(17a) Steinschneider: Virchow's Arch., Berl., 1867, xxxvii, 351.
The second was a more important source through the Latin translators in Spain, particularly in Toledo, where, from the middle of the twelfth till the middle of the thirteenth century, an extraordinary number of Arabic works in philosophy, mathematics and astronomy were translated. Among the translators, Gerard of Cremona is prominent, and has been called the "Father of Translators." He was one of the brightest intelligences of the Middle Ages, and did a work of the first importance to science, through the extraordinary variety of material he put in circulation. Translations, not only of the medical writers, but of an indiscriminate crowd of authors in philosophy and general literature, came from his pen. He furnished one of the first translations of the famous "Almagest" of Ptolemy, which opened the eyes of his contemporaries to the value of the Alexandrian astronomy.(18) Leclerc gives a list of seventy-one works from his hand.
(18) For an account of that remarkable work see German
translation by Manitius, Leipzig, 1912.
Many of the translators of the period were Jews, and many of the works were translated from Hebrew into Latin. For years Arabic had been the learned language of the Jews, and in a large measure it was through them that the Arabic knowledge and the translations passed into South and Central Europe.
The Arab writer whose influence on mediaeval thought was the most profound was Averroes, the great commentator on Aristotle.
THE RISE OF THE UNIVERSITIES
THE most striking intellectual phenomenon of the thirteenth century is the rise of the universities. The story of their foundation is fully stated in Rashdall's great work (Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages, Oxford, 1895). Monastic and collegiate schools, seats of learning like Salernum, student guilds as at Bologna, had tried to meet the educational needs of the age. The word "university" literally means an association, and was not at first restricted to learned bodies. The origin appears to have been in certain guilds of students formed for mutual protection associated at some place specially favorable for study—the attraction generally being a famous teacher. The University of Bologna grew up about guilds formed by students of law, and at Paris, early in the twelfth century, there were communities of teachers, chiefly in philosophy and theology. In this way arose two different types of mediaeval university. The universities of Northern Italy were largely controlled by students, who were grouped in different "nations." They arranged the lectures and had control of the appointment of teachers. On the other hand, in the universities founded on the Paris model the masters had control of the studies, though the students, also in nations, managed their own affairs.
Two universities have a special interest at this period in connection with the development of medical studies, Bologna and Montpellier. At the former the study of anatomy was revived. In the knowledge of the structure of the human body no advance had been made for more than a thousand years—since Galen's day. In the process of translation from Greek to Syriac, from Syriac to Arabic, from Arabic to Hebrew, and from Hebrew or Arabic to Latin, both the form and thought of the old Greek writers were not infrequently confused and often even perverted, and Galen's anatomy had suffered severely in the transmission. Our earliest knowledge of the teaching of medicine at Bologna is connected with a contemporary of Dante, Taddeo Alderotti, who combined Arabian erudition with the Greek spirit. He occupied a position of extraordinary prominence, was regarded as the first citizen of Bologna and a public benefactor exempt from the payment of taxes. That he should have acquired wealth is not surprising if his usual fees were at the rate at which he charged Pope Honorius IV, i.e., two hundred florins a day, besides a "gratification" of six thousand florins.
The man who most powerfully influenced the study of medicine in Bologna was Mundinus, the first modern student of anatomy. We have seen that at the school of Salernum it was decreed that the human body should be dissected at least once every five years, but it was with the greatest difficulty that permission was obtained for this purpose. It seems probable that under the strong influence of Taddeo there was an occasional dissection at Bologna, but it was not until Mundinus (professor from 1306 to 1326) took the chair that the study of anatomy became popular. The bodies were usually those of condemned criminals, but in the year 1319 there is a record of a legal procedure against four medical students for body-snatching—the first record, as far as I know, of this gruesome practice. In 1316, Mundinus issued his work on anatomy, which served as a text-book for more than two hundred years. He quotes from Galen the amusing reasons why a man should write a book: "Firstly, to satisfy his own friends; secondly, to exercise his best mental powers; and thirdly, to be saved from the oblivion incident to old age." Scores of manuscripts of his work must have existed, but they are now excessively rare in Italy. The book was first printed at Pavia in 1478, in a small folio without figures. It was very often reprinted in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The quaint illustration shows us the mediaeval method of teaching anatomy: the lecturer sitting on a chair reading from Galen, while a barber surgeon, or an "Ostensor," opens the cavities of the body.