At the end of Keble road we begin a loop round the University Parks, the river and Norham Gardens. For a rapid end to the walk ignore this, and turn to the right. Picking up this description at Keble College below.
To continue along the full walk, cross Parks Road, and almost opposite, (slightly to the left) take the entry to University parks.
The parks were used for artillery practive when Charles I was quartered in Oxford during the Civil war.
Progress anti-clockwise around the park, keeping furthest to the right edge for the longest walk, nearer to the centre for the cricket pitch and cricket pavilion.
On reaching the river, turn left, and follow the riverside path.
At the north end of the park turn left again, but look for a small alley way leading into Norham Gardens.
It is sometimes claimed that demand for this housing grew when the university allowed dons and fellows to marry. However, these suburbs were begun earlier, in the 1860's, to meet the increasing demand from the growing prosperous middle classes of Oxford. They were designed individually, but using the fashionable neo-gothic style, with generous space to support servants as well as families and guests.
This area came to symbolise the epitome of the refined middle class: civilised, cultured, with their own "North Oxford" accent.
Today most of the larger houses are converted into flats, language schools etc.
Norham Gardens leads back to Parks road, which we follow south towards the centre of Oxford.
Beyond Norham Gardens lies an early residential area, this time built in a classical style.
It is a particularly attractive suburb, but this is really taking the walk into new territory, and extending so far off the track is really only suggested for the over-enthusiastic.
Under increasing pressure from scientific discovery and the free churches, a number of reforming movements emerged in the Church of England during the 19th century.
The tractarians, or Oxford movement, led by John Henry Newman, John Keble, and Pusey, began with John Keble's sermon: "National Apostasy" delivered at St Mary's church in July 1833, and ended with Newman's conversion to Roman Catholicism in 1845.
Distinguished from the Broad Church movement, who sought a middle road between catholicism and the free churches, and from the Evangelical movement which emphasised personal faith based on the gospels, the tractarians stressed the direct line of descent from the apostles to the institutions of the contemporary established church. This conservative position was closely allied with the emphasis of the ecclesiological movement on ritual, architecture and decoration.
After Keble died a public subscription was raised to build a college "for diligent students living simply".
William Butterfield was chosen as the architect. "I set small store by popularity" - which he amply demonstrated by his choice of multi-coloured bricks, and an overall design variously described as "brutish", "dazzling", "startling", "impressive", "earnest", "exacting", "remarkable".
The most impressive component is the chapel, lavishly funded by the Gibbs family, who made their fortune importing guano as fertiliser.
Science teaching has been organised on a univerity-wide basis, rather than college by college since the end of 19th century, when it was recognised that Britain was falling behind Germany in this area.
Building of a University museum began in 1855 with the intention of bringing together the scattered university collections of zoological, entomological, palaeontological and mineral specimens.
Funding came from the university and private subscriptions, but proved insufficient to complete the decoration of the building to the extent intended by its promoter (Sir Henry Acland, Regius Professor of Medicine) and his friend John Ruskin.
Nevertheless it is regarded as one of the finest neo-gothic buildings in the country.
The internal columns are made from examples of different rocks found in the British isles.
Capitals and bases represent groups of animals and plants.
Fine decorative ironwork supports the glass roof that makes the central space so light and airy.
| C'est magnifique, mais ce n'est pas la guerre. | C'est magnifique, mais ce n'est pas la gare. |
| Its magnificent, but it is not war. | Its magnificent, but it isn't the station |
| Marshal Canrobert, on the charge of the Light Brigade at Balaclava. | Supposed comment by someone(?) on the design of the building |
Apart from their scientific value the collections are also of historical interest, but for non-specialists, some tantalising exhibits to seek out include:
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I was happy enough to be present on the memorable occasion at Oxford when Mr Huxley bearded Bishop Wilberforce. There were so many of us that were eager to hear that we had to adjourn to the great library of the Museum. I can still hear the American accents of Dr Draper's opening address, when he asked `Air we a fortuitous concourse of atoms?' and his discourse I seem to remember somewhat dry.
Then the Bishop rose, and in a light scoffing tone, florid and he assured us there was nothing in the idea of evolution; rock -pigeons were what rock-pigeons had always been. Then, turning to his antagonist with a smiling insolence, he begged to know, was it through his grandfather or his grandmother that he claimed his descent from a monkey? On this Mr Huxley slowly and deliberately arose. A slight tall figure stern and pale, very quiet and very grave, he stood before us, and spoke those tremendous words - words which no one seems sure of now, nor I think, could remember just after they were spoken, for their meaning took away our breath, though it left us in no doubt as to what it was. He was not ashamed to have a monkey for his ancestor; but he would be ashamed to be connected with a man who used great gifts to obscure the truth. No one doubted his meaning and the effect was tremendous. One lady fainted and had to carried out: I, for one, jumped out of my seat; and when in the evening we met at Dr Daubeney's, every one was eager to congratulate the hero of the day. I remember that some naive person wished it could come over again; and Mr Huxley, with the look on his face of the victor who feels the cost of victory, put us aside saying, `Once in a life-time is enough, if not too much.' Macmillan's Magazine, Oct 1998 |
Legend has it that the bishop asked Huxley whether he believed that he was descended from an ape on his father's side, or on his mother's side. Huxley replied that, if he had to choose between being descended from an ape or from a man who would use his great powers of rhetoric to crush an argument, we would prefer the former.
The accuracy of the historical details is questionable, but the importance of the story lies in symbolising a turning point in acceptance that scientific ideas should be assessed on scientific merit, not suppressed by established convention.
The Pitt Rivers Museum was founded 1884 when Lieutenant-General Pitt Rivers donated his collection of archaeology and ethography to the University. He originally intended that his collection should go to the science museum in South Kensington. He chose Oxford when this offer was refused because the authorities felt it should go to the British Museum.
The original collection consisted of around 18,000 items, but has since grown to over half a million, and continues to grow. It has been claimed that the museum contains more items per square foot than any other museum - and it certainly feels like it.
Nothing can quite prepare you for the contents, but a random selection of some of the exhibits gives some sense of what to expect:
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The objects are arranged in sequence with a view to show ... the successive ideas by which the minds of men in a primitive condition of culture have progressed in the development of their arts from the simple to the complex, and from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous. ... Human ideas as represented by the various products of human industry, are capable of classification into genera, species and varieties in the same manner as the products of the vegetable and animal kingdoms ... If, therefore, we can obtain a sufficient number of objects to represent the succession of ideas, it will be found that they are capable of being arranged in museums upon a similar plan.
[Extract taken from Pitt Rivers's catalogue of the Bethnal Green displays first published in 1874] |
The museum is part of the University School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography. But it is not only a resource for studied human society and human culture, it also illustrates our changing ideas about museums.
Its human appeal, though, lies in demonstrating man's ingenuity in all its diversity.
Beyond the museum, and just off Park Road, in South Parks Road, is Rhodes House.
An unremakable, and oddly proportioned building, which houses a library. The building is most notable, to my mind, for the beautifully manicured lawns - suggesting an organisation whose resources exceed its ambitions.
Following parks road brings us past Trinity college.
And so we reach the end of our final walk, back at the corner of Broad Street.
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