PREFACE THE first volume of this Register brought the history of Oriel, as a place of education for young students, down to the end of the seventeenth century. By that time, the character of the College had become definitely fixed, and the type which it assumed was that which ultimately became the normal one. Before the close of the fifteenth century, the number of Oxford students had already fallen considerably. In the next century, the dissolution of the monasteries, carrying with it the disappearance of the houses of students maintained by the great religious orders, operated still further in the same direction. It is not easy to determine the extent to which the medieval secular College admitted within its walls or provided for the instruction and discipline of young students not holding places on the foundation. In some Colleges leave was given by the statutes for the admission of a few Commen- sales, in Waynflete's language filii nobilium, or a few poor scholars. But the bulk of the extranet were accommodated in the Halls. Some of these Halls were independent, and had a continuous life of their own. But a great many, probably the larger number, came to be in the hands of one or other of the endowed corporations, and were served by members of the society which owned the buildings1. An examination of the lists of Principals in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries shows several instances in which this kind of appropriation had already taken place 2. 1 See Mr. Buchan's History of Brasenose College (p. 2), where the distinction between dependent and independent Halls is weil brought out. 2 At Oriel and elsewhere, Fellows who were inclined to undertake the instruction and supervision of young Scholars found their opportunity in the Principalship of a Hall connected with their own College : and the way was thus made easy for the introduction, at a later date, of under- graduate members within .the walls.