It was founded as the Collegio Ecclesiastico at the Palazzo dei Convertendi in 1852 by Pope Pius IX and is intended for older men, often convert clergymen, wishing to prepare for the priesthood.
[1] Pope Leo XIII issued a new constitution in 1898 and placed the college under the patronage of Bede, the eighth-century Anglo-Saxon monk and scholar.
[2] It was decided by the Sacred Congregation of Studies (1917), that it should be completely separated from the Venerable English College, and that it should have a corporate life entirely of its own under a rector and staff of its own and in its own premises.
Pending the acquisition of a permanent home, temporary premises were rented in the Prati di Castello from the Polish Hospice.
[4] In 1956 Pope Pius XII provided from the extraterritorial property of the Holy See the land on which the present Beda stands, adjacent to the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls.