page_title: Walter de Merton
section_title: Merton College
hierarchical_section_title: Walter de Merton / Career / Merton College
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Gisant de Walter de Merton, chancelier d'Angleterre (1272-1274) puis évêque de Rochester (1274-1278) dans la cathédrale de Rochester.
context_page_description: Walter de Merton was Lord Chancellor of England, Archdeacon of Bath, founder of Merton College, Oxford, and Bishop of Rochester. For the first two years of the reign of Edward I he was - in all but name - Regent of England during the King's absence abroad. He died in 1277 after falling from his horse, and is buried in Rochester Cathedral.
context_section_description: In 1261, two manors in Surrey were set aside for the support of "scholars residing at the schools" at Merton Priory; it was the beginning of Merton College.  In 1264 Walter drew up statutes for a "house of the scholars of Merton", at Malden in Surrey; ten years later these scholars were transferred to Oxford, and a permanent house established.  Merton College, thus founded and endowed, was one of the earliest examples of collegiate life at Oxford.  De Merton's statutes provided for a common corporate life under the rule of a warden but, as vows were to be taken and scholars entering a monastic order forfeited their scholarship, the college was really a place of training for the secular clergy. 
  Freed of the responsibilities of government, Walter turned his attention to his college again.  The statutes were redrafted and scholars moved permanently to Oxford.  They were established on the site of the parish church of St John whose advowson he had obtained in the early 1260s and where he had been buying adjoining houses and halls since 1264.  In 1270 he bought Kibworth Harcourt, Leicestershire as part of the confiscated estate of Saer de Harcourt, an erstwhile supporter of Simon de Montfort.  While De Merton was labouring for the establishment of Merton College, the barons emerged triumphant.  Walter, a partisan friend of Henry III, was removed from the chancellorship in 1263.  He was not immediately restored after the king's victory, but he did renew his acquaintance with the royal circle, by now at Windsor.
caption: Tomb of Walter de Merton in Rochester Cathedral
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