[Walter de Merton] also gradually came to own substantial estates, one of which at Malden, Surrey, he made over, manor house and estate for the establishment of "a house of Scholars of Merton". The original scholars were his nephews, for he was a family man, and later the school was filled by "capable young men preferably from the Diocese of Winchester". In 1264 he moved this Malden foundation to Oxford where he himself had also been educated. He directed that his scholars of Merton were to study in the University, to hire a hall and to live together as a community with a warden and stewards to administer the house, and were to forfeit their places there if they entered any religious order. This arrangement has been described as "the most momentous step on the history of our national education". From it derives the collegiate system of our older universities, Merton College probably being the first college anywhere to have its own charter of foundation, its own buildings, and in 1270 its own statutes for its governance. These Statutes were drawn up by Walter de Merton, reflect perhaps his experience at Merton Priory.
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More important even than his scheme for founding a college building however, was Walter de Merton's idea of education itself. Both at the time of his own education at Oxford and also when he moved his Malden school there, education was entirely concerned with religion and absorbed in theology and dogma. Oxford, then largely dominated by the Friars, concentrated on training people for service in religious orders. Hence the significance of Walter de Merton's provision that his scholars were to forfeit their places in his college if they entered an order. From this derives the idea of secularisation of studies at all universities, and has made possible the all-embracing curriculum of the present day.
Last updated 18 May 2003