Major Universities Founded Before 1900
Updated February 21, 2017 | Factmonster Staff 
| Nalanda (India) | c. 4th century B.C. |
| Salerno | 9th century |
| Al-Azhar (Cairo) | c. 988 |
| Bologna | 12th century |
| Paris | c. 1155 |
| Oxford | 1167 |
| Vicenza | 1204 |
| Cambridge | 1209 |
| Palencia | 1214 |
| Salamanca | 1218 |
| Padua | 1222 |
| Naples | 1224 |
| Toulouse | 1229 |
| Salamanca | 1243 |
| Rome | 1244 |
| Siena | 1247 |
| Piacenza | 1248 |
| Sorbonne | 1253 |
| Montpellier | 1289 |
| Lisbon (later Coimbra) | 1290 |
| Complutense | 1293 |
| Avignon | 1303 |
| Orleans | 1305 |
| Perugia | 1308 |
| Grenoble | 1339 |
| Pisa | 1343 |
| Prague | 1348 |
| Cracow | 1364 |
| Vienna | 1364 |
| Erfurt | 1379 |
| Heidelberg | 1385 |
| Ferra | 1391 |
| Wurzburg | 1402 |
| Leipzig | 1409 |
| St. Andrews | 1411 |
| Turin | 1412 |
| Louvain | 1426 |
| Bordeaux | 1441 |
| Barcelona | 1450 |
| Trier | 1450 |
| Glasgow | 1451 |
| Freiburg im Breisgau | 1455 |
| Ingolstadt | 1459 |
| Basel | 1460 |
| Nantes | 1463 |
| Bourges | 1465 |
| Ofen | 1475 |
| Tubingen | 1477 |
| Uppsala | 1477 |
| Copenhagen | 1479 |
| Aberdeen | 1494 |
| Valencia | 1501 |
| Wittenberg | 1502 |
| Seville | 1505 |
| Marburg | 1527 |
| Granada | 1533 |
| Universidad Santo Tomás de Aquino (Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo) | 1538 |
| Konigsberg | 1544 |
| Messina | 1548 |
| National University of Mexico | 1551 |
| National University of San Marcos de Lima | 1551 |
| National University of Bogota (Columbia) | 1573 |
| Bern | 1574 |
| Oviedo | 1574 |
| Leyden | 1575 |
| Warsaw | 1576 |
| Vilna | 1578 |
| Edinburgh | 1582 |
| Graz | 1586 |
| Trinity College (Dublin) | 1591 |
| Giessen | 1607 |
| National University of Cordoba (Argentina) | 1613 |
| Groningen | 1614 |
| National University of Bolivia | 1621 |
| Strasbourg | 1621 |
| Madrid | 1623 |
| Salzburg | 1623 |
| Utrecht | 1634 |
| Budapest | 1635 |
| Harvard College | 1636 |
| Bamberg | 1648 |
| Durham | 1657 |
| Kiel | 1665 |
| San Carlos University of Guatemala | 1676 |
| Innsbruck | 1677 |
| Halle | 1693 |
| William and Mary | 1693 |
| Saint John's College | 1696 |
| Yale College | 1701 |
| Breslau | 1702 |
| Dijon | 1722 |
| Central University of Caracas | 1725 |
| Central University of Havana | 1728 |
| Gottingen | 1734 |
| Central University of Chile | 1738 |
| University of Pennsylvania | 1740 |
| Erlangen | 1742 |
| College of New Jersey (Princeton) | 1746 |
| King's College (Columbia, 1784) | 1754 |
| Moscow | 1755 |
| Brown University | 1764 |
| Queen's College (Rutger's University, 1825) | 1766 |
| Central University of Ecuador | 1769 |
| Dartmouth College | 1769 |
| University of Malta | 1769 |
| Munster | 1771 |
| Dickinson College | 1773 |
| Zagreb | 1776 |
| Palermo | 1779 |
| University of Georgia | 1785 |
| Franklin and Marshall College | 1787 |
| University of Pittsburgh | 1787 |
| Georgetown University | 1789 |
| University of Vermont | 1791 |
| Hamilton-Oneida Academy (Hamilton College, 1812) | 1793 |
