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The
Scottish Historical Review
VOL. VIIL, No. 31 APRIL 1911
The Beginnings of St. Andrews University
1410-1418.
I
nnHE cathedral town of St. Andrews became the home of the
JL first Scottish University in 1410. St. Andrews was then,
and has ever remained, an ideal
place
for a seat of learning. The
town had been growing steadily
for centuries, under the
fostering
care of a long succession of bishops ; but its geographical position
was an effectual barrier to its becoming the centre of a great
population. In this
respect time has wrought but little change.
St. Andrews, although in touch with all the world, is still far
from being one of the busy haunts of men. The two ' seas '
which were once complained of as being to its disadvantage have
now been bridged, but men and things
are only the more swiftly
carried past its doors. The gray old town remains standing
isolated and remote. It is true that it increases in area and in
the number of its inhabitants with the years, but its growth
continued, until quite lately, to be relatively slow.
In plan and general outline St. Andrews has not altered much
since the natal year of its University. The twentieth century
finds it stretching itself towards the south and west, and covering
its suburbs with villas and gardens. The fifteenth century found
it confining itself within narrower limits, as if for greater warmth
and safety, and with nearly all its principal buildings clinging close
to the north and east. A large part of the ground now built
S.H.R. VOL. VIII, J>