[Transcriber's note: Obvious printer's errors have been corrected, all other inconsistencies are as in the original. Author's spelling has been maintained. ]

 The Cambridge Manuals of Science and Literature

 LIFE IN THE MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITY

 CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS London: FETTER LANE, E. C. 4 C. F. CLAY, Manager

[Illustration: Arms]

 New York: G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS Bombay, Calcutta, and Madras: MACMILLAN AND CO. , Ltd. Toronto: J. M. DENT & SONS, Ltd. Tokyo: THE MARUZEN-KABUSHIKI-KAISHA

 _All rights reserved_

[Illustration: The Student's Progress (From Gregor Reisch's _Margaritaphilosophica_, Edition of 1504, Strassburg)]

 LIFE IN THE MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITY

 BY

 ROBERT S. RAIT, M. A. FELLOW AND TUTOR OF NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD

 Cambridge: at the University Press 1918

 _First Edition, 1912_ _Reprinted 1918_

 _With the exception of the coat of arms at the foot, the design on the title page is a reproduction of one used by the earliest known Cambridge printer, John Siberch, 1521. _

NOTE ON THE FRONTISPIECE

In this picture the schoolboy is seen arriving with his satchel andbeing presented with a hornbook by Nicostrata, the Latin museCarmentis, who changed the Greek alphabet into the Latin. She admitshim by the key of _congruitas_ to the House of Wisdom ("Wisdom hathbuilded her house, she hath hewn out her seven pillars, " _Proverbs_ix. 1). In the lowest story he begins his course in Donatus under aBachelor of Arts armed with the birch; in the next he is promoted toPriscian. Then follow the other subjects of the _Trivium_ and the_Quadrivium_ each subject being represented by its chiefexponent--logic by Aristotle, arithmetic by Boethius, geometry byEuclid, etc. Ptolemy, the philosopher, who represents astronomy, isconfused with the kings of the same name. Pliny and Seneca representthe more advanced study of physical and of moral science respectively, and the edifice is crowned by Theology, the long and arduous coursefor which followed that of the Arts. Its representative in a medievaltreatise is naturally Peter Lombard. 

NOTE

I wish to express my obligations to many recent writers on Universityhistory, and to the editors of University Statutes and other records, from which my illustrations of medieval student life have beenderived. I owe special gratitude to Dr Hastings Rashdall, Fellow ofNew College and Canon of Hereford, my indebtedness to whose greatwork, _The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages_, is apparentthroughout the following pages. Dr Rashdall has been good enough toread my proof-sheets, and to make valuable criticisms and suggestions, and the Master of Emmanuel has rendered me a similar service. 

 R. S. R. _23rd January 1912. _

CONTENTS

Chapter I--INTRODUCTORY

Chaucer and the Medieval Student -- The Great Period ofUniversity-Founding -- The words "Universitas, " "Collegium, ""Studium Generale" -- Bologna -- Growth of Studia Generalia-- Paris, Oxford, Cambridge -- Definition of "Universitas". .. .. 1

Chapter II--LIFE IN THE STUDENT-UNIVERSITIES

Student-Guilds at Bologna -- "Nations" -- The College ofDoctors -- Relations with the City -- Position of an EnglishLaw Student at Bologna, and his relations to his Nation andhis Universitas -- The Office of Rector -- Powers of theUniversity over Citizens -- The Degradation of the BolognaMasters -- Examinations -- The Doctorate -- Regulations --Padua -- Limitations of the Rector's Powers at Florence --Spanish Universities -- Married Dons. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. . 13

Chapter III--THE UNIVERSITIES OF MASTERS

Early History of the University of Paris -- Faculties --"Nations" -- Struggle with the Chancellor -- Position of theRector -- Oxford --"Nations" -- The Proctors -- UniversityJurisdiction -- Germany -- Scotland. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 41

Chapter IV--COLLEGE DISCIPLINE

Origin of the College System -- Merton -- Imitations of the MertonRule -- New College -- Increase in Number of Regulations--Latin-Speaking -- Conversation in Hall -- Meals -- College Rooms --Amusements -- Penalties -- Introduction of Corporal Punishment --TheTonsure -- Attendance at Chapel -- Vacations -- Hospitality -- TheCareer of an English Student -- Meaning of "Poor and IndigentScholars" -- The College System at Paris -- Sconcing -- Other FrenchUniversities -- A Visitation of a Medieval College. .. .. .. .. .. . 49

Chapter V--UNIVERSITY DISCIPLINE

Growth of Disciplinary Regulations at Paris and Oxford --Records ofthe Chancellor's Court -- Discipline in Unendowed Halls -- AcademicDress restricted to Graduates -- Louvain -- Leipsic -- Leniency ofPunishments -- The Scottish Universities -- Table Manners at Aberdeen-- Life at Heidelberg. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 94

Chapter VI--THE "JOCUND ADVENT"

Admission of the Bajan at Paris -- The Universities ofSouthern France -- The Abbas Bejanorum -- The "JocundAdvent" in Germany -- the "Depositio" -- Oxford -- Scotland. . 109

Chapter VII--TOWN AND GOWN

Vienna -- St Scholastica's Day at Oxford -- Assaults byMembers of the University -- Records of the "Acta Rectorum"at Leipsic -- Parisian Scholars and the Monks of St Germain. . 124

Chapter VIII--SUBJECTS OF STUDY, LECTURES, EXAMINATIONS

Instruction given in Latin -- Preparation for the University--Grammar Masters -- French taught at Oxford -- The "Act" inGrammar --The Seven Liberal Arts and the Three Philosophies-- Text-books -- Ordinary and Cursory Lectures -- Methods ofLecturing -- Repetitions and Disputations -- University andCollege Teaching -- Examinations at Paris, Louvain, andOxford -- The Determining Feast -- Walter Paston at Oxford. .. 133

APPENDIX. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 157

BIBLIOGRAPHY. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 159

INDEX. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. . 163

LIFE IN THE MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITY (p.  001)

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTORY

 "A Clerk ther was of Oxenford also, That unto logik hadde longe y-go As lene was his hors as is a rake, And he was not right fat, I undertake; But loked holwe, and therto soberly, Ful thredbar was his overest courtepy, For he had geten him yet no benefyce, Ne was so worldly for to have offyce. For him was lever have at his beddes heed Twenty bokes, clad in blak or reed, Of Aristotle and his philosophye, Than robes riche, or fithele, or gay sautrye. But al be that he was a philosophre, Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre; But al that he might of his freendes hente, On bokes and on lerninge he it spente, And bisily gan for the soules preye Of hem that yaf him wherwith to scoleye, Of studie took he most cure and most hede, Noght o word spak he more than was nede, And that was seyd in forme and reverence And short and quik, and ful of hy sentence. Souninge in moral vertu was his speche. And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly teche. "

An account of life in the medieval University might well take the (p.  002)form of a commentary upon the classical description of a medievalEnglish student. His dress, the character of his studies and thenature of his materials, the hardships and the natural ambitions ofhis scholar's life, his obligations to founders and benefactors, suggest learned expositions which might

 in judicious hands Extend from here to Mesopotamy, and will serve for a modest attempt to picture the environment of oneof the Canterbury pilgrims. 

Chaucer's famous lines do more than afford opportunities ofexplanation and comment; they give us an indication of the placeassigned to universities and their students by English public opinionin the later Middle Ages. The monk of the "Prologue" is simply acountry gentleman. No accusation of immorality is brought against him, but he is a jovial huntsman who likes the sound of the bridle jinglingin the wind better than the call of the church bells, a lover of dogsand horses, of rich clothes and great feasts. The portrait of thefriar is still less sympathetic; he is a frequenter of taverns, adevourer of widows' houses, a man of gross, perhaps of evil, life. Themonk abandons his cloister and its rules, the friar despises the poorand the leper. The poet is making no socialistic attack upon the (p.  003)foundations of society, and no heretical onslaught upon the Church; hedraws a portrait of two types of the English regular clergy. Hisdescription of two types of the English secular clergy forms anilluminating contrast. The noble verses, in which he tells of thevirtues of the parish priest, certainly imply that the seculars alsohad their temptations and that they did not always resist them; butthe fact remains that Chaucer chose as the representative of theparochial clergy one who

 "wayted after no pompe and reverence, Ne maked him a spyced conscience, But Cristes lore, and his apostles twelve, He taughte, but first he folwed it himselve. "

The history of pious and charitable foundations is a vindication ofthe truth of the portraiture of the "Prologue. " The foundation of anew monastery and the endowment of the friars had alike ceased toattract the benevolent donor, who was turning his attention to theuniversities, where secular clergy were numerous. The clerks of Oxfordand Cambridge had succeeded to the place held by the monks, and, afterthem, by the friars, in the affection and the respect of the nation. 

Outside the kingdom of England the fourteenth century was also a greatperiod in the growth of universities and colleges, to which, all (p.  004)over Europe, privileges and endowments were granted by popes, emperors, kings, princes, bishops and municipalities. To attempt to indicate thevarious causes and conditions which, in different countries, led tothe growth, in numbers and in wealth, of institutions for the pursuitof learning would be to wander from our special topic; but we may takethe period from the middle of the fourteenth to the middle of thefifteenth century as that in which the medieval University made itsgreatest appeal to the imagination of the peoples of Europe. Itsinstitutional forms had become definite, its terminology fixed, andthe materials for a study of the life of the fourteenth centurystudent are abundant. The conditions of student life varied, ofcourse, with country and climate, and with the differences in theconstitutions of individual universities and in their relations toChurch and State. No single picture of the medieval student can bedrawn, but it will be convenient to choose the second half of thefourteenth century, or the first half of the fifteenth, as the centralpoint of our investigation. 

We have already used technical terms, "University, " "College, ""Student, " which require elucidation, and others will arise in thecourse of our inquiry. What is a University? At the present day aUniversity is, in England, a corporation whose power of granting (p.  005)certain degrees is recognised by the State; but nothing of this isimplied in the word "University. " Its literal meaning is simply anassociation. Recent writers on University history have pointed outthat _Universitas vestra_, in a letter addressed to a body of persons, means merely "the whole of you" and that the term was by no meansrestricted to learned bodies. It was frequently applied to municipalcorporations; Dr Rashdall, in his learned work, tells us that it isused by medieval writers in addressing "all faithful Christianpeople, " and he quotes an instance in which Pisan captives at Genoa inthe end of the thirteenth century formed themselves into a"Universitas carceratorum. " The word "College" affords us no furtherenlightenment. It, too, means literally a community or association, and, unlike the sister term University, it has never become restrictedto a scholastic association. The Senators of the "College of Justice"are the judges of the Supreme Court in Scotland. 

We must call in a third term to help us. In what we should describe asthe early days of European universities, there came into use a phrasesometimes written as _Studium Universale_ or _Studium Commune_, butmore usually _Studium Generale_. It was used in much the same sense inwhich we speak of a University to-day, and a short sketch of its (p.  006)history is necessary for the solution of our problem. 

