Drunken students still languish with their women by the Cherwell.

The pub brawling continues unabated in a rowdy city inn, while great men of the church are subjected to violence of the worst possible kind.

York might have its Vikings. But there is no doubting that Oxford University scholars certainly give Erik Bloodaxe and his Norseman pals a run for their money when it comes to having a lively past.

Visitors have been discovering Oxford - old and new - for ten years at the Oxford Story exhibition, on Broad Street, which is celebrating a successful first decade.

Some 1.7 million people have merrily rolled through 800 years of history in what is said to be the longest dark ride in Europe since it was opened by the Chancellor of Oxford University, Lord Jenkins of Hillhead. It can certainly claim to give a lesson like no other in Oxford.

The attraction was created by Heritage Projects, the company behind the Jorvik Viking Centre in York, one of Britain's greatest post-war tourism success stories.

With the Oxford Story attracting 170,000 visitors a year, it has never come close to rivalling Jorvik, where long queues of tourists appear every day of the year. But all the college heads who gathered for the Oxford Story's birthday party tonight THURSDAY JUNE 18 will still have good cause to celebrate the University's financial interest in the venture. For a start, the ride has gone a long way towards answering criticism that Oxford has never done enough to explain its history to the millions who visit arrive here every year trying to photograph "Oxford University.

Before the exhibition, those on the London to Stratford-upon-Avon coach run certainly had little chance to learn of Oxford's part in discovering everything from the student's party to penicillin.

With this ride, in just 25 minutes, you zip past dozen's of life-like models linked to such dramatic moments as the St Scholastica's Day Riot, the execution of the Oxford Martyrs and the English Civil War, without even having to pause for breath.

Centre's manager, Liz Feeney, who has been at the Oxford Centre since it opened, said: "We were among the first exhibitions of this type. Now you see them being opened all over the country. We carried out two years research before we opened and the University was closely involved in telling its own story." "

It was in fact originally the idea of Oxford engineering don, Dr Gerard McCrum, who saw the potential of partnership between the University and the creators of the Jorvik exhibition. Then there was the little matter of filling an old warehouse behind a bookshop in Broad Street with 500ft of electric track. The warehouse also offered the bonus of exposed one of Oxford's hidden treasures, a large medieval tower on the old city wall, which can only be viewed from the back of the building.

So what does the future hold for the history centre? Mrs Feeney hopes business will be boosted by the pedestrianisation of Broad Street, when the centre could spill onto the street to advertise itself more effectively. The centre is also involving itself in conference packages and linking up with special tours, like trips to commemorate the centenary of the death of Alice in Wonderland author, Charles Dodgson.

The University, like anyone involved in tourism in the city, must be hoping the Oxford Story is going to run and run.

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