ABSTRACT
The foundation of the University of Zaragoza in 1583 followed the pattern of Valencia and Barcelona, where minor colleges of arts and medicine eventually obtained university status in the sixteenth century. Fragmentary evidence indicates the existence of a small Estudi in Zaragoza as early as the thirteenth or fourteenth century. In 1476 the college was referred to as Estudio General de artes and universitas magistrorum in contemporary royal and papal sanctions. In 1542 Charles V granted this minor university the privilege to extend beyond its existing faculty of arts and called for the establishment of faculties of theology, civil and canonical law, medicine and philosophy. The royal initiative was approved by two papal bulls in the following decade. However, problems with funding and a long-held dispute with the neighbouring University of Huesca – and later Philip II’s wavering support – delayed the realisation of the proposed measures by several decades. The university was not inaugurated until 1583, when its official establishment was forced through by an alliance of local oligarchs and clerics led by Archbishop Pedro Cerbuna.