The twelfth century produced in Europe a renewal of interest and arevival of learning, brought about partly by the influence of greatthinkers like St Anselm and Abelard, and partly by the discovery oflost works of Aristotle. The impulse thus given to study resulted inan increase in the numbers of students, and students were naturallyattracted to schools where masters and teachers possessed, or had leftbehind them, great names. At Bologna there was a great teacher of theCivil Law in the first quarter of the twelfth century, and a greatwriter on Canon Law lived there in the middle of the same century. ToBologna, therefore, there flocked students of law, though not of lawalone. In the schools of Paris there were great masters of philosophyand theology to whom students crowded from all parts of Europe. Manyof the foreign students at Paris were Englishmen, and when, at thetime of Becket's quarrel with Henry II. , the disputes between thesovereigns of England and France led to the recall of English studentsfrom the domain of their King's enemy, there grew up at Oxford a greatschool or Studium, which acquired something of the fame of Paris andBologna. A struggle between the clerks who studied at Oxford and thepeople of the town broke out at the time of John's defiance of the (p.  007)Papacy, when the King outlawed the clergy of England, and thisstruggle led to the rise of a school at Cambridge. In Italy theinstitutions of the Studium at Bologna were copied at Modena, atReggio, at Vicenza, at Arezzo, at Padua, and elsewhere, and in 1244 or1245 Pope Innocent IV. Founded a Studium of a different constitution, in dependence upon the Papal Court. In Spain great schools grew up atPalencia, Salamanca, and Valladolid; in France at Montpellier, Orleans, Angers, and Toulouse, and at Lyons and Reims. The impulsegiven by Bologna and Paris was thus leading to the foundation of newStudia or the development of old ones, for there were schools ofrepute at many of the places we have mentioned before the period withwhich we are now dealing (_c. _ 1170-1250). It was inevitable thatthere should be a rivalry among these numerous schools, a rivalrywhich was accentuated as small and insignificant Studia came to claimfor themselves equality of status with their older and greatercontemporaries. Thus, in the latter half of the thirteenth century, there arose a necessity for a definition and a restriction of the termStudium Generale. The desirability of a definition was enhanced by thepractice of granting to ecclesiastics dispensations from residence intheir benefices for purposes of study; to prevent abuses it wasessential that such permission should be limited to a number of (p.  008)recognised Studia Generalia. 

The difficulty of enforcing such a definition throughout almost thewhole of Europe might seem likely to be great, but in point of fact itwas inconsiderable. In the first half of the thirteenth century, theterm Studium Generale was assuming recognised significance; a schoolwhich aspired to the name must not be restricted to natives of aparticular town or country, it must have a number of masters, and itmust teach not only the Seven Liberal Arts (of which we shall have tospeak later), but also one or more of the higher studies of Theology, Law and Medicine (_cf. _ Rashdall, vol. I. P. 9). But the title mightstill be adopted at will by ambitious schools, and the intervention ofthe great potentates of Europe was required to provide a mechanism forthe differentiation of General from Particular Studia. Already, in thetwelfth century, an Emperor and a Pope had given special privileges tostudents at Bologna and other Lombard towns, and a King of France hadconferred privileges upon the scholars of Paris. In 1224 the StudiumGenerale of Naples was founded by the Emperor Frederick II. , and in1231 he gave a great privilege to the School of Medicine at Salerno, aStudium which was much more ancient than Bologna, but which existedsolely for the study of Medicine and exerted no influence upon the (p.  009)growth of the European universities. Pope Gregory IX. Founded theStudium at Toulouse some fifteen years before Innocent IV. Establishedthe Studium of the Roman Court. In 1254 Alfonso the Wise of Castilefounded the Studium Generale of Salamanca. Thus it became usual for aschool which claimed the status of a Studium Generale to possess theauthority of Pope or Emperor or King. 

A distinction gradually arose between a Studium Generale under theauthority of a Pope or an Emperor and one which was founded by a Kingor a City Republic, and which was known as a _Studium Generalerespectu regni_. The distinction was founded upon the power of theEmperor or the Pope to grant the _jus ubique docendi_. This privilege, which could be conferred by no lesser potentate, gave a master in oneStudium Generale the right of teaching in any other; it was morevaluable in theory than in practice, but it was held in such esteemthat in 1292 Bologna and Paris accepted the privilege from PopeNicholas IV. Some of the Studia which we have mentioned as existing inthe first half of the thirteenth century--Modena in Italy, and Lyonsand Reims in France--never obtained this privilege, and as theirorganisation and their importance did not justify their inclusionamong Studia Generalia, they never took rank among the universitiesof Europe. The status of Bologna and of Paris was, of course, (p.  010)universally recognised before and apart from the Bulls of NicholasIV. ; Padua did not accept a Papal grant until 1346 and then merely asa confirmation, not a creation, of its privileges as a StudiumGenerale; Oxford never received, though it twice asked for, adeclaratory or confirmatory Bull, and based its claim upon immemorialcustom and its own great position. Cambridge, which in the thirteenthcentury was a much less important seat of learning than Oxford, wasformally recognised as a Studium Generale by Pope John XXII. In 1318;but its claim to the title had long been admitted, at all eventswithin the realm of England. After 1318 Cambridge could grant the_licentia ubique docendi_, which Oxford did not formally confer, although Oxford men, as the graduates of a Studium Generale, certainlypossessed the privilege. 

Long before the definition of a Studium Generale as a schoolpossessing, by the gift of Pope or Emperor, the _jus ubique docendi_, was generally accepted throughout Europe, we find the occurrence ofthe more familiar term, "Universitas, " which we are now in a positionto understand. 

A Universitas was an association in the world of learning whichcorresponded to a Guild in the world of commerce, a union among menliving in a Studium and possessing some common interests to protectand advance. Originally, a Universitas could exist in a less (p.  011)important school than a Studium Generale, but with exceptionalinstances of this kind we are not concerned. By the time which we havechosen for the central point of our survey, the importance of theseguilds or Universitates had so greatly increased that the word"Universitas" was coming to be equivalent to "Studium Generale. " Inthe fifteenth century, Dr Rashdall tells us, the two terms weresynonymous. The Universitas Studii, the guild of the School, became, technically and officially, the Studium Generale itself, and StudiaGeneralia were distinguished by the kind of Universitates or guildswhich they possessed. It is usual to speak of Bologna and Paris as thetwo great archetypal universities, and this description does notdepend upon mere priority of date or upon the impetus given to thoughtand interest in Europe by their teachers or their methods. Bologna andParis were two Studia Generalia with two different and irreconcilabletypes of Universitas. The Universitates of the Studium of Bologna wereguilds of students; the Universitas of the Studium of Paris was aguild of masters. The great seats of learning in Medieval Europe wereeither universities of students or universities of masters, imitationsof Bologna or of Paris, or modifications of one or the other or ofboth. It would be impossible to draw up a list and divide medieval (p.  012)universities into compartments. Nothing is more difficult to classifythan the constitutions of living societies; a constitution which oneman might regard as a modification of the constitution of Bolognawould be in the opinion of another more correctly described as amodification of the constitution of Paris, and a development in theconstitution of a University might be held to have altered itsfundamental position and to transfer it from one class to another. 

Where students legislated for themselves, their rules were neithernumerous nor detailed. Our information about life in thestudent-universities is, therefore, comparatively small, and it iswith the universities of masters that we shall be chiefly concerned. It is, however, essential to understand the powers acquired by thestudent-guilds at Bologna, the institutions of which were reproducedby most of the Italian universities, by those of Spain and Portugal, and, much less accurately, by the smaller universities of France. 

CHAPTER II (p.  013)

LIFE IN THE STUDENT-UNIVERSITIES

The Universitates or guilds which were formed in the Studium Generaleof Bologna were associations of foreign students. The lack ofpolitical unity in the Italian peninsula was one of the circumstancesthat led to the peculiar and characteristic constitution evolved bythe Italian universities. A famous Studium in an Italian city statemust of necessity attract a large proportion of foreign students. These foreign students had neither civil nor political rights; theywere men "out of their own law, " for whom the government under whichthey lived made small and uncertain provision. Their strength lay intheir numbers, and in the effect which their presence produced uponthe prosperity and the reputation of the town. They early recognisedthe necessity of union if full use was to be made of the offensive anddefensive weapons they possessed. The men who came to study law atBologna were not schoolboys; some of them were beneficed ecclesiastics, others were lawyers, and most of them were possessed of adequate meansof living. The provisions of Roman Law favoured the creation of suchprotective guilds; the privileges and immunities of the clergy (p.  014)afforded an analogy for the claim of foreign students to possess lawsof their own; and the threat of the secession of a large community waslikely to render a city state amenable to argument. The growth ofguilds or communities held together by common interests andsafeguarded by solemn oaths is one of the features of European historyof the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and the students of Bolognatook no unusual or extra-ordinary step when they formed theirUniversitates. 

The distinction of students into "Nations, " which is still preservedin some of the Scottish universities, is derived from thisguild-forming movement at Bologna at the end of the twelfth and thebeginning of the thirteenth century. No citizen of Bologna waspermitted to be a member of a guild, the protection of which he didnot require. The tendency at first was towards the formation of anumber of Universitates, membership of which was decided byconsiderations of nationality. But the conditions which had led to theformation of these Universitates were also likely to produce somemeasure of unification, and the law-students at Bologna soon ceased tohave more than two great guilds, distinguished on geographicalprinciples as the Universitas Citramontanorum and the UniversitasUltramontanorum. Each was sub-divided into nations; the cis-Alpine (p.  015)University consisting of Lombards, Tuscans, and Romans, and thetrans-Alpine University of a varying number, including a Spanish, aGascon, a Provençal, a Norman, and an English nation. The threecis-Alpine nations were, of course, much more populous at Bologna thanthe dozen or more trans-Alpine nations, and they were thereforesub-divided into sections known as Consiliariae. The students of Artsand Medicine, who at first possessed no organisation of their own andwere under the control of the great law-guilds, succeeded in thefourteenth century in establishing a new Universitas within theStudium. The influence of Medicine predominated, for the Arts coursewas, at Bologna, regarded as merely a preparation for the study of Lawand, especially, of Medicine; but this third Universitas gave adefinite status and definite rights to the students of Arts. In thesame century the two jurist universities came to act together soconstantly that they were, for practical purposes, united, so that, bythe beginning of the fifteenth century, the Studium Generale ofBologna contained virtually two universities, one of Law, and theother of Arts and Medicine, governed by freely-elected rectors. Thepeculiar relations of Theology to the Studium and to the universitiesis a topic which belongs to constitutional history, and not to our (p.  016)special subject. 

