The Oxford Penny

On St Scholastica’s Day in the reign of Edward III a battle broke out between the students of Oxford and the townsmen and lasted three days. On the second evening the townsmen brought in the country people and overpowered the scholars, many of whom were killed or wounded. The city was put under interdict, fined, stripped of privileges, and bound to an annual penance for ever: each St Scholastica’s Day the mayor and sixty-two citizens were to attend the Litany at St Mary’s and each offer a penny. The penance was kept for almost five hundred years.