. In the infobox: The source for the current warden is an archived story from eight years ago. This should be replaced by a source showing this person is currently warden. Updated. The source for the student numbers is over a decade old, implying the numbers are almost certainly out of date. Updated with new ref; the numbers have increased slightly. An external link to an archived website of the college boat club does not belong in the infobox. Removed; one may note however that boat clubs are much more important at Oxford than in most universities. History The organisation of this section is a bit odd, with an initial introductory paragraph, a sub-section titled 'Foundation' that goes through to admitting women in 1979, and then a single-paragraph sub-section on the civil war. The material would be better organised if the subsection on the foundation was limited to the foundation and early years, with the modern material in a separate section. Reorganised. The link to the college statues (footnote [7]) is dead. it looks from [3] that there are new statutes, which still verify the material. Updated URL. It would be better if the claim to be the first in the university to admit undergraduate students were verified by an independent source, possibly one of the many histories of the university, rather than the college's own website. Cited. That reference verifies the appointment of tutors, but I can't see anything there about being the first college to admit undergraduates. Ah sorry, updated the first mention to match: was already updated below. There is no mention of the college being a choral foundation in the 'foundation' section, this being left until the section on the choir. It would be good to at least mention this here. Added and wikilinked choir. The de novo seems redundant. It and the text leading up to it are closely based on the source cited with only minor re-wording, it would be better if this was re-written to convey the same meaning in different words (to be clear, the source is in the public domain, so this isn't a copyright issue). Rewritten. The over-flowery 'haunt of thieves', and the capitalisation of 'City Ditch' are also both straight from the same source (cited as note 10; actually pp. 25-26 not just 25) Edited. "City Ditch" was a placename; it'd make no sense as a generic description in 21st century English. It's probably worth mentioning just how recent the black death was at the time of the college's foundation – less than thirty years by my reckoning. Added. "On March 5th ... possession of the buildings" is again only very slightly re-worded from the same source (pp 17–18), although a different source is cited (which does not verify these dates) Rewritten and cited. Speculation in by Prickard with respect to the coat of arms that "the chevron was a device used by builders, and was perhaps adopted by Wykeham with reference to his skill at architecture" has become a more definite statement in the text that is supported by the source. Edited. The reference cited for the statement that New College and Winchester were both founded to address a shortage of clergy actually says that New College was founded to pray for Wykeham's soul and makes no mention of a shortage of priests. Edited. The source cited for "As well as being the first Oxford college for undergraduates, and the first to have senior members of the college give tutorials" does not verify either of these claims; it says that having provision for the appointment of tutors in the statutes was a novelty. The History of the University of Oxford: The early Oxford schools (OUP, 1984, pp 188–189) places the rise of teaching in colleges in the late 13th century.[4] Edited. Partly addressed, but (as noted above) the source cited doesn't verify being the first to admit undergraduates. The claim has already been softened to 'one of the first'. The source cited does not draw a link between 'the college's old reputation for "Golden scholars, silver bachelors, leaden masters and wooden doctors{"'} and the students being exempt from taking university examinations, although it does verify the preceding sentence. The reference to golden scholars, etc., is from p. 57 of Prickard, not actually included in the citation. Edited and added page ref. The use of the bell tower and the cloisters as an arsenal appear from the source cited to have been under the royalists pre-1646, not part of the parliamentary fortification of 1651. The cloister was 'pierced for musketry' in 1651, but there is no mention of it being used for musketry training in this source. Edited. It's not clear why 'Bell Tower' and 'Bowling Green' are capitalised. The citation here should also be pp 72–73, not just p 72. Fixed as requested. The reason was that these are names of specific places, and known as such in the college; of course they are also instances of generic bell towers and bowling greens, so we can choose to take them as such here. (If we put them in quotation marks to indicate they are proper names, someone will take them out as 'scare quotes'.) Robminchin (talk) 04:27, 17 April 2023 (UTC) College links The first reference cited re the links between New/Winchester and King's/Eton says that "The idea of a school feeding a College in the University was borrowed by the King from the Bishop", verifying the statement. The second, however, says that "Henry also found out about William Wykeham's unique achivement in founding Winchester College and its twin New College, Oxford, in 1382. The fact that Henry didn't know about Wykeham's colleges before building began shows an unfortunate lack of research. Plans were again scrapped, and redrawn." And, as a result, doubled the number of scholarships to outdo Wykeham. There is clearly a divergence of opinion here about whether Henry was inspired by Wykeham or only learnt about the earlier foundation after he had already started building his colleges. This should be reflected in the text. Added a rider to indicate the divergence. In addition to the Amicabilis Concordia, this section should identify King's as the sister college at Cambridge, which is mentioned in the lead, and provide a reference for this. Done. The first source cited refers to the Amicabilis Concordia as "formal ties", rather then the informal linking referred to in the text. The second refers to it as "an agreement entered into ... by the Wardens and Provosts" which implies at least a certain level of formality. Fixed. The two sources differ as to whether the agreement was made in 1444 (the first source cited) or 1464 (second source). Possibly 'mid 15th century' would work to cover both of these. Edited. Buildings and gardens Introductory section: Perpendicular style should probably be linked to Perpendicular Gothic Done. The citation for the college being larger than all the other colleges combined at the time of its