The universities of Bologna had to maintain a struggle with two otherorganisations, the guilds of masters and the authorities of this citystate. They kept the first in subjection; they ultimately succumbed tothe second. A guild of masters, doctors, or professors had existed inthe Studium before the rise of the Universitates, and it survived withlimited, but clearly defined, powers. The words "Doctor, " "Professor, "and "Magister" or "Dominus" were at first used indifferently, and aMaster of Arts of a Scottish or a German University is still describedon his diploma as a Doctor of Philosophy. The term "Master" was littleused at Bologna, but it is convenient to employ "master" and "student"as the general terms for teacher and taught. The masters were theteachers of the Studium, and they protected their own interests byforming a guild the members of which, and they alone, had the right toteach. Graduation was originally admission into the guild of masters, and the chief privilege attached to it was the right to teach. Thisprivilege ultimately became merely a theoretical right at Bologna, where the teachers tended to become a close corporation of professors, like the Senatus of a Scottish University. 

The Guild or College of Masters who taught law in the Studium of (p.  017)Bologna naturally resented the rise of the universities of students. The doctors, they said, should elect the rectors, as they do at Paris. The scholars follow no trade, they are merely the pupils of those whodo practise a profession, and they have no right to choose rulers forthemselves any more than the apprentices of the skinners. The masterswere citizens of Bologna, and it might be expected that the Statewould assist them in their struggle with a body of foreignapprentices; but the threat of migration turned the scales in favourof the students. There were no buildings and no endowments to render amigration difficult, and migration did from time to time take place. The masters themselves were dependent upon fees for their livelihood;they were, at Bologna, frequently laymen with no benefice to fall backupon, and with wives and children to maintain. As time went on and theteaching masters became a limited number of professors, they weregiven salaries, at first by the student-universities themselves andafterwards by the city, which feared to offend the student-universities. They thus passed, to a large extent, under the control of theuniversities; how far, we shall see as our story progresses. The cityauthorities tried ineffectually to curb the universities and toprevent migrations, but the students, with the support of the Papacy, succeeded in maintaining the strength of their organisations, and (p.  018)when, in the middle of the fourteenth century, secessions from Bolognacame to an end, the students had obtained the recognition and most ofthe privileges they desired. In course of time the authority of theState increased at Bologna and elsewhere, bodies of ReformatoresStudii came to be appointed by republics or tyrants in Italianuniversity cities, and these boards gradually absorbed the governmentof the universities. The foundation of residential colleges, and theerection of buildings by the universities themselves, deprived thestudents of the possibility of reviving the long disused weapon of amigration, and when the power of the Papacy became supreme in Bologna, the freedom of its student-universities came to an end. This, however, belongs to a later age. We must now attempt to obtain some picture ofthe life of a medieval student at Bologna during the greatness of theUniversitates. 

We will choose an Englishman who arrives at Bologna early in thefifteenth century to study law. He finds himself at once a member ofthe English nation of the Trans-montane University; he pays his fee, takes the oath of obedience to the Rector, and his name is placed uponthe "matricula" or roll of members of the University. He does not lookabout for a lodging-house, like a modern student in a ScottishUniversity, but joins with some companions (_socii_) probably of (p.  019)his own nation, to take a house. If our new-comer had been a Spaniard, he might have been fortunate enough to find a place in the greatSpanish College which had been founded in the latter half of thefourteenth century; as it is, he and his friends settle down almost ascitizens of Bologna. The success of the universities in their attemptto form a citizenship outside the state had long ago resulted in thecreation also of a semi-citizenship within the state. The laws of thecity of Bologna allowed the students to be regarded as citizens solong as they were members of a University. Our young Englishman has, of course, no share in the government of the town, but he possessesall rights necessary for the protection of his person and property; hecan make a legal will and bring an action against a citizen. Theexistence of these privileges, unusual and remarkable in a medievalstate, may excite his curiosity about the method by which they wereacquired, and he will probably be told strange and terrible tales ofthe bad old times when a foreign student was as helpless as any otherforeigner in a strange town, and might be tortured by unfair andtyrannous judges. If he is historically minded, he will learn aboutthe rise of the smaller guilds which are now amalgamated in hisUniversitas; how, like other guilds, they were benefit societiescaring for the sick and the poor, burying the dead, and providing (p.  020)for common religious services and common feasts. He will be told (inlanguage unfamiliar at Oxford) how the proctors or representatives ofthe guild were sent to cheer up the sick and, if necessary, to relievetheir necessities, and to reconcile members who had quarrelled. Thecorporate payment for feasts included the cost of replacing brokenwindows, which (at all events among the German students at Bologna)seem to have been associated with occasions of rejoicing. The guildwould pay for the release of one of its members who was in prison, butit would also insist upon the payment of the debts, even of those whohad "gone down. " It was essential that the credit of the guild withthe citizens of Bologna should be maintained. 

Many of these purposes were still served by the "nation" to which ourBologna freshman belonged: but the really important organisation wasthat of his Universitas. One of his first duties might happen to beconnected with the election of a new Rector. The title of the officewas common in Italy and was the equivalent of the Podesta, or chiefmagistrate, of an Italian town. The choice of a new Rector wouldprobably be limited, for the honour was costly, and the share of thefines which the Rector received could not nearly meet his expenses. Ashis jurisdiction included clerks, it was necessary, by the Canon (p.  021)Law, that he should have the tonsure, and be, at all eventstechnically, a clerk. He could not belong to any religious order, hisobligations to which might conflict with his duty to the Universitas, and the expense of the office made it desirable that he should be abeneficed clergyman who was dispensed from residence in his benefice;he could enter upon his duties at the age of twenty-four, and he wasnot necessarily a priest or even a deacon. Our freshman played a smallpart in the election. As a member of the English nation, he would helpto choose a Consiliarius, who had a vote in the election, and whobecame one of the Rector's permanent Council. The dignity of theRector's position would be impressed upon our novice by his seniorcontemporaries, who could boast that, if a Cardinal came to Bologna, he must yield precedence to the Rector, and the lesson would beemphasised by a great feast on the occasion of the solemn installationand possibly by a tournament and a dance, certainly by some moremagnificent banquet than that given by a Rector of the University ofArts and Medicine. After our student's day there grew up a strangeceremony of tearing the robe of the new Rector and selling back thepieces to him, and statutes had to be passed prohibiting theacceptance of money for the fragments, although if any studentsucceeded in capturing the robe without injuring it, he might (p.  022)claim its redemption. The state and hospitality which the officeentailed led to its being made compulsory to accept the offer of it, but this arrangement failed to maintain the ancient prestige of theRectorship which, after the decline of the Universitates themselves, had outlived its usefulness. 

Magnificent as was the position of the Rector of a Universitas, ouryoung Englishman would soon discover that his Rector was only aconstitutional sovereign. He had to observe the statutes and toconsult his Council upon important questions. He had no power todispense with the penalties imposed by the regulations, and for anymismanagement of the pecuniary affairs of the Universitas he waspersonally liable, when at the end of his period of office he had tomeet a Committee and to render an account of his stewardship. He couldsentence offending students to money fines, but he must have theconsent of his Council before expelling them or declaring them subjectto the ecclesiastical and social penalties of the perjured man. Heclaimed to try cases brought by students against townsmen, and aboutthe time of our scholar's arrival, the town had admitted that he mighttry students accused of criminal offences forbidden by the Universitystatutes, and had agreed to carry out his sentences. Too free a use ofthe secular arm would naturally lead to unpopularity and trouble; (p.  023)the spectacle of a student being handed over to the gaolers of thePodesta or of the Bishop can never have been pleasant in the eyes of aUniversitas. Changes in the statutes of the University could not bemade by the Rector; every twenty years eight "Statutarii" wereappointed to revise the code, and alterations made at other timesrequired the consent of the Congregation, which consisted of allstudents except citizens of Bologna and a few poor scholars who didnot subscribe to the funds of the Universitas. By the time of which weare speaking, the two jurist-universities at Bologna met together inone Congregation, and if a Congregation happens to be held during ourEnglishman's residence at Bologna, he will find himself bound underserious penalties to attend its session, where he will mix on equal, terms with members of the Cismontane University, listening to, ortaking part in, the debates (conducted in Latin) and throwing hisblack or white bean into the ballot box when a vote is necessary. 

Although the city of Bologna never admitted the jurisdiction of aUniversitas over citizens of the town, there were some classes ofcitizens whose trade or profession made them virtually its subjects. Landlords, stationers, and masters or doctors were in a peculiarrelation to the universities, which did not fail to use theiradvantage to the uttermost. If our English student and his socii (p.  024)had any dispute about the rent of their house, there was a compulsorysystem of arbitration; if he found an error in a MS. Which he hadhired or purchased from a Bologna bookseller he was bound to report itto a University Board whose duty it was to inspect MSS. Offered forsale or hire, and the bookseller would be ordered to pay a fine; hewas protected from extortionate prices by a system which allowed thebookseller a fixed profit on a second-hand book. MSS. Were freelyreproduced by the booksellers' clerks, and were neither scarce norunduly expensive, although elaborately illuminated MSS. Were naturallyvery valuable. The landlords and the booksellers were kept in propersubmission by threats of _interdictio_ or _privatio_. A citizen whooffended the University was debarred from all intercourse withstudents, who were strictly forbidden to hire his house or his books;if a townsman brought a "calumnious accusation" against a student, anddisobeyed a rectorial command to desist, he and his children, to thethird generation, and all their goods, were to lie under an interdict, "_sine spe restitutionis_. "

_Interdictio_, or discommuning, was also the great weapon which mightbe employed against the masters of the Studium. The degradation of themasters was a gradual process, and it was never complete. Theprivileges given by Frederick Barbarossa to Lombard scholars in (p.  025)the middle of the twelfth century included a right of jurisdictionover their pupils, and a Papal Bull of the end of the century speaksof masters and scholars meeting together in congregations. Theorganisation of the Universitas ultimately confined membership ofcongregation to students, and the powers of the Rector rendered themagisterial jurisdiction merely nominal. The loss of their privilegesis attributed by Canon Rashdall to the attitude they adopted in theearly struggles between the municipality and the student-guilds. Thedoctors, who were citizens of Bologna, allied themselves, he says, "with the City against the students in the selfish effort to excludefrom the substantial privileges of the Doctorate all but their ownfellow-citizens. .. . It was through identifying themselves with theCity rather than with the scholars that the Doctors of Bologna sankinto their strange and undignified servitude to their own pupils. "They made a further mistake in quarrelling with the town--the earliestmigrations were migrations of professors--and when, in the middle ofthe thirteenth century, a permanent _modus vivendi_ was arrived atbetween the city and the universities, the rights of the doctorsreceived no consideration. Other citizens of Bologna were forbidden totake an oath of obedience to the rectors, but the masters, who, intheory, possessed rights of jurisdiction over their pupils, were, (p.  026)in fact, compelled by the universities to take this oath. Eventhose of them who received salaries from the town were not exempted. Adoctor who refused to take a vow of obedience to the representative ofhis pupils had no means of collecting his lecture-fees, which remainedof some importance even after the introduction of salaries, and he wasliable to further punishment at the will of the Rector. The ultimatepenalty was _deprivatio_, and when this sentence was pronounced, notonly were the lectures of the offending doctor boycotted, but allsocial intercourse with him was forbidden; students must avoid hiscompany in private as well as decline his ministrations in theStudium. His restoration could only be accomplished by a vote of thewhole University solemnly assembled in Congregation. 

