BA History & Politics | Preliminary Examination - Course Handbook

2025-26

Welcome!

 

This handbook applies to students starting the Preliminary Examination in History and Politics in Michaelmas Term 2025.

Welcome to Oxford, and to the study of History and Politics here.

You have ahead of you three years of immersion into not only a vast range of past societies but also many different aspects of human activity. Yet such study is always conducted in dialogue with the present, with the world as it is and its problems and opportunities. You will therefore develop both technical skills which will equip you for any number of different careers, and a curiosity about the world in all its riches – past, present and future – which will be lifelong.

While much of your working life is governed by your colleges, the University through its History Faculty provides you with various additional resources, such as lectures, classes, libraries and language tuition; this is the body which designs the syllabus, and which formally examines you for the Preliminary Examination at the end of the first year (‘Prelims’), and for the Final Honour School (‘Finals’).

This booklet is the Faculty’s formal Handbook to guide you through the first year: it includes official regulations about courses and examinations; guidance to help you choose amongst the various options; advice on studying; and information on a range of other resources and matters which may become relevant in the course of your first year. You will of course also receive plenty of information and guidance from your colleges too, and ideally Faculty and colleges will complement each other.

You probably won’t want to read this Handbook all at once in detail, but do take an initial look through it so that you have a general sense of what it covers. The most important part to read now is the section on study (2 | Teaching and Learning). It would also be sensible to take note of the chapters about those facilities, such as libraries, which will be especially relevant to you.

Reading History at Oxford is a great opportunity, and we hope that you will make the most of it and will thoroughly enjoy doing so.

Professor Catherine Holmes and Professor Giuseppe Marcocci
(Directors of Undergraduate Studies, History)

Dr Paul Martin
(Director of Undergraduate Studies in Politics, DPIR)

The information in this handbook may be different for students starting in other years. This is version 1.0 of the Preliminary Examination in History and Politics Handbook, published online in October 2025.

If there is a conflict between information in this handbook and the Examination Regulations then you should follow the Examination Regulations.

If you have any concerns please contact the History Faculty Undergraduate Office: undergraduate.office@history.ox.ac.uk.

The information in this handbook is accurate as at date of publication, however it may be necessary for changes to be made in certain circumstances, as explained at http://www.ox.ac.uk/coursechanges and http://www.graduate.ox.ac.uk/coursechanges.

If such changes are made the department will publish a new version of this handbook together with a list of the changes. All students affected by the changes will be informed.

1| Course Content and Structure

The Preliminary Examination in History and Politics is a single nine-month course run by the Faculty of History. It does not count towards your final honours degree, but you are required to pass in order to progress into the Final Honour School.

The course consists of four papers. The formal Examination Regulations may be found in Appendix 1. The next sections briefly describe the four units, and full descriptions of each paper can be found on Canvas: https://canvas.ox.ac.uk/courses/22238  

The knowledge and skills you will acquire over the whole course are outlined in Section 2 | Teaching and Learning, which also focuses on the basic skills you need to develop in the first year.

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Choosing your Options

In making your choices of period or subject in the two History papers, you should be aware that:

  • for pedagogical or administrative reasons (such as the wish to teach first-year students within college), some Colleges may restrict the choice of their undergraduates in one or more of British Isles History, the Optional Subject, and Approaches/Historiography/ Foreign Texts.;
  • The range of European and World History papers offered in the first year for Prelims differs from that available in the second and third year, examined in Finals; similarly, at the modern end, the British Isles History papers offered in Finals differ from those offered at Prelims.

The regulations for History and Politics require that in the HPOL course as a whole each student must offer at least one paper in European & World History or the History of the British Isles covering a period before the nineteenth century. If you do not satisfy this provision in Prelims, you will have to do so in Finals.

The papers defined as covering a period before the nineteenth century is as follows:

Examination

Papers

Prelims

History of the British Isles 1 (300-1100) to 5 (1688-1848)

European and World History 1 (370-900), 2 (1000-1300), and 3 (1400-1600)

FHS

History of the British Isles 1 (300-1100) to 5 (1685-1830)

History of the British Isles Themes A and B

European & World History 1 (285-476) to 8 (1680-1848)

European & World History, Themes A, B and C

 

Students who have studied History of the British Isles 6 in either Prelims or in the Final Honours School and who also take Politics Paper 202 should avoid substantial duplication in their answers.

