Available Languages: French, German, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Portuguese, Modern Greek, Czech (with Slovak), Celtic.
Beginners’ Russian is not available.

This course is suitable for students wishing to combine the study of one European language with History. One of the great advantages of the course is that by choosing options carefully it is possible to study subjects which relate to each other significantly. Thus, for example, an interest in nineteenth-century French literature might be reinforced by the study of French and European historical options in the same period, or an interest in medieval Italian history can be enriched by a study of Dante.

Not only can the literature be related to its historical context, but the agenda of the historians can be reassessed by engagement with literary materials. The richness and variety of the cultural and intellectual historical topics pursued in the History Faculty make possible exciting and intellectually innovative combinations. Students undertaking this kind of joint degree therefore regularly make genuinely original contributions.

First Year

Students study four papers relating to their chosen language and two papers on History, on which they are examined at the end of the third term. The examination therefore comprises the following components:

1. Three language papers involving a combination of comprehension, précis, essay, translation, and grammatical exercises, depending on the language you are studying. 

1. Two literature papers.
2. General History (primarily European). These papers are studied thematically.  A choice of four options is available:
   • I: 370–900 (The Transformation of the Ancient World)
   • II: 1000–1300 (Medieval Christendom and its neighbours)
   • III: 1400–1650 (Renaissance, Recovery and Reform)
   • IV: 1815–1914 (Society, Nation and Empire)
     

1. One of:
   
   (a) History of the British Isles. This is divided into seven chronological periods which are studied thematically, and from which you should choose one period.
   
   (b) An Optional Subject which is based on primary sources translated into English where appropriate. There are over a dozen to choose from, ranging from political thought to Early Gothic France, c. 1100–c. 1150, and from Conquest and Colonization: Spain and America in the Sixteenth Century, to Revolution and Empire in France, 1789–1815, and The Rise and Crisis of European Socialisms.
   
   (c) Either Approaches to History, which examines how the study of history has drawn on allied disciplines such as archaeology, anthropology, sociology and the history of art; or Historiography Tacitus to Weber, which examines the work of some of the great historians or a Foreign Text by a great thinker such as Machiavelli, Alexis de Tocqueville or Frederich Meinecke, which is read in the original language.

The Later Years

Students combine a variety of options from the parent subjects, deepening their literary and historical sensibilities. Study for the final examinations is punctuated by the year abroad during which students have an opportunity to hone their language skills by working overseas.

Students work on the following course elements:

1.	A period of General History (chosen from some seventeen periods, which cover the whole of European history and its engagement with the non-European world from the fall of Rome until 1973, with additional papers in American history and the history of the wider world in the nineteenth century).
2.	A period of literature (from a choice of three periods, covering, respectively, the literature of the Medieval period; of the sixteenth–eighteenth centuries; of the Modern period).
3.	One paper from a choice of two papers on linguistic studies, or three papers on key texts in the literary canon of the language, or a Special Subject in Modern Languages.
4.	Translation into the language.
5.	Translation from the language into English.
6.	Oral work in the language.
7.	Either the paper and the extended essay required of one of the thirty History Special Subjects, and one of the options listed below
	Or any three of the following four items:   i A Further Subject (chosen from thirty-four subjects) or a History thesis.   ii One of the seven papers on the History of the British Isles or a History thesis.   iii Any paper on linguistic studies, or on key texts in the literary cannon of the language, or Special Subject in Modern Languages, which has not previously been studied.   iv An extended essay in a Modern Language subject or another of the papers described in 3 above.
8.	A bridge essay, designed to draw together interests and develop skill from both sides of the course.

Further information can be found on the Oxford University Admissions Website.