The oath of obedience was not merely a constitutional weapon kept inreserve for occasional serious disputes; it affected the daily life ofthe Studium, and the masters were subject to numerous pettyindignities, which could not fail to impress our English student if hewas familiar with University life in his own country. He would see, with surprise, a doctor's lecture interrupted by the arrival of aUniversity Bedel, as the debates of the House of Commons are interruptedby the arrival of Black Rod, and his instructor would maintain a reverentsilence while the Rector's officer delivered some message from the (p.  027)University, or informed the professor of some new regulation. If thelearned doctor "cut" a lecture, our student would find himselfcompelled to inform the authorities of the University, and he wouldhear of fines inflicted upon the doctors for absence, for lateness, for attracting too small an audience, for omitting portions of asubject or avoiding the elucidation of its difficulties, and forinattention while the "precepta" or "mandata" of the Rector were beingread in the schools. He and his fellow-students might graciously granttheir master a holiday, but the permission had to be confirmed by theRector; if a lecture was prolonged a minute after the appointed time, the doctor found himself addressing empty benches. The humiliation ofthe master's position was increased by the fact that his pupils werealways acting as spies upon him, and they were themselves liable topenalties for conniving at any infringement of the regulations on hispart. At Bologna, even the privilege of teaching was, to a slightextent, shared by the doctors with their pupils. Lectures were dividedinto two classes, ordinary and extra-ordinary; the ordinary lectureswere the duty of the doctors, but senior students (bachelors) wereauthorised by the Rector to share with the doctors the duty of givingextra-ordinary lectures. There were six chairs, endowed by the (p.  028)city, which were held by students, and the occupant of one of thesewas entitled to deliver ordinary lectures. Dr Rashdall finds theexplanation of this anomaly in an incident in the fourteenth centuryhistory of Bologna, when the Tyrant of the City forbade the professorsto teach. The student-chairs were rather endowments for the Rectorshipor for poor scholars than serious rivals to the ordinary professorships, and the extra-ordinary lectures delivered by students or bachelors maybe regarded as a kind of apprenticeship for future doctors. 

There remained one department of the work of the Studium in which ourBologna student would find his masters supreme. The sacred right ofexamining still belonged to the teachers, even though the essentialpurpose of the examination was changed. The doctors of Bologna hadsucceeded in preserving the right to teach as a privilege of Bolognesecitizens and even of restricting it, to some extent, to certain families, and the foreign student could not hope to become a professor of hisown studium. But the prestige of the University rendered Bolognesestudents ambitious of the doctorate, and the doctorate had come tomean more than a mere licence to teach. This licence, which hadoriginally been conferred by the doctors themselves, required, afterthe issue of a Papal Bull in 1219, the consent of the Archdeacon (p.  029)of Bologna, and the Papal grant of the _jus ubique docendi_ in 1292increased at once the importance of the mastership and of theauthority of the Archdeacon, who came to be described as theChancellor and Head of the Studium. "Graduation, " in Dr Rashdall'swords, "ceased to imply the mere admission into a private Society ofteachers, and bestowed a definite legal status in the eyes of Churchand State alike. .. . The Universities passed from merely local intoecumenical organisations; the Doctorate became an order ofintellectual nobility with as distinct and definite a place in thehierarchical system of medieval Christendom as the Priesthood or theKnighthood. " The Archdeacon of Bologna, even when he was regarded asthe Chancellor, did not wrest from the college of doctors the right todecide who should be deemed worthy of a title which Cardinals werepleased to possess. The licence which he required before admitting astudent to the doctorate continued to be conferred by the Bolognadoctors after due examination. 

We will assume that our English student has now completed his courseof study. He has duly attended the prescribed lectures--not less thanthree a week. He has gone in the early mornings, when the bell at StPeter's Church was ringing for mass, to spend some two hours listeningto the "ordinary" lecture delivered by a doctor in his own house (p.  030)or in a hired room; his successors a generation or two later wouldfind buildings erected by the University for the purpose. The rest ofhis morning and an hour or two in the afternoon have also, if he is anindustrious student, been devoted to lectures, and he has not beenneglectful of private study. He has enjoyed the numerous holidaysafforded by the Feasts of the Church, and several vacations in thecourse of the year, including ten days at Christmas, a fortnight atEaster, and about six weeks in the autumn. After five years of study, if he is a civilian, and four if he is a canonist, the Rector hasraised him to the dignity of a Bachelor by permitting him to give"extra-ordinary" lectures--and after two more years spent in thiscapacity he is ready to proceed to the doctorate. The Rector, havingbeen satisfied by the English representative in his Council that the"doctorand" has performed the whole duty of the Bolognese student, gives him permission to enter for the first or Private Examination, and he again takes the oath of obedience to that dignitary. The doctorunder whom he has studied vouches for his competence, and presents himfirst to the Archdeacon and some days afterwards to the College ofDoctors, before whom he takes a solemn oath never to seek admittanceinto the Bolognese College of Doctors, or to teach, or attempt toperform any of the functions of a doctor, at Bologna. They then (p.  031)give him a passage for exposition and send him home. He is followed tohis house by his own doctor who hears his exposition in private, andbrings him back to the august presence of the College of Doctors andthe Archdeacon. Here he treats his thesis and is examined upon it bytwo or more doctors, who are ordered by the University statutes not totreat any victim of this rigorous and tremendous examination otherwisethan if he were their own son, and are threatened with grave penalties, including suspension for a year. The College then votes upon his case, each doctor saying openly and clearly, and without any qualification, "Approbo" or "Reprobo, " and if the decision is favourable he is now aLicentiate and has to face only the expensive but not otherwiseformidable ordeal of the second or Public Examination. As a newlyappointed Scottish judge is, to this day, admitted to his office bytrying cases, so the Bologna doctor was admitted to his new dignity byan exercise in lecturing. The idea is common to many medievalinstitutions, and it survived at Bologna, even though the licentiatehad, at his private examination, renounced the right of teaching. OurEnglishman and his socii go together to the Cathedral, where he statesa thesis and defends it against the attacks of other licentiates. Hisown doctor, known in Bologna (and elsewhere) as the Promoter, (p.  032)presents him to the Chancellor, who confers upon him the _jus ubiquedocendi_. He is then seated in a master's chair, and the Promotorgives him an open book and a gold ring and (in the terminology of amodern Scottish University) "caps" him with the biretta. He isdismissed with a benediction and the kiss of peace, and is conductedthrough the town, in triumphal procession, by his friends, to whom hegives a feast. 

The feast adds very considerably to the expenses of the doctorate, forwhich fees are, of course, exacted by the authorities of theUniversity, the College of Doctors, and the Archdeacon. A considerableproportion of the disciplinary regulations, made by thestudent-universities, aimed at restricting the expenditure on feastingat the inception of a new doctor and on other occasions. When ouryoung English Doctorand received the permission of his Rector toproceed to his degree, he was made to promise not to exceed the properexpenditure on fees and feasts, and he was expressly forbidden toorganise a tournament. The spending of money on extravagant costumewas also prohibited by the statutes of the University, which forbade astudent to purchase, either directly or through an agent, any costumeother than the ordinary black garment, or any outer covering otherthan the black cappa or gabard. Other disciplinary restrictions at (p.  033)Bologna dealt with quarrelling and gambling. The debates ofCongregation were not to be liable to interruption by one studentstabbing his opponent in Italian fashion, and no one was allowed tocarry arms to a meeting of Congregation; if a student had reason toapprehend personal violence from another, the Rector could give him adispensation from the necessity of attendance. Gaming and borrowingfrom unauthorised money-lenders were strictly forbidden; to enter agaming-house, or to keep one, or to watch a game of dice was strictlyforbidden. The University of Arts and Medicine granted a dispensationfor three days at Christmas, and a Rector might use his own discretionin the matter. The penalties were fines, and for contumacy or graveoffences, suspension or expulsion. 

There are indications that the conduct of the doctors in theserespects was not above suspicion; they were expressly prohibited fromkeeping gaming-houses; and the appointment of four merchants of thetown, who alone were empowered to lend money to students, was aprotection not only against ordinary usurers, but also against doctorswho lent money to students in order to attract them to their lectures. That the ignominious position of the Bologna doctors had an evileffect upon their morals, is evident not only from this, but also fromthe existence of bribery, in connection with examinations for the (p.  034)doctorate, although corruption of this kind was not confined to thestudent-universities. 

The regulations of the greatest of the residential colleges ofBologna, the College of Spain, naturally interfere much more withindividual liberty than do the statutes of the student-universities, even though the government of the College was a democracy, based uponthe democratic constitution of the University. We shall have anopportunity of referring to the discipline of the Spanish College whenwe deal with the College system in the northern universities, andmeanwhile we pass to some illustrations of life in student-universitieselsewhere than at Bologna. 