In order to ensure that there is adequate teaching provision, the majority of Optional Subjects have a pre-determined cap on the number of places available for students each year. As places for these subjects may be competitive, students will be asked to indicate four papers that they would be keen to study, in order of preference.

Where the number of prospective takes exceeds the number of spaces available, students will be allocated to one of their chosen subjects via a random ballot. The balloting process takes place in Hilary Term.

Students will be contacted by email in advance of the ballot, and should consider their options carefully. While it is likely that you will get your first- or second-choice subject, you should be prepared to study any of your four choices. It may be helpful to discuss your choices with your college tutors; please ensure that you leave enough time to do so.

If you wish to make a special case for being accepted on to a particular paper, please consult your college tutors in the first instance.

In the outline papers, you may draw upon material you have studied in your British or European and World Paper, as well as material from your Optional Subject and Paper IV option. However, you should be aware that the focus and scope of questions in the outline papers is broader than in the Optional Subject and Paper IV, so you should not focus too narrowly on material from other papers.

More broadly, you should not actually re-use the same information or arguments across multiple papers. 

See the Prelims Examination Conventions under 3 | Examinations and Assessment, for further details. 

Please be aware of these limits on your choices from the outset. It is your responsibility, and not your tutors' to ensure that your choices fall within the regulations. 

The programme aims to enable its students to:

  • acquire a knowledge and understanding of humanity in past societies and of historical processes, characterised by both range and depth, and increasing conceptual sophistication;
  • approach the past through the work of a wide variety of historians, using a range of intellectual tools; and thus appreciate how History as a subject itself has developed in different societies;
  • learn the technical skills of historical investigation and exposition, above all how primary evidence is employed in historical argument;
  • enhance a range of intellectual skills, such as independent critical thinking, forensic analysis, imagination and creativity;
  • perhaps learn or develop languages, or numerical tools;
  • analyse and argue persuasively in writing, and engage in interactive oral discussion to deepen understanding;
  • develop the ability to work independently, and to plan and organise time effectively.

Pick between a paper in either British Isles OR European & World History

History of the British Isles

Studied in one of six periods, this paper requires students to consider the history of the societies which have made up the British Isles over an extended period of time. It aims to encourage appreciation of the underlying continuities as well as the discontinuities within each period, and to explore the relation between political, gender, economic, social and cultural developments in determining the paths followed by the societies of Britain, severally and together.

Course information for each of the period options available can be found at: https://canvas.ox.ac.uk/courses/22234/pages/bip-paper-options?module_item_id=209518

Teaching:

16 lectures in Michaelmas Term; 7 tutorials, normally over one term, for each of which an essay is prepared.

Assessment:

A 3-hour written examination takes place at the end of the Trinity Term. This accounts for 25% of your overall mark. 

 

European & World History

Studied in one of four periods, this is a paper in non-British Isles History, which combines the study of an extended period with geographical range. It is approached more thematically than British Isles History, with an emphasis on the conceptual categories – of gender, economy, culture, state and religion – which enable us to understand both what past societies have had in common and where they have differed.

Course information for each of the period options available can be found at: https://canvas.ox.ac.uk/courses/22234/pages/ewp-paper-options?module_item_id=209521

Teaching:

16 lectures in Hilary Term; 7 tutorials or 7 college classes (or a mixture), normally in Hilary Term, with submitted essays or essay plans for discussion. 

Assessment:

A 3-hour written examination takes place at the end of the Trinity Term. This accounts for 25% of your overall mark. 

Pick between either Introduction to the Theory of Politics (section (a) of Introduction to the Theory and Practice of Politics) OR Optional Subject 1, Theories of the State

Introduction to the Theory of Politics (section (a) of Introduction to the Theory and Practice of Politics)

This paper aims to familiarise students with major theoretical approaches to and issues in understanding democracy, through the study of key texts by Locke, Rousseau, Tocqueville, Marx and Engels, and Mill. Questions for Section (a) An Introduction to the Theory of Politics will be set on the following topics:

  1. The nature and the grounds of rights
  2. The nature and grounds of democracy
  3. The role of civil society
  4. Power in the democratic state
  5. The nature and grounds of liberty
  6. State paternalism
  7. Free speech

 Questions will also be set on the following texts:

  1. John Locke, Second Treatise on Government;
  2. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Social Contract;
  3. Alexis de Toqueville, Democracy in America;
  4. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto;
  5. John Stuart Mill, On Liberty.

