Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Chapter I THE FOUNDATION OF DOWNING COLLEGE
- Chapter II A COLLEGE ELECTION
- Chapter III UNDERGRADUATES IN BONDS
- Chapter IV THE ATTACK ON HEADS OF HOUSES
- Chapter V CHRISTOPHER WORDSWORTH
- Chapter VI THE RELIGIOUS TESTS
- Chapter VII CHANCELLORS AND HIGH STEWARDS
- Chapter VIII TOWN AND GOWN
- Chapter IX TROUBLE AT THE FITZ WILLIAM
- Chapter X INTERNAL REFORM
- Chapter XI THE ROYAL COMMISSION
- Chapter XII BETWEEN THE TWO COMMISSIONS
- Chapter XIII STATUTE XLI AND THE THREE REGIUS PROFESSORSHIPS
- Chapter XIV THE STATUTORY COMMISSION AND THE UNIVERSITY
- Chapter XV THE STATUTORY COMMISSIONERS AND TRINITY COLLEGE
- Chapter XVI CAMBRIDGE AS IT WAS
- Appendices
- A Fellowships of Trinity College
- B The Trinity Seniority
- C Sir Isaac Newton's rooms
- D The statue of Isaac Barrow in Trinity Chapel
- Index
B - The Trinity Seniority
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 September 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Chapter I THE FOUNDATION OF DOWNING COLLEGE
- Chapter II A COLLEGE ELECTION
- Chapter III UNDERGRADUATES IN BONDS
- Chapter IV THE ATTACK ON HEADS OF HOUSES
- Chapter V CHRISTOPHER WORDSWORTH
- Chapter VI THE RELIGIOUS TESTS
- Chapter VII CHANCELLORS AND HIGH STEWARDS
- Chapter VIII TOWN AND GOWN
- Chapter IX TROUBLE AT THE FITZ WILLIAM
- Chapter X INTERNAL REFORM
- Chapter XI THE ROYAL COMMISSION
- Chapter XII BETWEEN THE TWO COMMISSIONS
- Chapter XIII STATUTE XLI AND THE THREE REGIUS PROFESSORSHIPS
- Chapter XIV THE STATUTORY COMMISSION AND THE UNIVERSITY
- Chapter XV THE STATUTORY COMMISSIONERS AND TRINITY COLLEGE
- Chapter XVI CAMBRIDGE AS IT WAS
- Appendices
- A Fellowships of Trinity College
- B The Trinity Seniority
- C Sir Isaac Newton's rooms
- D The statue of Isaac Barrow in Trinity Chapel
- Index
Summary
The eleventh chapter of the Elizabethan statutes of Trinity prescribes the mode of election into the Seniority of the College.
“Statuimus porro et decernimus”, it set out, “ut Seniorum electio intra novem dies ad summum post locum vacantem fiat: sitque ista horum eligendorum forma. Cum Senioris alicujus vacet locus, Magister, vel eo absente, Vicemagister, convocatis in Sacello, ut dictum est, illis Senioribus qui reliqui sunt, cooptet in eum ccetum Socium ilium qui sit proxime Senior, nisi gravis causa, per Magistrum el majorem partem praedictorum Seniorum approbanda, obstiterit. Sin autem ea de causa minus idoneum censuerint; Socius senior proximus ordine eligatur; et ita deinceps…. Quod si post tria scrutinia aperta, de uno eligendo non convenerint, is in numerum eum cooptatus esto, quern Magister, si domi sit, vel si absit, certior de ea re per literas Vicemagistri factus, solus nominaverit; qui postero die quo electus fuerit, det coram Magistro, vel eo absente, Vicemagistro ac septem reliquis Senioribus jusjurandum, se munus illud fideliter et omnino secundum legem de eo sanciiam obiturum.”
The third chapter of the same statutes enjoined that a Senior, on absenting himself from college, should appoint a vicarius or deputy.
It is therefore clear that the Fellow next in order of succession to the Seniority ought to be elected, unless the Master and four of the Seniors agreed that he was disqualified by a “gravis causa”; but in the nineteenth century the exact connotation of this phrase was in doubt.
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- Early Victorian Cambridge , pp. 429 - 433Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009First published in: 1940