At Padua we find a "Schools-peace" like the special peace of thehighway or the market in medieval England; special penalties wereprescribed for attacks on scholars in the Schools, or going to orreturning from the Schools at the accustomed hours. The presence ofthe Rector also made a slight attack count as an "atrocious injury. "The University threatened to interdict, for ten years, the ten housesnearest to the place where a scholar was killed; if he was wounded theperiod was four or six years. At Florence, where the Faculty ofMedicine was very important, there is an interesting provision for thestudy of anatomy. An agreement was made with the town, by which (p.  035)the students of Medicine were to have two corpses every year, one maleand one female. The bodies were to be those of malefactors, whogained, to some extent, by the arrangement, for the woman's penaltywas to be changed from burning, and the man's from decapitation, tohanging. A pathetic clause provides that the criminals are not to benatives of Florence, but of captive race, with few friends orrelations. If the number of medical students increased, they were tohave two male bodies. At Florence, as almost everywhere, we findregulations against gambling, but an exception was made for theKalends of May and the days immediately before and after, and nopenalty could be inflicted for gambling in the house of the Rector. The records, of Florence afford an illustration of the checks upon therectorial power, to which we have referred in speaking of the typicalStudent-University at Bologna. In 1433, a series of complaints werebrought against a certain Hieronimus who had just completed his yearof office as Rector, and a Syndicate, consisting of a Doctor ofDecrees (who was also a scholar in civil law), a scholar in Canon Law, and a scholar in Medicine, was appointed to inquire into the conductof the late Rector and of his two Camerarii. The accusations wereboth general and personal, and the Syndics, after deciding that (p.  036)Hieronimus must restore eight silver _grossi_ of University moneywhich he had appropriated, proceeded to hear the charges brought byindividuals. A lecturer in the University complained that the Rectorhad unjustly and maliciously given a sentence against him and infavour of a Greek residing at Florence, and that he had unjustlydeclared him perjured; fifty gold florins were awarded as damages forthis and some other injuries. A doctor of Arts and Medicine obtained ajudgment for two florins for expenses incurred when the Rector was inhis house. A student complained that he had been denounced as"infamis" in all the Schools for not paying his matriculation-fee, andthat his name had been entered in the book called the "Speculum. " TheSyndics ordered the record of his punishment to be erased. The mostinteresting case is that of student of Civil Law, called AndreasRomuli de Lancisca. He averred that he had sold Hieronimus sixmeasures of grain, to be paid for at the customary price. After fourmonths' delay, the Rector paid seven pounds, and when asked tocomplete the payment, gave Andreas a book of medicine, "for which Igot five florins. " Some days later he demanded the return of the book, to which Andreas replied: "Date mihi residuum et libenter restituamlibrum. " To this request the Rector, "in superbiam elevatus, " answered, "Tu reddes librum et non solvam tibi. " The quarrel continued, and (p.  037)one morning, when Andreas was in the Schools at a lecture, Hieronimussent the servant of the Podesta, who seized him "ignominiose etvituperose" in the Schools and conducted him to the town prison like acommon thief. For all these injuries Andreas craved redress and a sumof forty florins. The damages, he thought, should be high, not merelyfor his personal wrongs, but also for the insult to the scholar'sdress which he wore, and, indeed, to the whole University. He wasallowed twenty pounds in addition to the sum due for the grain. TheSyndicate of 1433 must have been an extreme case; matters werecomplicated by the fact that the Rector's brother was "ExecutorOrdinamentorum Justitiæ Civitatis Florentiæ, " and he was thereforesuspected of playing into the hands of the city. But the knowledgethat such an investigation was possible must have restrained thearbitrary tendencies of a Rector. 

A reference to the imitation of the Bolognese constitution in Spainmust close this portion of our survey. At Lerida, in the earliest codeof statutes (about 1300), we find the doctors and master sworn to obeythe Rector, who can fine them, though he must not expel them withoutthe consent of the whole University. Any improper criticisms of the Rector("verba injuriosa vel contumeliosa") by anyone, of whatsoever (p.  038)dignity, are to be punished by suspension until satisfaction is made, and so great is the glory of the office ("Rectoris officium tanta[excellentia] præfulget") that an ex-Rector is not bound to take theoath to his successor. The regulations affecting undergraduates aremore detailed than at Bologna, and indicate a stricter discipline. After eight days' attendance at a doctor's lecture, a student must notforsake it to go to another doctor; no scholar is to go to the Schoolon horseback unless for some urgent cause; scholars are not to giveanything to actors or jesters or other "truffatores" (troubadours), nor to invite them to meals, except on the feasts of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost, or at the election of a Rector, or when doctorsor masters are created. Even on these occasions only food may begiven, although an ordinance of the second Rector allows doctors andmasters to give them money. No students, except boys under fourteen, are to be allowed to play at ball in the city on St Nicholas' day orSt Katherine's day, and none are to indulge in unbecoming amusements, or to walk about dressed up as Jews or Saracens--a rule which is alsofound in the statutes of the University of Perpignan. If scholars arefound bearing arms by day in the students' quarter of the town, theyare to forfeit their arms, and if they are found at night with eitherarms or musical instruments in the students' quarter, they are to (p.  039)forfeit arms or instruments. If they are found outside their ownquarters, by night or by day, with arms or musical instruments, thetown officials will deal with laymen, and the Bishop or the Rectorwith clerks. Laymen might be either students or doctors in Spain as inItaly; at Salamanca, a lecturer's marriage was included among thenecessary causes which excused a temporary absence from his duties. Inthe universities of Southern France, the marriage of resident doctorsand students was also contemplated, and the statutes of the Universityof Aix contain a table of charges payable as "charivari" by a rector, a doctor, a licentiate, a bachelor, a student, and a bedel. In eachcase the amount payable for marrying a widow was double the ordinaryfee. If the bridegroom declined to pay, the "dominus promotor, "accompanied by "dominis studentibus, " was, by permission of theRector, to go to his house armed with frying-pans, bassoons, andhorns, and to make a great tumult, without, however, doing any injuryto his neighbours. Continued recusancy was to be punished by placingfilth outside the culprit's door on feast-days. In the University ofDôle, there was a married Rector in 1485, but this was by a specialdispensation. There are traces of the existence of marriedundergraduates at Oxford in the fifteenth century, and, in the (p.  040)same century, marriage was permitted in the Faculty of Medicine atParis, but the insistence upon celibacy in the northern universitiesis one of the characteristic differences between them and theuniversities of Southern Europe. 

CHAPTER III (p.  041)

THE UNIVERSITIES OF MASTERS

The Guild or Universitas which grew up in the Studium Generale ofParis was a Society of masters, not of students. The Studium Generalewas, in origin, connected with the Cathedral Schools, and recognitionas a Master was granted by the Chancellor of the Cathedral, whose dutyit was to confer it upon every competent scholar who asked for it. Thesuccessful applicant was admitted by the existing masters into theirSociety, and this admission or inception was the origin of degrees inthe University of Paris. The date of the growth of an organised Guildis uncertain; Dr Rashdall, after a survey of the evidence, concludesthat "it is a fairly safe inference that the period 1150-1170--probablythe latter years of that period--saw the birth of the University ofParis. " Such organisation as existed in the twelfth century was slightand customary, depending, as the student-universities of Bologna andin other medieval guilds, upon no external authority. The successorsof these early masters, writing in the middle of the thirteenthcentury, relate how their predecessors, men reverend in character (p.  042)and famous for learning, decided, as the number of their pupilsincreased, that they could do their work better if they became aunited body, and that they therefore formed themselves into a Collegeor University, on which Church and State conferred many privileges. The bond of union they describe as a "jus speciale" ("si quodam essentjuris specialis vinculo sociati"), and this conception explains theappearance of their earliest code of statutes in the first decade ofthe thirteenth century. The Guild of masters, at Paris, like the Guildof students at Bologna, could use with advantage the threat of amigration, and, after a violent quarrel with the town in the year1200, they received special privileges from Philip Augustus. Someyears later, Pope Innocent III. Permitted the "scholars of Paris" toelect a procurator or proctor to represent their interests in law-suitsat Rome. Litigation at Rome was connected with disputes with theChancellor of the Cathedral. Already the scholars of Paris hadcomplained to the Pope about the tyranny of the Chancellor, andInnocent had supported their cause, remarking that when he himselfstudied at Paris he had never heard of scholars being treated in thisfashion. It moved and astonished the Pope not a little that theChancellor should attempt to exact an oath of obedience and paymentof money from the masters, and, in the end, that official was (p.  043)compelled to give up his claim to demand fees or oaths of fealty orobedience for a licence to teach, and to relax any oaths that hadalready been taken. The masters, as Dr Rashdall points out, alreadypossessed the weapon of boycotting, and ordering their students toboycott, a teacher upon whom the Chancellor conferred a licenceagainst the wish of their guild, but they could not at first compelhim to grant a licence to anyone whom they desired to admit. After thePapal intervention of 1212, the Chancellor was bound to licence acandidate recommended by the masters. 

In the account of their own history, from which we have alreadyquoted, the Parisian masters speak of their venerable "gignasiumlitterarum" as divided into four faculties, Theology, Law, Medicine, and Philosophy, and they compare the four streams of learning to thefour rivers of Paradise. The largest and most important was theFaculty of Arts, and the masters of that Faculty were the protagonistsin the struggle with the Chancellor, a struggle which continued longafter the intervention of Innocent III. In the course of this long andsuccessful conflict, the Faculty of Arts developed an internalorganisation, consisting of four nations, distinguished as the French, the Normans, the Picards, and the English. Each nation elected aproctor, and the four proctors or other representatives of the (p.  044)nations elected a Rector, who was the Head of the Faculty of Arts. The division into nations and the title of Rector may have been copiedfrom Bologna, but the organisation at Paris was essentially different. The Parisian nations were governed by masters, not by students, andwhereas, at Bologna, the artists were an insignificant minority, atParis, the Rector became, by the end of the thirteenth century, themost powerful official of the University, and, by the middle of thefourteenth, was recognised as its Head. The superior Faculties ofTheology, Canon Law, and Medicine, though they possessed independentconstitutions under their own Deans, consisted largely of men who hadtaken a Master's or a Bachelor's degree in Arts, and, from the middleof the thirteenth century, they took an oath to the Rector, which washeld to be binding even after they became doctors. The non-artistmembers of these Faculties were not likely to be able to resist anauthority whose existence was generally welcomed as the centre of theopposition to the Chancellor. Ultimately, the whole University passedunder the sway of the Rector, and the power of the Chancellor wasrestricted to granting the _jus ubique docendi_ as the representativeof the Pope. Even this was little more than a formality, for theChancellor "ceased, " says Dr Rashdall, "to have any real control overthe grant or refusal of Licences, except in so far as he retained (p.  045)the nomination of the Examiners in Arts. "

At Oxford, the University was also a Guild of masters, but Oxford wasnot a cathedral city, and there was no conflict with the Bishop or theChancellor. In the end of the twelfth or the beginning of thethirteenth century, the masters of the Studium probably elected aRector or Head in imitation of the Parisian Chancellor. After thequarrel with the citizens, which led to the migration to Cambridge, and when King John had submitted to the Pope, the masters were able toobtain an ordinance from the Papal legate determining the punishmentof the offenders, and providing against the recurrence of suchincidents. The legate ordered that if the citizens should seize theperson of a clerk, his surrender might be demanded by "the Bishop ofLincoln, or the Archdeacon of the place or his Official, or theChancellor, or whomsoever the Bishop of Lincoln shall depute to thisoffice. " The clause lays stress upon the authority of the Bishop ofLincoln, which must in no way be diminished by any action of thetownsmen. The ecclesiastical authority of the Bishop was welcomed bythe University as a protection against the town, and the Chancellorwas too far away from Lincoln to press the privileges of the Dioceseor the Cathedral against the clerks who were under his special (p.  046)care. The Oxford Chancellor was a master of the Studium, and, thoughhe was the representative of the Bishop, he was also the Head of themasters guild, and from very early times was elected by the masters. Thus he came to identify himself with the University, and his officeincreased in importance as privileges were conferred upon theUniversity by kings and popes. No Rectorship grew up as a rival to theChancellorship, though some of the functions of the Parisian Rectorwere performed at Oxford by the Proctors. There were only two "Nations"at Oxford, for the Oxford masters were, as a rule, Englishmen; menfrom north of the Trent formed the Northern Nation, and the rest ofEngland the Southern Nation. Scotsmen were classed as Northerners, andWelshmen and Irishmen as Southerners. The division into Nations wasshort-lived, and the two Rectors or Proctors, though stilldistinguished as Northern and Southern, soon became representativeselected by the whole Faculty of Arts. As at Paris, the Faculty of Artswas the moving spirit in the University, and Theology, Law, andMedicine never developed at Oxford any independent organisation. Theproctors, as Dr Rashdall has shown, thus became the Executive of theUniversity as a whole, and not merely of the Faculty of Arts. 