foundation does not state whether it is talking about size of its buildings or the number of people. Unless a source can be found stating that it was the largest in terms of its buildings, this sentence would be better in the history section than in the buildings and gardens section. Repositioned as requested. "Listed as being of special architectural or historical importance" presumably refers to designation as a listed building; this should be linked. Linked. A list of listed buildings is attached to the claim. The link cited for "today, the college is one of Oxford's most widely visited" seems to now be a redirect. It looks from the Wayback machine like it verified the claim back in 2017, but that's no longer "today" (and it's not clear that the source is reliable). Removed. "today" is always a hostage to fortune, and I'm not sure claims do much anyway. Or any biggest fastest oldest mostest really. The paragraph on the Gradel Quadrangles doesn't go past the granting of planning permission in 2018; presumably something has happened in the five years since. Added sentence on constructor. Chiswick Chap (talk) 07:26, 18 April 2023 (UTC) Sorry for the delay, I was sick for a few days and now I'm having internet problems. Robminchin (talk) 04:29, 22 April 2023 (UTC) Glad you're back; I'll have limited access this weekend. Chiswick Chap (talk) 07:55, 22 April 2023 (UTC) I've managed to get hold of Sherwood and Pevsner (1974) to check the paragraphs citing that work. Mostly okay, but a couple of items to note: The claim to be the first quad to be given a planned layout is not verified. The college's History page states "Architecturally, New College was innovative in its design, in that it was all planned around an enclosed quadrangle (finished 1386). This was the first quadrangle of its type, though it has since become one of the defining features of colleges across Oxford and Cambridge." However as we've already mentioned this above, I'm removing the repeat mention here. Rather than the whole Holywell Quad being high Victorian as stated in the text, the source says that Scott's 1872 range is high Victorian but Champney's Robinson Tower and sets of 1885 and 1896 are late Victorian. Edited and attributed. Hall The citation at the end of the second sentence is to pp 26–31, but the page that verifies this sentence is p 32 (the first sentence is verified by the original citation). Fixed page range. According to the source, Wykeham forbade the activities not just because of the proximity of the chapel but also because there were people in lodgings below the hall. Added. The same citation also verifies almost all of the rest of the paragraph. In some places the text is very close to the original again (including the use of "painted glass" to refer to stained glass). Said and linked "stained glass", reworded. The citation should be given again after these sentences to make it clear it is verifying them; as it stands it looks like they should be verified by the citation on the final sentence. Repeated ref for clarity. The reference cited for the last sentence says there were restorations (no mention of how major) in 2003 and 2015. It does not verify a reopening in January 2015. Dropped the reopening. Chapel "retain their medieval appearance" is not verified by the citation given Rewritten with new citation. The citation for the 2007 Oxford Preservation Trust Awards looks like it should actually be to [5] Updated URL, the one paper has eaten the other. That the chapel is renowned for its interior is unreferenced. Removed. The citation for the art work does not verify that there are works by El Greco and Epstein in the chapel, just that works by them are on display in the college. El Greco see next; cited Goodall 2019 for Epstein. The citation for the stained glass by Reynolds does additionally verify the El Greco picture of St James in the chapel, but not the Epstein sculpture. Named and repeated ref to support El Greco. The sentence on the misericords is unreferenced. Cited. The misericords being "of outstanding beauty" is a WP:AESTHETIC opinion that needs to be attributed in the text to an expert. Removed. The niches being provided by Scott is flatly contradicted by the source cited (or, rather, the linked PDF from the webpage cited, which doesn't say anything much), which says they had been plastered over until rediscovered by Wyatt and Pears during a 1780s redesign. Degarbled. The citation should be to this pdf, and not to just p 6 (which is a plan of the reredos, verifying nothing) Fixed. The sentence on the crozier is, yet again, almost straight from the source cited, but it has lost that the original resemblance noted was to a specific pastoral staff in the treasury of Cologne Cathedral, leaving a sentence that doesn't make much sense as a pastoral staff is just another term for a crozier. The presence of "the bishop's gold crozier of William of Wykeham" in the chapel is also noted by the NY Times article cited above. Reworded and added that ref too. That the cloisters are famous needs a citation to someone other than the college's own webpage (although that they featured in HP can be sourced to this, as this is a simple fact). Edited. That the scene in HP was "memorable" is again an aesthetic opinion and should be either given add an expert opinion or removed (I'd go for the latter, as it doesn't seem to be adding much) Removed. That the bell tower had one of the oldest rings of ten bells is not verified by the source cited. Removed. Gardens and city wall The citation for the link to Versailles should be p 40, not 41 Fixed. The source says "built, it used to be said, after the model of the Palace of Versailles". The tense here indicates this is a thing that was no longer said (in 1906), presumably because it had turned out not to be the case. The article's "said to be modelled on the Palace of Versailles" does not, therefore, seem justified. Agree, removed. The reference for the sentence on the inspection of the wall every three years links to a site selling rental car insurance (I suspect link rot and usurpation rather than deliberate spam) Removed. The reference for the herbaceous border says that the world's longest is in a castle in Scotland, but does not verify the claim here to be the largest in England. Rewritten and cited. Treasures This section is almost completely unreferenced Edited and cited. I've added the out-of-the-way Hepworth statue that's mentioned in the college's 'Our Buildings' page. The one reference given, for the first printed edition of Aristotle, gives the year in the text as 1909 but the source referenced was published in 1906. The text mention has been removed per the next item. The source also says the library contains this book, not that it once contained it. Is it still in the library? Or did something happen to it in the 20th century? Edited.

