875 ‘Grantabrycge’ mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
1025 (c.) Tower of St Bene’t’s built
1201 Cambridge granted a town charter
1209 Traditional foundation date of the university
1318 Papal Bull confirms the status of the university
1349 Black Death
1381 Peasants’ Revolt
1502 Lady Margaret Beaufort founds first Chair of Divinity
1540 Five Regius Professorships founded
1584 Cambridge University Press founded
1618 Perse Grammar School established
1640 Oliver Cromwell elected MP for Cambridge
1643 Parliamentary forces occupy Cambridge
1687 Newton’s Principia Mathematica published
1763 Publication of the first Cambridge guidebook, Cantabrigia Depicta
1780 John Mortlock opens first Cambridge bank
1788 Petty Cury paved and lit
1793 ‘Cambridge Chimes’ first rung at Great St Mary’s
1801 First national census – population of Cambridge 9,000
1841 Population 24,000
1845 Railway station opened
1847 Prince Albert elected chancellor
1856 Cambridge University Act abolishes university courts
1858 Cambridge College of Art opened by John Ruskin
1861 University teachers allowed to marry
1870 Cavendish Laboratory opened
1874 Leys School founded
1883 Footlights founded
1888 First ‘safety bicycles’ in use
1905 First motor bus services established
1908 Ban on Sunday railway trains lifted
1911 Population 40,000
1932 Atom split at the Cavendish Laboratory
1934 Last Stourbridge fair; University Library built; Guildhall rebuilt
1936 Arts Theatre opened
1947 Women granted the right to receive degrees
1948 Last University MP elected (separate university representation abolished 1950)
1951 Cambridge granted city status
1970 Trinity College establishes Cambridge Science Park
1972 King’s and Churchill accept female undergraduates
1995 Judge Institute of Management Studies opened
2001 Population 109,000 (including 22,000 students)
2005 Anglia Ruskin Polytechnic becomes Anglia Ruskin University
2009 Cambridge celebrates 800th anniversary
College Foundations (with full and alternative names)
1284 Peterhouse (College of the Scholars of the Bishop of Ely, St Peter’s College)
1317 (The) King’s Hall (merged into Trinity, 1546)
1321 University Hall (refounded as Clare Hall)
1324 Michaelhouse (merged into Trinity, 1546)
1326/46 Clare Hall (Clare College)
1347 Pembroke Hall (College, House or Hall of Valence Mary, Pembroke College)
1348/9 Gonville Hall (1351 Hall of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary; 1393 took over Physwick Hostel (merged with Trinity 1546); 1557 re-founded as Gonville and Caius College)
1349/50 Trinity Hall (College of the Scholars of the Holy Trinity of Norwich)
1352 Corpus Christi College (College of Corpus Christi and the Blessed Virgin Mary, St Bene’t’s, Benet College)
1428 Buckingham College (1542 re-founded as Magdalene College)
1439 Godshouse (1505 refounded as Christ’s College)
1441 King’s College (Royal College of St Mary and St Nicholas)
1446/8 Queens’ College (Queens’ College of St Margaret and St Bernard, refounded 1465)
1473 Catharine Hall (St Catharine’s College)
1496 Jesus College (College of the Blessed Virgin Mary, St John the Evangelist and the Glorious Virgin St Radegund)
1505 Christ’s College (incorporating Godshouse)
1509/11 St John’s College (College of St John the Evangelist)
1542 Magdalene College (formerly Buckingham College)
1546 Trinity College (College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity – merged from King’s Hall (1317) Michaelhouse (1324) and Physwick Hostel (1393))
1584 Emmanuel College
1594/6 Sidney Sussex College (Lady Frances Sidney Sussex College)
1731 Homerton College (1895 moved from Hackney to Cambridge, in 1977 ‘adopted’ by the university)
1800 Downing College (from a bequest of 1717)
1869 Girton College (1872 moved from Hitchin to Cambridge) Fitzwilliam House (1966 Fitzwilliam College)
1871 Newnham College
1882 Selwyn Hostel (1923 Selwyn College; 1957 full collegiate status)
1885 Hughes Hall (Cambridge Training College for Women; 1985 ‘approved foundation)
1896 St Edmund’s House (1965 St Edmund’s College; 1975 ‘approved foundation’)
1954 New Hall (2008 Murray Edwards College)
1960 Churchill College
1964 Darwin College
1965 Lucy Cavendish College University College (1973 Wolfson College)
1966 Clare Hall
1977 Robinson College (1985 ‘approved foundation’)