An essential difference between Bologna and its two great northern (p.  047)sisters lies in the fact that, at Paris and at Oxford, masters andscholars alike were all clerks, possessing the tonsure and wearing theclerical garb, though not necessarily even in minor orders. They couldthus claim the privileges of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and atOxford this jurisdiction was exercised by the Chancellor, who also, along with the proctors, was responsible for academic discipline andcould settle disputes between members of the University. In this, theUniversity of Oxford had a position of independence which Paris neverachieved, for though the Parisian Rector's court dealt with cases ofdiscipline and with internal disputes, criminal jurisdiction remainedthe prerogative of the Bishop. In the middle of the fourteenthcentury, royal grants of privileges to the University of Oxfordculminated in the subjection of the city, and from the middle of thefifteenth "the burghers lived in their own town almost as the helotsor subjects of a conquering people. " (_Cf. _ Rashdall, vol. Ii. Chap. 12, sec. 3). The constitution of Oxford was closely imitated atCambridge, where the Head of the University was also the Chancellor, and the executive consisted of two rectors or proctors. In thefifteenth century the University freed itself from the ecclesiasticaljurisdiction of the Bishop of Ely. 

Germany possessed no universities before the fourteenth century. (p.  048)Prague was founded in 1347-8, and was followed before 1400 by Vienna, Erfurt, Heidelberg, and Cologne, and in the first quarter of the nextcentury by Würzburg, Leipsic, Rostock, and in the Low Countries byLouvain. The first Scottish University dates from the early years ofthe fifteenth century. While the provincial universities of Francetended to follow Bologna rather than Paris as their model, the Germanuniversities approximated to the Parisian type, and although thefounders of the Scottish universities were impressed by some of theconditions of the student-universities, and provided for them atheoretical place in their constitutions, yet the three medievalScottish universities of Scotland, in their actual working, morenearly resembled the master type. 

CHAPTER IV (p.  049)

COLLEGE DISCIPLINE

We are now in a position to approach the main part of oursubject--life in a medieval University of masters--and we propose toproceed at once to its most characteristic feature, life in a medievalCollege. The system originated in Paris. In the early days of theUniversity, students at Paris lived freely in private houses, which anumber of "socii" hired for themselves. A record of a dispute whichoccurred in 1336 shows that it was usual for one member of such acommunity to be responsible for the rent, "tanquam principalis dictaedomus, " and the member who was held to be responsible in theparticular case is described as a "magister. " At first it was notnecessary that he should be a master, but this soon became usual, andultimately (though not till the close of the Middle Ages) it was madecompulsory by the University. Dr Rashdall has drawn attention to thedemocratic character of these Hospicia or Halls, the members of whichelected their own principal and made the regulations which heenforced. This democratic constitution is found at Oxford as well asat Paris, and was, indeed, common to all the early universities. (p.  050)When a benevolent donor endowed one of these halls, he invariably gaveit not only money, but regulations, and it was the existence of anendowment and of statutes imposed by an external authority thatdifferentiated the College from the Hall. The earliest Collegefounders did not necessarily erect any buildings for the scholars forwhose welfare they provided; a College is essentially a society, andnot a building. The quadrangular shape which is now associated withthe buildings of a College was probably suggested accidentally by thedevelopment of Walter de Merton's College at Oxford; but, long afterthe foundation of Merton College in 1263 or 1264, it was notconsidered necessary by a founder to build a home for his scholars, who secured a suitable lodging-house (or houses) and were prepared tomigrate should such a step become desirable in the interest of theUniversity. 

The statutes of Merton provide us with a picture of an endowed Hall atthe period when such endowments were beginning to change the characterof University life. The conception of a College, as distinguished fromthe older Halls, developed very rapidly, and the Founder's provisionsfor the organisation of his society were altered three times within tenyears. In 1264, Walter de Merton, sometime Chancellor of England, (p.  051)drew up a code of statutes for the foundation of a house, to be calledthe House of the Scholars of Merton. His motive was the good of HolyChurch and the safety of the souls of his benefactors and relations, and these objects were to be served by providing for the maintenanceof twenty poor scholars and two or three priests in the schools ofOxford, or elsewhere, if learning should, in these days of civil war, flourish elsewhere than at Oxford. The endowment which he provided wasto consist of his manors of Maldon and Farleigh, in Surrey, to whichwas added the Merton estate, at the end of what are now the "Backs" inCambridge. This was purchased in 1269-70. The lands were given to hisscholars, to be held under certain conditions, in their own name. Hisown kindred were to have the first claim upon places in the newSociety, and, after them, natives of the diocese of Winchester; theywere to have allowances of forty shillings each per annum, to livetogether in a Hall, and to wear uniform garb in token of unity andmutual love. As vacancies arose, by death, by admission into areligious order, by the acceptance of livings in the Church, or byappointments in other callings, they were to be filled up, and if thefunds of the society permitted, the numbers, both of scholars and ofpriests, were to be increased. Scholars who proved to be incorrigiblyidle, or who led evil lives, were to be deprived; but the sick and (p.  052)infirm were to be treated generously, and any of the Founder's kin whosuffered from an incurable malady, and were incapable of earning anhonest living in the Studium or elsewhere, were to be maintained tilltheir death. It was assumed that the scholars had already received thepreliminary training in Latin which was necessary for their studies, but provision was made for the elementary instruction of poor ororphan boys of the Founder's kin, until they were ready to enter theUniversity. Once or twice a year all the members of the foundationwere to meet and say mass for their Founder and his benefactors, living and dead. The management of the property was entrusted to aWarden, who was to reside not at Oxford or any other Studium where theHall might happen to be, but at Maldon or Farleigh. The Warden was amember of the Society, but had no authority over the scholars, exceptthat, in cases of disputed elections, he, or the Chancellor or Rectorof the University where the Hall happened to be at the time, was toact on the advice of six or seven of the senior scholars, and thesenior scholars, rather than the Warden, were looked upon by thefounder as the natural leaders of his Society. Every year, eight orten of the seniors were to go to Surrey to stay for eight days toinquire into the management of their property, and, if at any (p.  053)other time, evil rumours about the conduct of the Warden reached theHall, two or three of them were to go to investigate. The scholarscould, with the consent of the Patron, the Bishop of Winchester, bringabout the deposition of the Warden, and elections to the Wardenshipwere entrusted to the twelve seniors. They were to consult the"brothers" who assisted the Warden at Merton, and were also to obtainthe sanction of the Bishop of Winchester. 

These first Merton statutes clearly contemplate an endowed Hall, differing from other Halls only in the existence of the endowment. Some regulations are necessary in order that the tenure of theproperty of the Society may be secure and that its funds may not bemisapplied, and the brief code of statutes is directed to these ends. Walter de Merton's earliest rules make the minimum of change inexisting conditions. But the preparation of this code of statutes musthave suggested to the Founder that his generosity gave him the powerof making more elaborate provisions. The Mendicant Orders had alreadyestablished at Oxford and at Paris houses for their own members, andthe Monastic Orders in France were following the example of theFriars. These houses were, of course, governed by minute and detailedregulations, and it may have seemed desirable to introduce somestricter discipline into the secular halls. At all events, in (p.  054)1270, Walter de Merton took the opportunity of an increase in hisendowments to issue a code of statutes more than twice as long as thatof 1264. These new statutes mark a distinct advance in the Founder'sideal of College life. The Warden becomes a much more important factorin the conduct of the Hall as well as in the management of theproperty; in the election and in the expulsion of scholars he is givena greater place; his allowances are increased, and his presence atOxford seems to be implied. The scholars are to proceed from Arts toTheology; four or five of them may be permitted to study the CanonLaw, and the Warden may allow some of them to devote some time to theCivil Law. Two Sub-Wardens are to be appointed, one at Maldon and onein Oxford; Deans are to watch over the morals of the scholars, andsenior students are to preside over the studies of the freshmen. Thescholars are to be silent at meals and to listen to a reader; theremust be no noise in their chambers, and a senior is to be in authorityin each chamber, and to report breaches of regulations. Conversationis to be conducted in Latin. 

We have here the beginnings of a new system of University life, and wecan trace the tendency towards collegiate discipline still moreclearly in the Founder's statutes of 1274, which are much longer andmore elaborate than in 1270. The scholars or Fellows are now to (p.  055)obey the Warden, as their Superior; the Deans and the seniors inchambers are to bear rule under him and, in the first instance, toreport to him; the Sub-Warden is to take his place in his absence andto assist him at other times; three Bursars are to help him in themanagement, of the property. The Patron or Visitor, may inquire intothe conduct of the Warden or into any accusations brought against him, and has the power of depriving him of his office. The Warden is not anabsolute sovereign; the thirteen seniors are associated with him inthe government of the College, and the Sub-Warden and five seniors areto inspect his accounts once a year. At the periodical scrutinies, when the conduct of all the members of the College is to be examined, accusations can be brought against him and duly investigated. Thiscustom, and others of Walter de Merton's regulations, were clearlyborrowed from the rules of monastic houses, and a company of secularclerks seems to have had difficulty in realising that they were boundby them, for as early as 1284 the Archbishop of Canterbury, who hadbecome the Visitor of the College, had to issue a series of orders forthe observances of the statutes. The Warden and Fellows of Merton hadpermitted the study of medicine: they had interpreted too liberally thepermission to study law; they had increased their own allowances (p.  056)and the salaries of their brewer and their cook; the Fellows hadresisted the authority of the Warden; they had neglected theattendances at divine service enjoined by the Founder, and they hadbeen lax about expulsions. The change which Walter de Merton had madein a scholar's life was so far-reaching that a secular would probablynot have shared the astonishment of Archbishop Peckham (himself afriar) at the unwillingness of the Merton scholars to recognise theloss of their traditional freedom. 