Music

Choir

I suggest this subsection needs to be re-written from the ground up. There are problems with the statement of option as fact and virtually nothing is verified by the citations given. Something needs to be said about the college choir to satisfy the broad coverage criteria, so I don't think it can be simply deleted.

• Something certainly needs to be said, and that would need to be similar to what is here; further, much of this is in fact correct, as are most of the citations.

• The opening two sentences need citations

• Added.

• I'm not sure what's happening with the second reference - there seems to be an archive link that isn't to an archived version of the original url but to something similar from 2008, but the actual link is live. It would be better to remove the archive link entirely (or at least point it to an archived version of the current page).

• It was a valid archive link but the url-status parameter was missing: fixed.

• The claim in the third sentence that "The choir has a reputation as one of the finest Anglican choirs in the world" needs to make it clear among whom it has this reputation and to provide independent citations to support this claim.

• Removed.

• The citation given says the choir has a "particular emphasis on British composers of the English Renaissance, the middle Baroque, and the music of Handel" in its recordings, but does not verify that it is "known particularly for its performances of Renaissance and Baroque music".

• Edited.

• The citation for the number of recordings still in the catalogue is actually a discography that merely says many of them are available to buy. It does not verify the number available to buy nor, as an archived page from almost a decade ago, can it possibly verify which ones are "still available"

• Let's remove this, as it's close to a cited claim below.

• The final sentence of the opening paragraph is verified, but by an archived page from 2009 that may not be current. Also, "appearing a number of times at the BBC Proms" differs only in tense from the "has appeared a number of times at the BBC Proms" of the source.

