ning of the
thirteenth century, the masters of the Studium probably elected a
Rector or Head in imitation of the Parisian Chancellor. After the
quarrel with the citizens, which led to the migration to Cambridge,
and when King John had submitted to the Pope, the masters were able to
obtain an ordinance from the Papal legate determining the punishment
of the offenders, and providing against the recurrence of such
incidents. The legate ordered that if the citizens should seize the
person of a clerk, his surrender might be demanded by "the Bishop of
Lincoln, or the Archdeacon of the place or his Official, or the
Chancellor, or whomsoever the Bishop of Lincoln shall depute to this
office." The clause lays stress upon the authority of the Bishop of
Lincoln, which must in no way be diminished by any action of the
townsmen. The ecclesiastical authority of the Bishop was welcomed by
the University as a protection against the town, and the Chancellor
was too far away from Lincoln to press the privileges of the Diocese
or the Cathedral against the clerks who were under his special (p. 046)
care. The Oxford Chancellor was a master of the Studium, and, though
he was the representative of the Bishop, he was also the Head of the
masters guild, and from very early times was elected by the masters.
Thus he came to identify himself with the University, and his office
increased in importance as privileges were conferred upon the
University by kings and popes. No Rectorship grew up as a rival to the
Chancellorship, though some of the functions of the Parisian Rector
were performed at Oxford by the Proctors. There were only two "Nations"
at Oxford, for the Oxford masters were, as a rule, Englishmen; men
from north of the Trent formed the Northern Nation, and the rest of
England the Southern Nation. Scotsmen were classed as Northerners, and
Welshmen and Irishmen as Southerners. The division into Nations was
short-lived, and the two Rectors or Proctors, though still
distinguished as Northern and Southern, soon became representatives
elected by the whole Faculty of Arts. As at Paris, the Faculty of Arts
was the moving spirit in the University, and Theology, Law, and
Medicine never developed at Oxford any independent organisation. The
proctors, as Dr Rashdall has shown, thus became the Executive of the
University as a whole, and not merely of the Faculty of Arts.

An essential difference between Bologna and its two great northern (p. 047)