The system inaugurated by Walter de Merton was destined to have agreat development. In the document of 1284, Peckham speaks of Mertonas a "College, " and its Founder was the founder of the Oxford Collegesystem. Although he repeated in his last statutes his permission tomove his Society from Oxford, he regarded Oxford as its permanenthome. Now that the civil war was over and England at peace, he had, hesays, purchased a place of habitation and a house at Oxford, "where aUniversity of students is flourishing. " Not only had he provided adwelling-place, he had also magnificently rebuilt a parish church toserve as a College-Chapel. The example he set was followed both atOxford and at Cambridge, and the rule of Merton became the model onwhich College founders based elaborate codes of statutes. Englishfounders generally followed Walter de Merton in making their (p.  057)societies self-governing communities, with an external Visitor as theultimate court of appeal. There were in many colleges "poor boys" whowere taught grammar, performed menial offices, and were not members, nor always eligible for election as members, of the Society; but as ageneral rule the Fellows or Socii all had a share in the management ofthe affairs of the House. Routine business was frequently managed bythe Head, the officers, and a limited number of the Senior Fellows, but the whole body of Fellows took part in the election of a new Head. A period of probation, varying from one year to three, was generallyprescribed before an entrant was admitted a "full and perpetual"Fellow, and during this period of probation he had no right of voting. This restriction was sometimes dispensed with in the case of"Founder's kin, " who became full Fellows at once, and the late SirEdward Wingfield used to boast that in his Freshman term (1850) he hadtwice voted in opposition to the Warden of New College in a Collegemeeting. As in a monastic house, this freedom was combined with astrict rule of obedience, and though the Head of a medieval Collegemight be irritated by incidents of this kind, he possessed greatdignity and high authority within his domain. As founders did more fortheir students, they expected a larger obedience from them, and (p.  058)attempted to secure it by minute regulations; and the authority of theHead of the College increased with the number of rules which he was toenforce. The foundation of New College at Oxford in 1379 marks thecompletion of the collegiate ideal which had advanced so rapidly underthe successive constitutions of Merton College a hundred years before. William of Wykeham, in providing for the needs of his scholars, availed himself of the experience of the past and created a new modelfor the future. The Fellows of New College were to be efficientlyequipped at Winchester for the studies of the University, and, as weshall see, they were to receive in College special instruction inaddition to the teaching of the University. Their magnificent homeincluded, besides their living-rooms, a noble chapel and hall, alibrary, a garden, and a beautiful cloister for religious processionsand for the burial of the dead. King Henry VI. Built a still moremagnificent house for his Cambridge scholars, and his example wasfollowed by Henry VIII. The later College-founders, as we have said, expected obedience in proportion to their munificence, and the simplerstatutes of earlier colleges were frequently revised and assimilatedto those of later foundations. We reserve for a later section what wehave to say about education, and deal here with habits and customs. 

The Merton rule that conversation must be in Latin is generally (p.  059)found in College statutes. At Peterhouse, French might occasionally bespoken, should just and reasonable cause arise, but English veryrarely. At New College, Latin was to be spoken even in the garden, though English might be used in addressing a layman. At Queen'sCollege, Oxford, which was founded by a courtier, French was allowedas a regular alternative for Latin, and at Jesus College, Oxford, conversation might be in Greek, Latin, or Hebrew. In spite of theinfluence of the Renaissance, it seems unlikely that either Greek orHebrew was much used as an alternative to Latin, but the Latin-speakingrule had become less rigid and in sixteenth-century statutes moregenerous provision is made for dispensations from it. The Latin rulewas not merely an educational method; it was deliberately intended tobe a check upon conversation. College founders accepted the apostolicmaxim that the tongue worketh great evil, and they were convinced thata golden rule of silence was a protection against both ribaldry andquarrels. In the later statutes of Clare, the legislator recognisesthat not merely loss of time, but the creation of a disposition to beinterested in trifles can be traced to "frequentes collocutiones, " andhe forbids any meetings in bedrooms (even meetings of Masters of Arts)for the purpose of feasting or of talking. If anyone wishes to (p.  060)receive a friend at dinner or supper, he must apply to the Master forleave, and such leave is to be very rarely given. Conversation in Hallwas prohibited by the rule of silence and by the provision of areader, which we have already found at Merton. The book read wasalmost invariably the Bible. William of Wykeham, who was followed inthis, as in other respects, by later College founders, forbade hisscholars to remain in Hall after dinner or supper, on the ground thatthey were likely to talk scandal and quarrel; but on great Feast days, when a fire was allowed in the Hall, they might sit round and indulgein canticles and in listening to poems and chronicles and "mundi hujusmirabilia. " The words, of the statute (which reappear in those oflater colleges) seem to imply that even on winter evenings a fireburned in the Hall only on Feast days, and the medieval student musthave suffered severely from cold. There were, as a rule, no fireplacesin private rooms until the sixteenth century, when we find referencesto them, _e. G. _ in the statutes of Corpus Christi College, Oxford; andthe wooden shutters which took the place of windows shut out thescanty light of a winter day. When a Disputation (_cf. _ p. 146) washeld in Hall at night, a fire was lit, but we are not told how, whenthere was no Disputation or Colleges meeting, the medieval studentspent the time between supper and the "nightcap" which accompanied (p.  061)Compline. Dinner was at ten in the morning and supper at six in theevening. Dr Caius, in the middle of the sixteenth century, ordered hisstudents to be in bed by eight o'clock in the evening, and "early tobed" must have been the custom on winter nights in a medieval College. "Early to rise" was the stern law, even in the dark mornings, for thestudent's day began at six o'clock, and he must often have listened tolectures which commenced in the dark, although dawn overtook thelecturer before he finished his long exposition. In early times therewas no provision for breakfast, and, though the existence of such ameal is distinctly contemplated in the statutes of Queen's College, Oxford, there is no hint of it in those of New College. Probably someinformal meal was usual everywhere, and was either paid for privatelyor winked at by the authorities. The absence of any general provisionfor breakfast led to its being taken in private rooms and not in Hall, and this is the humble origin of the College breakfast party. 

The number of occupants of a single room varied in different colleges. Special provision was made in later College statutes for the Head ofthe College; at New College he was given (for the first time) a separateestablishment and an allowance of plate and kitchen utensils; he (p.  062)was to dine in Hall only on some twenty great Feasts of the Church, and to sit at a separate table on these occasions. Henry VI. Followedthis precedent at King's, and elsewhere we find that the Head of aCollege is to have "principalem mansionem" with garden and stablingfor the horses, without which it was not becoming that he shouldtravel on College business. It was generally the duty of the Head toapportion the rooms among other members of the College, and to seethat the juniors were under proper supervision. At Peterhouse, and inmany other colleges, there were to be two in each chamber. WhenWilliam of Wykeham built on a large scale, he ordered that thereshould be four occupants in the ground-floor rooms and three in thefirst-floor rooms. At King's, the numbers were three in ground-floorrooms and two in first-floor rooms. At Magdalen, the numbers were thesame as at New College, but two of the beds in the upper rooms and onein the lower were to be "lectuli rotales, _Trookyll beddys_ vulgariterappellati. " Separate beds were usually provided, though sometimes boysunder fourteen or fifteen years of age were denied this luxury. Thebedrooms were also studies; at Oxford there was no general sitting-room, except in monastic colleges, though Cambridge College statutes speakof a "parlura, " corresponding to the modern parlour or combinationroom. Each of the occupants of a room in New College was the (p.  063)proprietor of a small window, at which he worked, probably at some"study" or desk like the old Winchester "toys. " The rooms had fourwindows and four "studiorum loca, " and the general type of a Collegechamber, after the foundation of New College, was a room with onelarge window, and two, three, or four small windows for "studies. "

A large proportion of the care of statute-makers was devoted to theprohibition of amusements. The statutes of Peterhouse forbade dogs orfalcons, "for if one can have them in the House, all will want them, and so there will arise a constant howling" to disturb the studious. Dice and chess, being forbidden games to clerks, were also prohibited, and the scholars of Peterhouse were forbidden to frequent taverns, toengage in trade, to mix with actors, or to attend theatricalperformances. These enactments are repeated in later College statutes, with such additions as the legislator's knowledge of human naturedictated and with occasional explanations of some interest inthemselves. The keeping of dogs is often described as "taking thechildren's bread and giving it to dogs, " and the Founder of Queen'sCollege, Oxford, ordered that no animals were to be kept under theFellows' rooms, since purity of air is essential for study. Williamof Wykeham expressly forbade chess, which he classed with games (p.  064)leading to the loss of money or estate, but King Henry VI. , who madelarge use of the statutes of New College, omitted the mention of chessfrom his King's College statutes, while he added to Wykeham'sdenunciation of ferrets and hawks, an _index expurgatorius_ of animalswhich included monkeys, bears, wolves, and stage, and he expresslyforbade nets for hunting or fishing. The principle on which modernDeans of colleges have sometimes decided that "gramophones are dogs"and therefore to be excluded from College, can be traced in numerousregulations against musical instruments, which disturb the peaceessential to learning. That the medieval student felt the temptationsof "ragging" in much the same way as his modern successors, appearsfrom many threats directed against those who throw stones and othermissiles to the danger of the buildings. Wykeham thought it necessaryto forbid the throwing of stones in Chapel, to the danger of thewindows and reredos, and for the safety of the reredos he prohibiteddancing or jumping in the Hall, which is contiguous to the Chapel. Games in the Hall were also forbidden for the comfort of the chaplainswho lived in the rooms underneath. King Henry VI. Forbade dancing orjumping, or other dangerous and improper games in the Chapel, cloister, stalls, and Hall of King's College. 

