Priorities of the College of William and Mary

The College of William and Mary was chartered on February 8, 1693, by King William and Queen Mary, with main buildings designed by Sir Christopher Wren. It was the first college in the United States in its antecedents, which go back to the college proposed at Henrico in 1619, and second to Harvard University in actual operation. It was the first American college to receive its charter from the Crown under the Seal of the Privy Council in 1693, and hence was known as “their Majesties’ Royal College of William and Mary.” It was the first and only American college to receive a colonial coat-of-arms from the College of Heralds in 1694. In 1729 it became the first college in the United States to have a full faculty, consisting of a president, six professors, usher, and writing master. It was the first college to confer metallic prizes, the gold medals donated by Lord Botetourt in 1771, and the first college to establish an inter-collegiate fraternity, the Phi Beta Kappa, on December 5, 1776. In 1779 it became the first college to have the elective system of study, the honor system, a school of Modern Languages, and a school of Municipal and Constitutional Law, and the first college to become a university. It was also the first college to teach Political Economy in 1784 and to have a school of Modern History in 1803.

Williamsburg, Virginia · United States