Course information can be found at https://canvas.ox.ac.uk/courses/71424

Teaching:

 16 lectures (8 in Michaelmas Term and 8 in Hilary Term), between 4 and 8 tutorials depending on your college.

Assessment:

 A 3-hour written examination takes place at the end of the Trinity Term. This accounts for 25% of your  overall mark.

 

Optional Subject 1: Theories of the State (Aristotle, Hobbes, Rousseau, Marx)

This paper introduces students to some of the major influences upon the development of western political thought, through the study of key texts by Aristotle, Hobbes, Rousseau and Marx.

Teaching:

 7 tutorials over one or two terms, with submitted essays or essay plans for discussion, or 7 classes.

Assessment:

 A 3-hour written examination takes place at the end of the Trinity Term. This accounts for 25% of your  overall mark.

 

Pick between either an Optional Subject OR a Documentary OR Methodological Paper in History.

Quantification in History

Acquiring and applying the numerical skills needed for certain types of historical investigation.

For course information on this paper see: https://canvas.ox.ac.uk/courses/22238/modules/items/294748

Optional Subject

The Optional Subject challenges you to examine a closely-defined period or theme in greater depth than the outline papers. This paper is based on the study of selected primary texts and documents, and provides the opportunity to engage with a range of more specialist approaches to understanding the past. 

The teaching of Optional Subjects is partly based on the usual essay-plus-tutorial format, but this is balanced by Faculty classes for eight-to-twelve students, in which you will develop your ability to work effectively in a group. All students will be encouraged to participate in the discussion which constitutes the main form of teaching in these classes, and students are also asked to set the agenda for the classes or to give presentations on the material. Most Optional Subjects focus the classes around the set texts and use the tutorials for study of the substantive topics; but patterns of teaching vary from subject to subject.

 

Ballot:

The ballot for Optional Subjects is held at the beginning of Hilary Term.

See 1.2.2 | Balloting for Optional Subjects for further details on the ballot process.

Teaching:

Faculty lectures or classes in first half of Trinity Term; 6 tutorials in Trinity Term, for which essays are normally prepared.

Assessment:

A 3-hour written examination takes place at the end of the Trinity Term. This accounts for 25% of your overall mark. You are required to answer three questions, to illustrate your answers as appropriate by reference to the prescribed texts.

 

Course information for each of the options available can be found at: https://canvas.ox.ac.uk/courses/22234/pages/optional-subject-paper- options?module_item_id=209524

 

Approaches to History / Historiography: Tacitus to Weber / Texts in a Foreign Language

One of:

 

  1. Approaches to History: Anthropology and History; Archaeology and History; Art and History; Economics and History; Gender and Women’s History; Sociology and History; Histories of Race; Environmental Histories.
  2. Historiography: Tacitus to Weber: Tacitus, Augustine, Machiavelli, Gibbon, Ranke, Macaulay, Weber
  3. Texts in a Foreign Language: Herodotus; Einhard & Asser; Tocqueville; Meinecke and Kehr; Machiavelli; Vicens Vives; Trotsky

Through this choice of papers students are encouraged to reflect on the variety of approaches used by modern historians, or on the ways in which history has been written in the past, to read historical classics written in a range of ancient and modern languages, or to acquire the numerical skills needed for certain types of historical investigation.

Teaching:

Faculty lectures or classes, normally in Michaelmas Term; 7 college classes or tutorials, held over one or two terms (normally Michaelmas and Hilary).

Assessment:

A 3-hour written examination takes place at the end of the Trinity Term. This accounts for 25% of the overall mark.

 

For further information about individual papers go to:

https://canvas.ox.ac.uk/courses/22234/pages/paper-iv-paper- options?module_item_id=209527

This paper introduces students to the study of how politics and government is practised in democratic, partially-democratic and non-democratic states. Candidates will be required to answer three questions.

Questions will be set on the following topics:

(i) regime types; definition and measurement of variations between types of democracy;

(ii) political institutions and practice outside the advanced industrial democracies; stability, state capacity and state formation;

(iii) the state and its institutions (executives, legislatures, parties and party systems, electoral systems, courts, constitutions and centre- periphery relations);

(iv) parties and party systems; political values and identity politics.