• Once one has appeared at the Proms, that remains true for all time. Reworded slightly, this is a basic fact and standard form of words.

• The citations for the Gramophone awards are undated dead links. From the looks of the Wayback Machine, they've been dead for over a decade.

• Updated the ref for the 2008 Grammy, the URL had been changed. Unfortunately the Grammy archive doesn't go back as far as 1997, but Discogs has republished "Excerpts" from Gramophone for the 1997 awards, so I've cited that.

• The sentence about the organist becoming Oxford's first choral professor seems completely unrelated to anything else in this section, and isn't verified by the citation given.

• The connection seems immediately apparent but if others can't see it let's do without.

• The 2009 Bartlemas procession is verified, but if this was only a one-off it doesn't seem worth mentioning. It needs evidence that this is a revived tradition.

• Not sure I follow that logic; if the tradition was revived for a procession, that is a matter of interest; if it's repeated, of course that would be nice too, but a different matter.

• We don't want or need a list of everything the choir has done in its history here, so if it was a one-off event that has no ongoing significance then it seems undue to mention it here.

• OK, I'll record that I don't agree, because it is only an active, energetic and outgoing choir that takes the trouble to revive old traditions, but am removing the item now.

• Only the 2015 Papal mass is verified by the sources cited; the citation for the 2016 mass does not verify the participation of the college choir.

• Removed 2016.

• The Catholic Herald link is dead, but it could be retrieved from the Wayback Machine.

• Archived.

Organ

• The statement that the organ tuning is "regulated by Bishop and Son of London and Ipswich" is unverified, and not obviously relevant.

• Removed.

• The citation verifies that the organ was restored by Goetze and Gwynn in 2014, but the statement about registration changes and the 32 ft Fagot receiving a full-length bass are from a user comment on the news story, this not a reliable source (and the "32 ft Fagot" section is copied verbatim from that comment). If this is included, it should also be re-written to explain what it means.

• Removed.

Organists and directors of music

• It is unclear why this section exists. It seems to be straying away from focus on the topic of the article.

• The College's centuries-long tradition of professional organists is an integral part of its being.

• The same could be said of having a list of chaplains or librarians, or any other college officer. The argument that a tradition of professional organists is more important than these needs to be made with backing from independent sources.

• Removed for now.

Student life

Middle Common Room

• This section needs more citations. Only the existence of the MCR journal is verified.

• As with the JCR, I'm not sure we've anything worth saying here so let's do without the subsection.

Junior Common Room

• The citation to the top level of the JCR website doesn't obviously verify anything in the opening sentence.

• We're down to such a minimal statement here, that there are students and a committee, I think we'll be better off not mentioning it.

• It's not clear why the student statistics are in this section as they have no apparent connection with the JCR.

• As the section states, the JCR is the body of undergraduates in the college.

• But the JCR has nothing to do with admissions. This would sit better in the "outreach" section.

• Not sure it belongs there either. Let's just drop them.

• The webpage cited for the admissions statistics does not verify the claims made in this sentence

• As above.

Outreach

• The opening sentence makes vague, unreferenced claims she needs to be either tightened up or deleted.

• Removed.

• The source cited verified the goals and existence of the Step-Up programme but not that it started in 2017. I also noticed that it is "Step-Up" rather than "Step Up".

• Removed date, added hyphen.

• The source cited for Oxford for Wales doesn't verify that this started in 2020.

• Removed the date; we could probably rely on the access-date ("By 2020, the college had founded...") but that's untidy.

People

Alumni and fellows

• The reference for the first sentence names Hugh Grant and Susan Rise as alumni of New College, but does not verify 'a legacy of distinguished alumni and staff'.

• Removed.

• The reference for the second sentence verifies Richard Dawkins was a Professorial Fellow at New College and held the Simonyi professorship, but does not mention Marcus du Sautoy.

• Removed, there is no need for any text here as the list of New College people is sufficient.

Wardens

• The reference for this is a bit odd, being a history from 1954. While it states that "The college was governed by the Warden, who was elected for life by a majority of fellows; he had to be a fellow or ex-fellow, 30 years of age at least, a graduate in theology or law, or an M.A., in priest's orders or to take them immediately" this doesn't seem to verify the current role.

