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Scenes from Student Life: Episode 2: Town and Gown

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Episode 2: Town and Gown

Town and Gown

BBC Radio 4 - Scenes from Student Life, Town and Gown

Student life through 900 years. Ellie Cawthorne on the rivalry between town and gown.

In 1355, 63 Oxford University students were killed by townspeople at the St Scholastica's Day Riot. Ellie Cawthorne investigates the tensions between town and gown, then and now.

The tension between university students and local people flared up into a bloody battle in Oxford on February 10, 1355 - known as the St Scholastica's Day Riot.

Recent graduate Ellie Cawthorne travels to Oxford to meet local historian Mark Davies and hear the grisly facts - 63 students lost their lives and others were scalped as the townspeople exacted their revenge on the scholars. Documents at the Bodleian Library show that King Edward III came down heavily on the side of the University, exacting penance from the town which continued for 500 years.

Chief archivist Simon Bailey tells Ellie that a final burying of the hatchet occurred as late as 1955 - 600 years after the event - when the City Mayor and University Chancellor granted each other reciprocal privileges. 

The friction between town and gown is traced forward to today, with locals unhappy about the takeover of pubs and living quarters as university numbers increase.

Sidney Sussex college at Cambridge commissioned a video to make students more self-aware, and advised them to "ditch the gown" on a night out so as not to offer a target. But other events attempt to bring both sides together, whether it's a fun run or, at Oxford, the annual Town and Gown Boxing Match where both sides put on gloves and bash the living daylights out of each other.


Producer: Richard Bannerman
Series Producer: Nick Baker
A Testbed production for BBC Radio 4.

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Recent graduate Ellie Cawthorne explores 900 years of student life.

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