List of oldest universities in continuous operation Details, Meaning List of oldest universities in continuous operation Article and Explanation Guide

List of oldest universities in continuous operation Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description

This is a list of the oldest Universities. To be listed on this page, the educational institution must satisfy the definition of university, it must be founded before 1500, and it must be operational without a significant interruption ever since.

Al-Azhar University, Cairo, Egypt, founded 988

University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy, founded 1088

University of Oxford, Oxford, England, founded about 1096

University of Paris, Paris, France, founded 1150 (now split between several autonomous universities)

University of Modena, Modena, Italy, founded 1175

University of Cambridge, Cambridge, England, founded about 1208

Salamanca University, Salamanca, Spain, founded 1218

University of Padua, Padua, Italy, founded in 1222

University of Naples, Naples, Italy, founded 1224

University of Siena, Siena, Italy, founded 1240

University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal, founded in 1290 in Lisbon

Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Madrid, Spain, founded 1293 in Alcalá de Henares

University of Rome, Rome, Italy, founded 1303

University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy, founded 1343

University of Prague, Prague, Czech Republic, founded 1348

University of Pavia, Pavia, Italy, founded 1361

Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland, founded 1364

University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria, founded 1365

University of Pécs, Pécs, Hungary, founded 1367

Ruprecht Karls University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany, founded 1386

University of Ferrara, Ferrara, Italy, founded 1391

University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany, founded 1409

St. Andrews University, St. Andrews, Scotland, founded 1412

University of Rostock, Rostock, Germany, founded 1419

Catholic University of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium, founded 1425, now split between the French-speaking Université catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve and the Dutch-speaking Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, still at Leuven

Poitiers University, Poitiers, France, founded 1431

University of Glasgow, Glasgow, Scotland, founded 1450

Ernst Moritz Arndt University of Greifswald, Greifswald, Germany, founded 1456

Albert Ludwigs University of Freiburg, Freiburg, Germany, founded 1457

Basel University, Basel, Switzerland, founded 1460;

Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden, founded 1477

Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany, founded in 1477

University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark, founded 1479

University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, Scotland, founded 1494

By contrast, the earliest university in the Americas is the Universidad Autonoma de Santo Domingo, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic founded in 1538; the oldest in the United States is the University of Pennsylvania, founded in 1749 (the oldest college is Harvard College, founded in 1636); the oldest in Canada, Université Laval, founded 1663; the oldest in Australia is University of Sydney, founded 1850.

Caveat

The actual date a University started to function is often rather hazy and differs a good deal from legend or from the date its ancestor-institution was founded. For example, it is generally admitted today that Oxford's foundation can't be precisely dated, but must lie somewhere in the mid-to-late 12th century.

Likewise, hair-splitting is pointless: the notion that a college could be empowered give the bachelor's degree is a modern American one; by European terms, Harvard had already adopted the powers (if not the style) of a University in 1642. No doubt it thought of itself as the germinal college of a New Cambridge University or such-like. Pennsylvania was simply the first American institution to call itself a university; but neither it nor Harvard nor any of the four other American colleges at the time was nearly big or diverse enough to be like a true European University. And despite its name, Harvard is in fact presently a university.

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List of oldest universities in continuous operation Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description

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