The year is now 1539. Martin Luther has nailed his 95 Theses to the Wittenberg door (1517) and has been excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church; the Protestant Reformation is officially under way in Europe; and, in England, Henry VIII has established the Church of England in separation from the Roman Church (1536). In Scotland, the Papacy still reigns, the Cathedral in St Andrews remains a place of pilgrimage, and Archbishop James Beaton still resides in the St Andrew’s Castle, but small cracks are beginning to form in the Mother Church’s Scottish foundation.
Only eight years previous, in 1528, a former student of St. Leonard’s College, by the name of Patrick Hamilton, became one of the Protestant Church in St Andrew’s most well known martyrs. He was tried, convicted, and burned at the stake by Archbishop James Beaton for teaching the heretical doctrines of Martin Luther, which he had become acquainted with during his travels to Paris. He was burned at the stake outside of St. Salvator’s Chapel, where a monogram of his initials silently testifies to his Lutheran witness today.
(A legend exists today that if students step on the monogram at any point during the course of their studies, then they won’t receive their degree. If they do unwittingly step on the stones, however, all is not lost. They need only to join the rest of the inebriated students at 5am on the 1st of May for the annual ‘May Dip’. A baptism of sorts in the icy North Sea for the remission of University sins.)
Though St. John’s College was abandoned in 1527, its presence lived on, even in the form of a school of divinity. Only 12 years later, in 1539, then current Archbishop James Beaton requested of the Pope that a new College be founded on the same site, which, at this point, is still just the buildings along South Street, particularly the Chapel of St John the Evangelist and the Principle’s House. A Papal Bull and a meeting in the St Andrew’s Castle made the new college official on February 7, 1537. It was to be called St. Mary’s of the Assumption and to be dedicated to the training of new priests for the Catholic ministry. The Archbishop was determined that the Roman Catholic Church would remain dominant in Scotland. Unfortunately, less than one week later, Archbishop James Beaton died of ill health and would not see the College flourish. His nephew, Cardinal David Beaton, succeeded him in establishing the College on the site of St. John’s College, still referred to as The Pedagogy.
Over the next six or seven years, Cardinal David Beaton had a library built on the site where today sits the Eastern half of the King James Library and Parliament Hall. Cardinal Beaton’s library was to become the primary library for the University of St Andrews for the next several hundred years.
The years from 1539 to 1550 were nothing short of tumultuous for the College, the University, and the town. Protestantism was spreading throughout Europe and beginning to find significant support in Scotland. On March 1, 1546, Cardinal Beaton followed in his uncle’s footsteps and had a Scottish Protestant minister by the name of George Wishart burned at the stake. Wishart was responsible for spreading the teachings of Calvin and Zwingli throughout Scotland, as well as raising up his famous disciple, John Knox.
In retaliation, Protestant supporters murdered Cardinal Beaton on May 29th of that same year, mutilating his body and hanging it from the window of the St Andrew’s Castle, the Cardinal’s residence. It is said to have been hanged in the second-story front-facing window of the remaining tower—for everyone to see.
Much would change for the College of St. Mary’s of the Assumption over the course of the next century, but it will all require its own post. Until next time…
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