1835, John Noble Johnson, edited by Robert James Graves, The life of Thomas Linacre, doctor in medicine, physician to King Henry VIII […] with memoirs of his contemporaries, and of the rise and progress of learning, more particularly of the schools from the ninth to the sixteenth century inclusive, London: Lumley, →OCLC, page 65:
These disputations gradually sank into mere formal exercises, and from the repeal of the statute, which inculcated this and similar forms in the schools at Oxford, may be dated the total overthrow of the scholastic learning of our fathers in that university, of which the Soph's exercises, still practised in the schools of Cambridge, seem to be reserved as a solitary example.
1859, C.R.C. '53, “The vow of the sophomore”, in Andrew Jackson Hetrick, editor, Songs of old Nassau, New York: M. W. Dodd, →OCLC, page 42:
Chorus.¶ The soph'more! The soph, soph, the soph, the soph'more!
1882 February 23, “Home hits and happenings”, in Ariel[1], volume 5, number 6, Minneapolis: Ariel Association of the University of Minnesota, page 91:
The Soph knows that he is wise. The Soph thinks that he is a bad Man, but be is not. He is only playful, and lov-ing, but not fun-ny. He likes to write a-bout the Jun-iors at Ex time. The Soph learns a great man-y things be-fore he gets to be a Jun-ior.
a.1884, Ebenezer Cobham Brewer, “Soph”, in Dictionary of phrase and fable : giving the derivation, source, or origin of common phrases, allusions and words that have a tale to tell, 20th revised and corrected edition, London [u.a.]: Cassell, published 1884?, →OCLC, page 839:
A student at Cambridge is a Freshman for the first term, a Junior Soph for the second year, and a Senior Soph for the third year. The word Soph is a contraction of "sophister," which is the Greek and Latin sophistës (a sophist). At one time these students had to maintain a given question in the schools by opposing the orthodox view of it.
1707, Thomas Blount, “Soph”, in Glossographia anglicana nova: or, a dictionary, […], London: D. Brown [et al.], →OCLC, unnumbered page:
Soph, a Sophiſter; which see.
a.1884, Ebenezer Cobham Brewer, “Soph”, in Dictionary of phrase and fable : giving the derivation, source, or origin of common phrases, allusions and words that have a tale to tell, 20th revised and corrected edition, London [u.a.]: Cassell, published 1884?, →OCLC, page 839:
The word Soph is a contraction of "sophister," which is the Greek and Latin sophistës (a sophist).