| Williams College | 1793 |
| Bowdoin College | 1794 |
| University of Tennessee | 1794 |
| Union College | 1795 |
| University of North Carolina | 1795 |
| Middlebury College | 1800 |
| Oslo | 1801 |
| University of South Carolina | 1801 |
| United States Military Academy | 1802 |
| Kazan | 1804 |
| Kharkov | 1804 |
| Ohio University | 1804 |
| University of Maryland | 1807 |
| Lyons | 1808 |
| Miami University (Ohio) | 1809 |
| Berlin | 1810 |
| National University of Nicaragua | 1811 |
| Colby College | 1813 |
| Ghent | 1816 |
| Liege | 1817 |
| University of Michigan | 1817 |
| Bonn | 1818 |
| Saint Louis University | 1818 |
| Colgate University | 1819 |
| Norwich University | 1819 |
| St. Petersburg | 1819 |
| University of Cincinnati | 1819 |
| University of Virginia | 1819 |
| Indiana University | 1820 |
| Amherst College | 1821 |
| McGill University | 1821 |
| University of Buenos Aires | 1821 |
| Hobart College | 1822 |
| Trinity College (Hartford) | 1823 |
| Kenyon College | 1824 |
| Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute | 1824 |
| Lafayette College | 1826 |
| Western Reserve University | 1826 |
| University of Toronto | 1827 |
| London | 1828 |
| Denison University | 1831 |
| New York University | 1831 |
| University of Alabama | 1831 |
| Wesleyan University | 1831 |
| Kiev | 1832 |
| Zurich | 1832 |
| Haverford College | 1833 |
| National University of the Republic (Montevideo) | 1833 |
| Oberlin College | 1833 |
| Brussels | 1834 |
| Tulane University | 1834 |
| Wheaton College | 1834 |
| Emory University | 1836 |
| Athens | 1837 |
| Indiana Asbury University (DePauw University, 1883) | 1837 |
| Knox College | 1837 |
| Mount Holyoke College | 1837 |
| Boston University | 1839 |
| University of Missouri | 1839 |
| Bethany College | 1840 |
| Dalhousie University | 1841 |
| Fordham University | 1841 |
| Ohio Wesleyan University | 1842 |
| University of Notre Dame | 1842 |
| Holy Cross College | 1843 |
| University of Delaware | 1843 |
| Baylor College | 1845 |
| United States Naval Academy | 1845 |
| Beloit College | 1846 |
| Bucknell College | 1846 |
| Grinnell College | 1846 |
| University of Buffalo | 1846 |
| Lawrence College | 1847 |
| State University of Iowa | 1847 |
| University of Mississippi | 1848 |
| University of Wisconsin | 1849 |
| Manchester | 1850 |
| University of Dayton | 1850 |
| University of Rochester | 1850 |
| University of Utah | 1850 |
| Bates College | 1855 |
| Michigan State | 1855 |
| Pennsylvania State University | 1855 |
| Jassy | 1860 |
| Belgrade | 1864 |
| Bucharest | 1864 |
| Cornell | 1865 |
| Massachusetts Institute of Technology | 1865 |
| Odessa | 1865 |
| University of California | 1869 |
| Geneva | 1876 |
| Texas A&M | 1876 |
| Amsterdam | 1877 |
| Stockholm | 1878 |
| Liverpool | 1881 |
| University of Texas | 1883 |
| Gothenburg | 1887 |
| Sofia | 1888 |
| Clemson | 1889 |
| Lausanne | 1891 |
| Stanford | 1891 |
| Wales | 1893 |
| Marseilles | 1896 |
| Nancy | 1896 |
| Birmingham | 1900 |
