203. EDUCATION; THE UNIVERSITIES
COMMON SCHOOLS
Not less important than the Gothic cathedrals for the understanding of medieval civilization were the universities. They grew out of the monastic and cathedral schools where boys were trained to become monks or priests. Such schools had been created or restored by Charlemagne. [18] The teaching, which lay entirely in the hands of the clergy, was elementary in character. Pupils learned enough Latin grammar to read religious books, if not always to understand them, and enough music to follow the services of the Church. They also studied arithmetic by means of the awkward Roman notation, received a smattering of astronomy, and sometimes gained a little knowledge of such subjects as geography, law, and philosophy. Besides these monastic and cathedral schools, others were maintained by the guilds. Boys who had no regular schooling often received instruction from the parish priest of the village or town. Illiteracy was common enough in medieval times, but the mass of the people were by no means entirely uneducated.
RISE OF UNIVERSITIES
Between 1150 and 1500 A.D. at least eighty universities were established in western Europe. Some speedily became extinct, but there are still about fifty European institutions of learning which started in the Middle Ages. The earliest universities did not look to the state or to some princely benefactor for their foundation. They arose, as it were, spontaneously. In the eleventh and twelfth centuries Europe felt the thrill of a great intellectual revival. It was stimulated by intercourse with the highly cultivated Arabs in Spain, Sicily, and the East, and with the Greek scholars of Constantinople during the crusades. The desire for instruction became so general that the common schools could not satisfy it. Other schools were then opened in the cities and to them flocked eager learners from every quarter.
PETER ABELARD 1079-1142 A.D.
How easily a university might grow up about the personality of some eminent teacher is shown by the career of Abelard. The eldest son of a noble family in Brittany, Abelard would naturally have entered upon a military career, but he chose instead the life of a scholar and the contests of debate. When still a young man he came to Paris and attended the lectures given by a master of the cathedral school of Notre Dame. Before long he had overcome his instructor in discussion, thus establishing his own reputation. At the early age of twenty-two Abelard himself set up as a lecturer. Few teachers have ever attracted so large and so devoted a following. His lecture room under the shadow of the great cathedral was filled with a crowd of youths and men drawn from all countries.
UNIVERSITY OF PARIS
The fame of Abelard led to an increase of masters and students at Paris and so paved the way for the establishment of the university there, later in the twelfth century. Paris soon became such a center of learning, particularly in theology and philosophy, that a medieval writer referred to it as "the mill where the world's corn is ground, and the hearth where its bread is baked." The university of Paris, in the time of its greatest prosperity, had over five thousand students. It furnished the model for the English university of Oxford, as well as for the learned institutions of Scotland, Denmark, Sweden, and Germany.
UNIVERSITY OF BOLOGNA
The institutions of learning in southern Europe were modeled, more or less, upon the university of Bologna. At this Italian city, in the middle of the twelfth century, a celebrated teacher named Irnerius gathered about him thousands of pupils for the study of the Justinian code. [19] The university developed out of his law school. Bologna was the center from which the Roman system of jurisprudence made its way into France, Germany, and other Continental countries. From Bologna, also, came the monk Gratian, who drew up the accepted text-book of canon law, as followed in all Church courts. [20] What Roman law was to the Empire canon law was to the Papacy.
UNIVERSITY ORGANIZATION
The word "university" [21] meant at first simply a union or association. In the Middle Ages all artisans were organized in guilds, [22] and when masters and pupils associated themselves for teaching and study they naturally copied the guild form. This was the more necessary since the student body included so many foreigners, who found protection against annoyances only as members of a guild.
DEGREES
Like a craft guild a university consisted of masters (the professors), who had the right to teach, and students, both elementary and advanced, who corresponded to apprentices and journeymen. After several years of study a student who had passed part of his examination became a "bachelor of arts" and might teach certain elementary subjects to those beneath him. Upon the completion of the full course—usually six years in length—the bachelor took his final examinations and, if he passed them, received the coveted degree of "master of arts." But as is the case to-day, many who attended the universities never took a degree at all.
THE TEACHERS
A university of the Middle Ages did not need an expensive collection of libraries, laboratories, and museums. Its only necessary equipment consisted in lecture rooms for the professors. Not even benches or chairs were required. Students often sat on the straw-strewn floors. The high price of manuscripts compelled professors to give all instruction by lectures. This method of teaching has been retained in modern universities, since even the printed book is a poor substitute for a scholar's inspiring words.
THE STUDENTS
The universities being under the protection of the Church, it was natural that those who attended them should possess some of the privileges of clergymen. Students were not required to pay taxes or to serve in the army. They also enjoyed the right of trial in their own courts. This was an especially valuable privilege, for medieval students were constantly getting into trouble with the city authorities. The sober annals of many a university are relieved by tales of truly Homeric conflicts between Town and Gown. When the students were dissatisfied with their treatment in one place, it was always easy for them to go to another university. Sometimes masters and scholars made off in a body. Oxford appears to have owed its existence to a large migration of English students from Paris, Cambridge arose as the result of a migration from Oxford, and the German university of Leipzig sprang from that of Prague in Bohemia.
[Illustration: VIEW OF NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD New College, despite its name, is one of the oldest of the Oxford collegiate foundations. It was established in 1379 A.D. by William of Wykeham. The illustration shows the chapel, the cloisters consecrated in 1400 A.D., and the detached tower, a tall, massive structure on the line of the city wall.]
COLLEGES
The members of a university usually lived in a number of colleges. These seem to have been at first little more than lodging-houses, where poor students were cared for at the expense of some benefactor. In time, however, as the colleges increased in wealth, through the gifts made to them, they became centers of instruction under the direction of masters. At Oxford and Cambridge, where the collegiate system has been retained to the present time, each college has its separate buildings and enjoys the privilege of self-government.
FACULTIES
The studies in a medieval university were grouped under the four faculties of arts, theology, law, and medicine. The first-named faculty taught the "seven liberal arts," that is, grammar, rhetoric, logic, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music. They formed a legacy from old Roman education. Theology, law, and medicine then, as now, were professional studies, taken up after the completion of the Arts course. Owing to the constant movement of students from one university to another, each institution tended to specialize in one or more subjects. Thus, Paris came to be noted for theology, Montpellier, Padua, and Salerno for medicine, and Orléans, Bologna, and Salamanca for law.
[Illustration: TOWER OF MAGDALEN COLLEGE, OXFORD Magdalen (pronounced Maudlin) is perhaps the most beautiful college in Oxford. The bell tower stands on High Street, the principal thoroughfare of Oxford, and adjoins Magdalen Bridge, built across the Cherwell. Begun in 1492 A.D.; completed in 1505 A.D. From its summit a Latin hymn is sung every year on the morning of May Day. This graceful tower has been several times imitated in American collegiate structures.]