Oxford was an important town long before it acquired fame as the seat of a university. This landmark volume, lauded on its first publication as 'a compendium and a treasure house', traces the history of the city from its earliest origins to the rise of the 20th-century motor industry, exploring as well the complex and changing relationship between 'town and gown'. The book is in two parts, the first of which provides a chronological narrative of Oxford's development, and of its social, economic and civic life. The second comprises detailed encyclopaedic accounts of particular topics and institutions.