Please Note: First-year HPOL students must do a compulsory course in quantitative methods (Q Step 1) as part of their Politics teaching. Full information about the course is on Politics Canvas https://canvas.ox.ac.uk/courses/71424  (see All Politics Papers and then Q Step 1)

 

Teaching:

30 lectures (16 in Michaelmas Term and 14 in Hilary Term), Between 7 and 10 tutorials over one or two terms, depending on your college.

Assessment:

A 3-hour written examination takes place at the end of the Trinity Term. This accounts for 25% of the overall mark.

 

Course information can be found at: https://canvas.ox.ac.uk/courses/71424

After passing the Preliminary Examination you will proceed in the second and third years to the Final Honour School. The Final Honour School is a separate examination, and will be examined through seven papers, with options including:

  • History of the British Isles
  • European and World History
  • Comparative Government
  • Theory of Politics
  • International Relations
  • Further Subject
  • Special Subject (Gobbets and Extended Essay)
  • Thesis from Original Research

Please note that the Special Subject counts for two papers in Finals.

 

A separate handbook providing details of courses, examination methods and other matters related to the Final Honour School is available on the Oxford Historians Hub, and is updated annually. 

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Paper Term Dept/Faculty College Comments
Lectures Classes Tutorials Classes
1. History of the British Isles (1-6) MT 16   7   6 lectures and 7 tutorials for each of the six papers
HT        
TT        
1. European and World History (1-4) MT         16 lectures and 7 tutorials for each of the four papers
HT 16   7  
TT        

3. Optional Subject (1-21)

(or [2.] Theories of the State)

 MT         All Optional Subjects are taught in weeks 1-6 of Trinity Term, except for Augustan Rome, which is taught in Hilary Term. Faculty lectures or classes and six tutorials.
HT        
TT 6- 12 6  
3. Quantification in History MT   8 7   Eight two-hour classes plus seven tutorials in weeks 1-7 of Michaelmas Term.
HT        
TT        

Paper Term Dept/Faculty College Comments
Lectures Classes Tutorials Classes
2. Introduction to the Theory of Politics MT 8   4-8   Colleges to arrange revision classes.
HT 8    
TT      
4. Introduction to the Practice of Politics MT 16   7-10   Colleges to arrange revision classes.
HT 14    
TT      
4. Political Analysis MT         Teaching is mainly in weeks 1-6 of Trinity Term, except for Augustan Rome, which is taught in Hilary Term.
HT 8 4    
TT        

Note: ‘Introduction to the Practice of Politics’ is compulsory; ‘Political Analysis’ is a component of the Practice course and assessed by means of a submitted essay. ‘Introduction to the Theory of Politics’ can be taken instead of the History ‘Theories of the State’ paper. 

For full details of the examined elements of your course, including particular course requirements, progression requirements, combinations of course options, deadlines and submission modes, you should consult the Exam Regulations at the below link. It is your responsibility to read and adhere to the Examination Regulations.

Searching for Exam Regulations

When searching for the Exam Regulations relevant to your course, please use the following parameters:

Search Type: Undergraduate

Regulation Title: Preliminary Examination in History and Politics

Student Start Date: The term in which you matriculated

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Contacts

The main office contact for all undergraduate matters is: undergraduate.office@history.ox.ac.uk

History

Directors of Undergraduate Studies: Prof. Catherine Holmes and Prof. Giuseppe Marcocci

Undergraduate Officer: Dr. Callum Kelly

Undergraduate Assistant:  Mrs. Eesha Salman

Examinations Officer: Ms. Isabelle Moriceau

Academic Office Assistant: Mr. Rowan Ritchie

Admissions Officer: Ms. Liz Owen

 

Politics

Director of Undergraduate Studies: poldus@politics.ox.ac.uk

Undergraduate Studies Officer: ug.studies@politics.ox.ac.uk

Chair of the History and Politics Joint School: To Be Confirmed

Useful Links

History Faculty Website

DPIR Website

History Lecture List

Politics Lecture List

Canvas

History Faculty Library

Politics Library

Examination Regulations

Oxford Students Website

Student Self Service

Guidance for using Self Service