The Archive Collections

The core collection – primarily charters, accounts, battels books, and documents relating to College estates and livings – is small and streamlined. But it also constitutes a rare, largely unbroken, run of Oxford college administrative records from the fifteenth century to the present. College registers, which document governance of the College by the Rector and Fellows, cover the period 1472-1980s when they are succeeded by a more complicated series of modern administrative records. None of these records have been published.

Student records begin in 1673, in the form of matriculation registers. These give the student’s place of birth and father’s name and status or profession, and from 1864 the sending school is frequently included. In the medieval and early modern periods, some minimal biographical information about students may also be gleaned from the registers, charters, or benefactions, particularly if they held endowed scholarships or made gifts to the College. From the nineteenth century onwards there are incomplete series of photographs of students and Fellows, College societies, and sports teams. The Archive also holds runs of twentieth-century College publications.

The College collects private papers from alumni. The most significant relate to Fellows and Rectors, including John Wesley, Mark Pattison, Nevil Sidgwick, and William Warde Fowler; and some distinguished alumni, including Osbert Lancaster, Edward Thomas, and Gavin Selerie.

Lincoln College supports the Oxfordshire Record Society, the British Records Association, and the Oxford Historical Society.