Seven years later, on 21 August 1814, a school of higher instruction for the whole Abruzzi area, with university level teaching in medicine, was inaugurated in L'Aquila by Joachim Murat, Napoleon's brother-in-law and king of Naples.

Immediately after the Restoration, by a decree on 14 January 1817, King Ferdinand settled that in L'Aquila, as in Bari, Salerno and Catanzaro, a Reale Liceo be opened, teaching law, anatomy and physiology, surgery and midwifery, chemistry and pharmaceutical studies as well as forensic medicine and various scientific subjects.

By a decree of 3 December 1874, the students of the L'Aquila Reale Liceo were recognised as qualified to practise pharmacy, surgery and land-surveying, but degrees were conferred by the University of Naples, upon which the Licei were dependent.

As a result of this decree, the number of students attending the school in L'Aquila, which in 1861 had become the Scuola Universitaria di Farmacia, Notariato e Chirurgia minore, dropped considerably.

The success enjoyed by these courses formed the foundation for a free University of L'Aquila, and, thanks to support from local bodies, on 15 December 1952 teaching was inaugurated at the Istituto Universitario di Magistero.

In the academic year 1982-83 the Faculties of Education, Medicine, Engineering and Sciences, which had until that time constituted the free University of L'Aquila (established by a decree of the President of the Republic of 18 August 1964), became state institutions.