Beneath every spire a cellar

Apart from libraries and other centrally administered faculties, the University of Oxford is made up of 45 colleges and halls, all possessing a wine cellar. As a result, the wine culture of the place is immense and indelible, and a sizeable minority of dons – the term describes any fellow of a college – have built highly respectable private cellars of their own.

Frequently a case of misunderstanding when a tourist asks ‘Where is the University?’, the colleges collectively comprise the university despite being self-governing, quasi-autonomous legal entities. Their wine cellars are correspondingly as diverse and different as they are, and they might be compared to a large extended family, exhibiting a sibling likeness when viewed from afar but proving utterly unique when encountered in person.

It is therefore impossible to generalise about size and content, except to say that large colleges have necessarily large cellars on account of their catering needs, but not all large colleges are equally wealthy. St John’s College has a capacious private endowment of more than £300 million for approximately 500 students, meaning that it can easily stretch to cru classé and grand cru wines even for ordinary guest nights, which are held regularly throughout the academic year. At the other end of the scale, less wealthy colleges have frequently been more experimental with New World wines – perhaps through necessity but often with genuinely meritorious results.

In general, college cellars have a heavy French bias where wine is concerned and a tremendously expansive Port heritage stretching back into the 17th century, when the great Port shippers were first established. Other fortified wines such as Sherry and Madeira have a special place in Oxford’s affections, whereas conventional or – God forbid – fashionable spirits get short shrift.

Before delving into the contents of the cellars of the two Oxford colleges with which I am well acquainted, two memories may begin to describe the extraordinary wine culture within the ‘city of the dreaming spires’.