Revisiting a blog post from a few years ago now which, fortunately, requires no updating.

Youth isn’t everything

Previously it was Times Higher Education but more recently it has been the turn of QS to produce a ranking of newer universities, presumably on the basis that somehow they suffer in the rankings for not having done enough stuff over their limited histories. Unfortunately, this rather discriminates against older institutions which are also often disadvantaged in the rankings for being, well, old.

So, it’s time to right this wrong by producing the all new top 20 of universities over 500 years old. Let’s hear it for the ancients!

And the good news is that European universities once again dominate and Italy in particular does extremely well. It is also another good year for the University of Bologna, the grandaddy of them all, which is top of the heap for a record-breaking 925th year. Let’s look at the full top 20:

1. University of Bologna
2. University of Oxford
3. University of Cambridge
4. University of Salamanca
5. University of Padua
6. University of Naples
7. University of Valladolid
8. University of Murcia
9. University of Montpelier
10. University of Macerata
11. University of Coimbra
12. University of Alacala
13. La Sapienza, University of Rome
14. University of Perugia
15. University of Florence
16. University of Camerino
17. University of Pisa
18. Charles University of Prague
19. University of Pavia
20. Jagiellonian University

Not a huge amount to report here with the top 20 remaining entirely static (as it has done indeed since Poland’s Jagiellonian University opened back in 1364).

Sadly there’s still no place in the top 20 for the august institutions of Heidelberg, Vienna and Turin. And Scotland’s ancients, St Andrews, Glasgow and Aberdeen, also miss out yet again.