Balliol College , founded in 1263, is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England.
Balliol is Oxford's most popular college, measured in terms of the number of applications for entry from prospective students. In 2005, Balliol had the largest number of applications of any Oxford college both from undergraduate students and from graduate students (for at least the third year running), according to the college website. Balliol also traditionally attracts more international students than the other undergraduate colleges. As of 2006, Balliol had an endowment of £78 m.
Traditionally, the undergraduates are amongst the most politically active in the university, and the college's alumni include three former prime ministers. H. H. Asquith (a Balliol undergraduate and British Prime Minister) once wryly described Balliol men as possessing "the tranquil consciousness of an effortless superiority". Adam Smith, a graduate student of the college, is perhaps its best known alumnus. During Benjamin Jowett's Mastership in the 19th century, the College rose from its relative obscurity to occupy the first rank of colleges, and indeed continues to play a prominent role. In 2006, 45.1% of finalists got First Class Honours degrees, a higher proportion than any other Oxford college has ever achieved, and was placed second in the Norrington Table.
The College was founded in about 1263 (leading some to argue that it is the University's oldest college, a claim contested by University College and Merton College) by John I de Balliol under the guidance of the Bishop of Durham. After his death in 1268, his widow, Dervorguilla of Galloway, made arrangements to ensure the permanence of the college. She provided capital, and in 1282, formulated the college statutes, documents that survive to this day.
The college provides its students with a broad range of facilities, including accommodation, the great hall (refectory), a library, two bars, and separate common rooms for the fellows, the graduates and undergraduates. There are also garden quadrangles and a nearby sportsground and boat-house. The sportsground is mainly used for cricket, tennis, hockey and football. The majority of undergraduates are housed within the main college or in the modern annexes around the sportsground. Croquet may be played in the Master's Field, or garden quadrangles in the summer. The graduates are housed mainly within Holywell Manor which has its own bar, gardens, common room, gym and computing facilities. Balliol is proud to have a long standing Music Society which organises four free Sunday evening concerts in the College Hall each term. Balliol is the only Oxford college to have its own bridge club.
Balliol also takes pride in its college tortoises. The original tortoise, who resided at the College for at least 43 years, was known as Rosa, named after the notable German Marxist Rosa Luxemburg. Each June, pet tortoises from various Oxford colleges are brought to Corpus Christi College where they participate in a very slow race; Balliol's own Rosa competed and won many times. Rosa disappeared in the Spring of 2004, and while numerous conspiracy theories have abounded, none is officially recognised by the College. It should be noted that Rosa had a long and happy life through the care of David Russell (the Comrade Tortoise) and he was distraught to have had her lost. However, on 29 April 2007, Chris Skidmore, a Graduate of Christ Church working at the House of Commons, donated a pair of tortoises - one to his own college, and one to Balliol, where he had attended an open day in 1999. The new tortoise, Matilda died in April 2009. Taking care of the resident tortoise is one of the many tasks assigned to Balliol students each year. This position, known as "Comrade Tortoise", has been filled by a student every year, regardless of whether there has been a tortoise to care for or not. The Assistant Gardener, Steve Taylor who joined Balliol from Cotswold Wildlife Park assists Comrade Tortoise in the practical matters of testudinal care.
Balliol students are noted for their left-wing tendencies; the college ethos has been described as "conservatively left-wing". The JCR has had requests for the Sun and News of the World newspapers several times, but each time a majority of students voted against the idea. In 2008 it was voted by a GM that the JCR would receive a daily copy of the Sun. Two weeks later, at the next GM, this decision was reversed.
Balliol's JCR is noted for being particularly active, providing many services for its members. These range from laundry facilities, one of the few entirely student-run bars in Oxford (the Manager, Lord/Lady Lindsay, is elected each year by students in the JCR) to a cafeteria (known as Pantry) which serves itemised cooked breakfast until 11.30am each day, Lunch 6 days a week, afternoon tea and cakes, and dinner 5 nights a week. Members of the JCR are encouraged to get involved with the running of these facilities.
There is a fierce rivalry between Trinity College and Balliol College that is shown by students of both colleges.
Along with many of the ancient colleges, Balliol has evolved its own traditions and customs over the centuries, many of which occupy a regular calendar slot.
In 1880, seven mischievous undergraduates at Balliol College, Oxford, published The Masque of B-ll--l, a broadsheet of forty quatrains making light of their superiors -- the Master and selected Fellows, Scholars, and Commoners -- and themselves. The outraged authorities immediately suppressed the collection, and only a few copies survived, three of which found their way into the College Library over the years, and one into the Bodleian Library.
The best known of these quatrains is the one on Benjamin Jowett. This has been widely quoted and reprinted in virtually every book about Jowett and about Balliol ever since.
"First come I.
My name is J-W-TT.
There's no knowledge but I know it.
I am Master of this College,
What I don't know isn't knowledge."
The other quatrains are much less well known. William Tuckwell included 18 of these quatrains in his Reminiscences in 1900, but they all came out only in 1939, thanks to Walter George Hiscock, an Oxford librarian, who issued them personally then and in a second edition in 1955.