• Added refs, and see next.

• A section included in many articles on educational institutions is Organization and administration (c.f. WP:HED/AG). It would be more usual to describe the warden (and the governing body) in such a section, as well as the relationship between the college and the university. This would also be a place to mention that the students are divided into an MCR and JCR, without having to have subsections for each common room.

• Good idea, reorganised and said that. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:42, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Images

Only one image with a technical issue:

• The image File:Oxford men and their colleges - The Cloister, New College.png used to illustrate the cloisters and chapel in the Chapel section has a copyright tag indicating it is in the public domain in the US because it was published before 1928. However, this contains the note that "If the work is not a U.S. work, the file must have an additional copyright tag indicating the copyright status in the source country." There doesn't seem to be any doubt that it is out of copyright as the artist, Frederick Mackenzie, died in 1854, but the tag for this is missing.

• Added PD-old-100 on Commons.

Criteria

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a. (prose, spelling, and grammar):

   b. (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a. (reference section):

   b. (citations to reliable sources):

   c. (OR):

   d. (copyvio and plagiarism):

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a. (major aspects):

   b. (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.

   a. (images are tagged and non-free content have non-free use rationales):

   b. (appropriate use with suitable captions):

7. Overall:

   Pass/fail:

(Criteria marked are unassessed)

Congratulations!

Queries

• First college in the university to admit undergraduate students

Chiswick Chap, the citation to a college website mentions "a novelty at the time, undergraduates", but the source doesn't fully support the claim and isn't independent. Should the claim be removed? TSventon (talk) 19:07, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

Many thanks for the concern. That it was a novelty does mean that it was a first. On independence, we are allowed to rely on the college for basic facts about itself, this is a correct use of primary sources. Chiswick Chap (talk) 07:03, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Chiswick Chap, the current wording is incorrect. I have checked the Encyclopaedia of Oxford article for New College and the Victoria County History (VCH) articles for Merton and Exeter and they show that undergraduates at colleges before the foundation of New College were rare but not non existent. That explains why the college website uses the word "novelty" rather the word "first".

The Encyclopaedia of Oxford article for New College says "Six colleges had already been founded in Oxford ... but most of these existed principally for graduates studying Theology ; undergraduates lived mainly in ACADEMIC HALLS"

The VCH says that Merton admitted founders kin from 1274 "Others of them, perhaps the majority, are boys, or youths, reading for the bachelor's degree. They are, in fact, undergraduates." According to the VCH, Exeter had thirteen scholars from 1316, including a chaplain and "The other twelve, who were to be at least sophists (i.e. undergraduates of two years' standing)" TSventon (talk) 12:12, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Don't worry, it's been changed now anyway. Chiswick Chap (talk) 16:05, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Chiswick Chap, Robminchin said "It would be better if the claim to be the first in the university to admit undergraduate students were verified by an independent source, possibly one of the many histories of the university, rather than the college's own website."

Would the VCH be a better reference, it says "Most previous colleges had been designed to enable graduates to proceed to higher degrees. New College was primarily designed to take undergraduates through their arts course;" TSventon (talk) 16:12, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

• larger than all of the (six) existing Oxford colleges combined

I suggest that this should be "about as large as" rather than "larger than". The existing source is to an old version of the college website, so it is not independent and the college may have decided the statement was incorrect and removed it. In Medieval Oxford Salter said "I estimate that in 1360 the six colleges which then existed would contain about 10 undergraduates, 23 bachelors and 40 masters." Alan B Cobban references this in 2017 "prior to the virtual doubling of the number of fellowships with the foundation of New College in 1379, the six secular colleges supplied a total of only about 63 graduate fellows." TSventon (talk) 16:12, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Done. Chiswick Chap (talk) 17:53, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

• Chiswick Chap, Robminchin, The Buildings and grounds section does not mention the sports ground. I suggest adding

"The New College sports ground south of the University Parks was established in the 1880s. The Weston buildings, which accommodate postgraduate students, were built next to the ground in 1999."

References

TSventon (talk) 09:29, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Added. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:01, 24 April 2023 (UTC)