Since the topic of elementary education has been mentioned and as it is obvious that elementary instruction must of necessity have been arranged for, we may here consider briefly how this would be effected. We suggest that, as a general rule, there would be found some clerk or other in minor orders attached to every church who would be prepared to give this instruction. In course of time express provision for elementary instruction seems to have been made. Thus at Brecon, the A B C was taught to young children by the chaplain of the college[190]; at the collegiate church of Glasney the founder, Bishop Goode of Exeter, provided that the bellringer was to receive “40s. yerely as well for teachynge of pore mens children there A B C as for ryngynge the belles”[191]; at Launceston, a benefaction existed for the purpose of paying “an aged man chosen by the mayor to teche chylderne the A B C.”[192]
Writing.
Three distinct stages in the meaning to be attached to this term can be traced. Originally it was a specialist craft, as only the skilled man would be able to write out the charters which were required and to copy the manuscripts which were so highly esteemed. In Saxon days there were two distinct styles of writing in this country, the Canterbury style and the Lindisfarne style. The Roman mission introduced the Canterbury style of writing. The characteristics of this style were that the Roman uncials were adopted but with the addition of some local peculiarities. The Canterbury psalter,[193] which is now in the British Museum, is an example of the work of this mode. The Lindisfarne style had a greater influence upon our national handwriting, as, with certain modifications of its half-uncial characteristics, it was the recognised English style until a new fashion of writing was introduced from Gaul about the end of the tenth century.[194] The next stage in the evolution of writing is connected with its practical value as a means of communication and for business purposes. Now it is known as the “scrivener’s art.” We can trace the appointment of masters to teach writing for this purpose in this country from the fifteenth century. Thus, of the three masters appointed to the college of Acaster in 1483, one was to teach grammar, the second, song, “and the third to teche to Write and all suche thing as belonged to Scrivener craft.”[195] The third stage in the evolution of writing is reached when ability to write is considered to be one of the earliest of the school tasks to be undertaken, and when writing is considered indispensable for all intellectual progress. This stage was reached about the time of the Renaissance. We stop at this point because a further consideration would carry us outside the limit of our task.[196] Our only purpose has been to show that the establishment of a writing school in any place in the Middle Ages did not mean the establishment of an elementary school as the term is understood to-day. As a matter of fact, the first elementary schools, in the modern sense, cannot be traced further back in England than to the establishment of the charity schools of the seventeenth century. Preparatory schools, of course, are much older, but not elementary schools.
CHAPTER III.
ORGANISATION OF EDUCATION BY THE SECULAR CLERGY.
In a previous chapter we have pointed out the nature of the work of the monasteries in connection with the educational development of this country. Important as this work was, yet it did not influence the country as a whole to any appreciable extent, as each monastery concerned itself only with those matters which affected its own interests or the interests of the order to which it belonged. The secular clergy were more in touch with the ordinary life of the people, and it is through their work that we trace the beginnings of an organised system of education.
Though the Norman Conquest effected a distinction between Church and State, yet it did not involve any change in the existing ecclesiastical system, and as education at this period was inseparable from religion, neither was any radical change effected in educational development. The Norman contribution to religion was threefold: it brought the Church in this country into closer connection with the Church in the continental countries; it stimulated the activities of the Church; and it appointed to the chief administrative posts men who were foreigners but who were also, in many cases, men of ability and energy. The effect of this upon the educational development was, that there gradually emerged a definite and systematic educational organisation, and it is in this fact that we find the distinctive Norman contribution to educational progress.