Every October, as the leaves on the college walls turn red, Cambridge quietly gains a few thousand new members. They arrive with suitcases and nervous parents, find their rooms and the dining hall, and within a few days they take part in a ceremony with an unfamiliar name: matriculation.
The word comes from the Latin matricula, a list or register. To matriculate is, quite literally, to have your name entered on the roll. Once you have done it, you are no longer a visitor. You are a member of the University and of your college, with all the rights, the libraries and the traditions that come with it.
A signature, a photograph and a dinner
Each college does things a little differently, but the shape is much the same. New students promise to abide by the University’s rules, now usually by signing a form online, and many colleges also invite them to sign the college’s own matriculation book, sometimes in front of the Master. Gowns go on, often for the first time.
Then comes the matriculation photograph: the whole year group lined up on tiered benches in the court, Fellows seated in the front row, everyone squinting at the camera. Decades later, alumni can still find their younger selves in that picture. The day ends with a formal Matriculation Dinner in Hall, by candlelight.
Your name on the roll, and the first page of your Cambridge story.
Not only an Oxbridge word
Matriculation is not unique to Cambridge. Oxford and Durham hold their own ceremonies, and German-speaking universities still talk about Immatrikulation. In the United States, to “matriculate” simply means to enrol, and in South Africa “matric” is the final year of school. The word has travelled a long way from its Latin list.
At Cambridge, though, it has a lovely symmetry. A few years after that first photograph, the same students cross the road to the Senate House to graduate. Matriculation is the beginning of the chapter, and graduation is the end of it, which is exactly why our Best of Luck scent belongs to both.
[Fact-check before publishing: dates and details.]