The University of Edinburgh : an illustrated history
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
The University of Edinburgh : an illustrated history
Edinburgh University Press, c2003
- : hbk
- : pbk
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Note
Bibliography: p. 208-211
Includes index
Description and Table of Contents
- Volume
-
: hbk ISBN 9780748616459
Description
This is a history of the University of Edinburgh from its origins as a town college in the 16th century to its present condition as Scotland's largest university. It describes the Reformation and its impact on students and the syllabus, the competitive challenge of competition from English and European universities, the transformations of the Enlightenment, and the opportunities and pitfalls of the expansions of the 19th and 20th centuries. The authors describe the building of the university from Old College to George Square, and the establishment and growth of the departments of theology, law, philosophy, medicine, science, and the humanities. They trace the often tense relationship between the university and the city, and do not ignore the darker side of the university's history: describing how, at the end of the 17th century, it hanged one of its students for blasphemy; in the 19th century its anatomy department supported a thriving bodysnatching trade; and in the 20th century its students could still shock the nation and its genetic scientists shake the world.
The university's history is revealed as fraught with upheaval and crisis in which, despite everything within and without, it survived to become one of the world's greatest centres of scholarship, research, teaching and learning. This is a work of scholarship worn lightly, a story told with wit and style, and peopled by individuals famous and infamous. Illustrated with colour and black-and-white illustrations, it should be a book for all concerned with the university now or in the past to read and to enjoy.
- Volume
-
: pbk ISBN 9780748616466
Description
From a small city college in the sixteenth century the University of Edinburgh grew to be one of the world's greatest centres of scholarship, research and learning. Its history is told here by three of its leading historians with wit, verve and style. Copiously illustrated in colour and black and white, this is a book for everyone concerned with the university or the city of Edinburgh to read and enjoy. The authors consider the impacts of Reformation, Union with England, Enlightenment, and scientific and industrial revolutions. They show the university rising to the challenge of competition from Europe, describe the great periods of expansion in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and chart the university's building from Old College to George Square. They explore its tense relationship with the city, explore the histories of student outrage and unrest, recall the days when blasphemy could be punished by death, and reveal that the university's department of anatomy once supported a thriving trade in body-snatching. Upheaval and crisis, triumph and achievement succeed each other by turns in a story that is entertaining, intriguing and surprising -- and always interesting.
by "Nielsen BookData"