Other disciplinary regulations common to all colleges deal with (p.  065)carrying arms, unpunctuality, talking during the reading in Hall ordisturbing the Chapel services, bringing strangers into College, sleeping out of College, absence without leave, negligence andidleness, scurrilous or offensive language, spilling water in upperrooms to the detriment of the inhabitants of the lower rooms, andfailure to attend the regular "scrutinies" or the stated generalmeetings for College business. At these scrutinies, any seriouscharges against members of the Society were considered, and it is inkeeping with some of the judicial ideas of the time that some statutesforbid the accused person to have a copy of the indictment againsthim. For contumacy, for grave moral offences, for crimes of violence, and for heresy, the penalty was expulsion. Less serious offences werepunished by subtraction of "commons, " _i. E. _ deprivation of allowancesfor a day or a week (or longer), or by pecuniary fines. When Collegefounders provided clothes as well as board and lodging for theirscholars, the forfeiture of a robe took its place among the penaltieswith which offenders were threatened. The "poor boys" who sang inChapel and waited on the Fellows were whipped like boys elsewhere, whowere being taught grammar, but the birch was unknown as a punishmentfor undergraduates till late in the middle ages. The introduction (p.  066)of corporal punishment into college life in England may be traced by acomparison of William of Wykeham's statutes with those of Henry VI. The King's College statute "De correctionibus faciendis circa delictaleviora" is largely a transcript of a New College statute, with thesame title, and both contemplate subtraction of commons as the regularpenalty. But the King's College statute contains an additional clause, to the effect that scholars and younger Fellows may be punished withstripes. In the statutes of Magdalen, dated some seventeen yearslater, William of Waynflete returned to the New College form of thestatute, but he provided that his demys (_i. E. _ scholars who receivedhalf the commons of a Fellow) should be subject to the penalty ofwhipping in the Grammar School. The statutes of Christ's Collegeprescribe a fine of a farthing for unpunctuality on the part of thescholars, studying in the Faculty of Arts, and heavier fines forabsence, and it is added that if the offender be not an adult, awhipping is to be substituted for the pecuniary penalty. At Brasenose, where the Fellows were all of the standing of at least a Bachelor ofArts, the undergraduate scholars were subjected to an unusually strictdiscipline, and offenders were to be punished either by fines or bythe rod, the Principal deciding the appropriate punishment in eachcase. For unpunctuality, for negligence and idleness, for playing, (p.  067)laughing, talking, making a noise or speaking English in, alecture-room, for insulting fellow-students, or for disobedience tohis pastors and masters, the Brasenose undergraduate was to bepromptly flogged. Among the crimes for which the birch is ordered wefind "making odious comparisons, " a phrase which throws some light onthe conversational subjects of sixteenth-century undergraduates. Thekind of comparison is indicated in the statute; remarks about thecountry, the family, the manners, the studies, and the ability, or theperson, of a fellow-student must be avoided. Similarly, at JesusCollege, Cambridge, it is forbidden to compare country to country, race to race, or science to science, and William of Wykeham and otherfounders had to make similar injunctions. The medieval student wasdistinctly quarrelsome, and such records as the famous Merton"scrutiny" of 1339, and investigations by College Visitors, show thatthe seniors set the undergraduates a bad example. The statutes ofCorpus Christi College, Oxford, provide for two new penalties. Anoffending undergraduate might be sentenced to feed by himself, at asmall table in the middle of the Hall, and in aggravated cases to themonastic penalty of bread and water. An alternative penalty wasdetention in the library at the most inconvenient time ("per horam (p.  068)vel horas cum minime vellet"), and the performance of an imposition tobe shown up in due course. The rough and ready penalty of the birchis, however, frequently mentioned in the statutes of Corpus and ofother sixteenth-century Colleges. Cardinal Wolsey thought it properthat an undergraduate should be whipped until he had completed histwentieth year. At Trinity, Cambridge (where offenders were sociablyflogged before the assembled College on Friday evenings) the age waseighteen. Dr Caius restricted the rod to scholars who were not adult. "We call those adults, " he says, "who have completed their eighteenthyear. For before that age, both in ancient times and in our own memory, youth was not accustomed to wear _brâccas_, being content with_tibialia_ reaching to the knees. " The stern disciplinarian might findan excuse for prolonging the whipping age in the Founder's wish that, "years alone should not make an adult, but along with years, gravityof deportment and good character. " As late as the foundation ofPembroke College at Oxford (1624) whipping is the penalty contemplatedfor undergraduates under eighteen. But when we come to the statuteswhich were drawn up in 1698 with a view to the foundation of WorcesterCollege, not only is there no mention of the birch, but even pecuniarypenalties are deprecated for minor offences, for which impositions (p.  069)and gating are suggested. 

Minor penalties were enforced by the Head of a college, the Vice-Head, the Deans, and, in sixteenth-century colleges, by the tutors. By latercollege statutes, these officers received for their personal use aportion of the fines they inflicted, and appeals were sometimespermitted from an officer to the Head, and even to the Chancellor orVice-Chancellor of the University. The oath taken by scholarsfrequently bound them to reveal to the authorities, any breach of thestatutes, and there are indications that members of the College wereencouraged to report each other's misdeeds. Thus the Master ofChrist's is to fine anyone whom he hears speaking one completesentence in English, or anyone whom he may know to have been guilty ofthis offence, except in sleeping-rooms or at times when permission hadbeen given. 

Oxford and Cambridge Colleges were, as we have seen, endowed homes forthe education of secular clerks. All of them, on entrance, had to havethe tonsure, and provision was often made for the cutting of theirhair and beard. At Christ's College, there was a regular Collegebarber "qui . .. Caput et barbam radet ac tondebit hebdomadis singulis. "They wore ordinary clerical dress, and undue expenditure on clothesand ornaments was strictly prohibited, _e. G. _ the Fellows of (p.  070)Peterhouse were forbidden to wear rings on their fingers "ad inanemgloriam et jactantiam. " The early founders did not insist upon HolyOrders for the Heads or Fellows of their colleges, though many of themwould naturally proceed to the priesthood, but in later collegestatutes all the Fellows were ultimately to proceed, at stated times, to Holy Orders and to the priesthood, though dispensations for delaymight be granted, and students of Medicine were sometimes excused fromthe priesthood. When they became priests they were, like otherpriests, to celebrate mass regularly in the Chapel, but were not toreceive payment for celebrations outside the College. As mere tonsuredundergraduates, they were not, at first, subject to regulations fordaily attendance at divine service; but later founders were stricterin this, as in other matters. Bishop Bateman, who, in the middle ofthe fourteenth century, legislated for the infant Gonville College, ordered that every Fellow should hear one mass daily and say certainprayers, and in his own foundation of Trinity Hall, he repeated theinjunction. The prescribed prayers included petitions for the Founder, or for the repose of his soul; every Fellow of Trinity Hall was tosay, immediately upon rising in the morning and before going to bed atnight, the prayer "Rege quaesumus Domine, " during the Bishop's lifetime, and after his death, "Deus qui inter Apostolicos Sacerdotes, " and (p.  071)to say the psalm "De profundis clamavi" and a "Kurie eleeson" for therepose of the soul of the Founder's father and mother, his predecessorsin the see of Norwich, and after his death for his own soul. The tenpriests, who served the Chapel at New College, said masses for theFounder and his benefactors, but every Fellow was to attend mass everyday and to say prayers in his own room, morning and evening, including"Rege, quaesumus, Domine, Willielmum Pontificem Fundatorem nostrum"or, after his death, "Deus qui inter Apostolicos sacredotes famulumtuum Fundatorem nostrum pontificali dignitate"; and every day, bothafter High Mass in Chapel, and after dinner and supper in Hall, thepsalm "De profundis" was said. Penalties were prescribed fornegligence, and as time went on, a whipping was inflicted for absencefrom Chapel, _e. G. _ at Christ's College, and at Balliol, for which newstatutes were drawn up in 1507. 

Residence in College was continuous throughout the year, even duringthe University vacation, which lasted from early in July to thebeginning of October. Leave of absence might be granted at any time inthe year, on reasonable grounds, but was to be given generally invacations. General rules were laid down for behaviour in keeping withthe clerical profession during absence, and students on leave were (p.  072)forbidden to frequent taverns or otherwise transgress the rules whichwere binding upon them in the University. Occasionally we find somerelaxation in these strict regulations, as when the Founder of CorpusChristi at Oxford allows "moderate hunting or hawking" when one of hisscholars is on holiday away from Oxford. The same indulgent Founder, after the usual prohibition of games in College, allows a game of ballin the garden for the sake of healthy exercise. ("Non prohibemus tamenlusum pilae ad murum, tabulata, aut tegulas, in horto, causa solummodo exercendi corporis et sanitatis. ") Associations with home lifewere maintained by vacation visits, but the influx of "people" to theUniversity was, of course, unknown. The ancient statutes of Peterhousepermit a woman (even if she be not a relation) to talk with a Fellowin the Hall, preferably in the presence of another Fellow, or atleast, a servant; but the legislator had grave fears of the results ofsuch "confabulationes, " and the precedent he set was not followed. AFellow or scholar is frequently permitted by College statutes toentertain his father, brother, nephew, or a friend, obtaining firstthe consent of the Head of the College, and paying privately for theentertainment, but no such guest might sleep in College, and thepermission is carefully restricted to the male sex. Women were, as (p.  073)a rule, not allowed within a College gate; if it was impossible tofind a man to wash clothes, a laundress might be employed, but shemust be old and of unprepossessing appearance. A scholar or Fellow ofa college had not, however, committed himself irrevocably to acelibate life, for marriage is included among the "causas rationabileset honestas" which vacated a fellowship. It was possible, thoughprobably infrequent, for a Fellow who had not proceeded to Holy Ordersto leave the College "uxore ducta, " giving up his emolument, hisclerical dress, and the tonsure. Even if a Fellow enjoyed theFounder's provision for the long period of his course in Arts andTheology, and proceeded in due time to Holy Orders, it was notcontemplated that he should remain a Fellow till his death. 

 ". .. He had geten him yet no benefyce, Ne was so worldly for to have offyce, "

says Chaucer, indicating the natural end of a scholar's career. Hemight betake himself to some "obsequium, " and rise high in the serviceof the king, or of some great baron or bishop, and become, like one ofWykeham's first New College scholars, Henry Chichele, an archbishopand a College founder himself. Should no such great career open up forhim, he can, at the least, succeed to one of the livings which thefounders of English colleges purchased for this purpose. His "obsequium"would naturally lead to his ceasing to reside, and so vacate his (p.  074)fellowship, and his acceptance of a benefice over a certain valuebrought about the same result. Some such event was expected to happento every Fellow; unless he happened to be elected to the Headship, itwas not intended that he should grow old in the College, and atQueen's College, Oxford, the arbitrary or unreasonable refusal of abenefice vacated a Fellowship. The object of the College Founder was, that there should never be wanting a succession of men qualified toserve God in Church and State, and to Chaucer's unworldly clerk, if hewas a member of a College, there would come, in due course, thecountry living and goodbye to the University. But statutes were notalways strictly observed and the idle life-Fellow, who survived to bethe scandal of early Victorian days, was not unknown in the end of theMiddle Ages. 

One of the causes of vacating a fellowship throws some light upon theclass of men who became members of Oxford and Cambridge Colleges. Theopening sentences of founders' statutes usually contain some suchphrase as "collegium pauperum et indigentium scholarium"; but latersections of the statutes contemplate the possibility of their succeedingto property--"patrimonium, haereditatem, feudumve saeculare, velpensionem annuam"--and if such property exceeded the annual value ofa hundred shillings, a Fellowship was _ipso facto_ vacated. The (p.  075)"pauperes et indigentes" expressions must not be construed tooliterally; the Founder was establishing a claim to the merits of himthat considereth the poor, and the language he used was part of theordinary formulas of the time, and ought not to be interpreted morestrictly than the ordinary phrases of legal and Diplomatic documentsor than the conventional terms of courtesy, which begin and conclude amodern letter. That an English College Founder wished to give helpwhere help was required, is undeniable, but help was required byothers than the poorest. The advancement of the study of theology wasnear the heart of every medieval founder, and the study of theologydemanded the surrender of the best years of a man's life, and theextension of the period of education long after he might be expectedto be earning his own living. A curriculum in the University whichcovered at least sixteen years, and might be followed by nothing moreremunerative than the cure of Chaucer's poor priest, required somesubstantial inducement if it was to attract the best men. Canon Law, Civil Law and Medicine, if they offered more opportunity of attaininga competency, required also a very long period of apprenticeship inthe University. There were many youths in the Middle Ages (as thereare to-day) neither "pauperes" nor "indigentes" in the strict (p.  076)sense of the word, but too poor to be able to afford sixteen years ofstudy in the University. The length of the medieval curriculumproduced some of the necessities which colleges were established tomeet. 

That the founders were not thinking of the poorest classes of thecommunity, is evident from many provisions of their statutes. Theyfrequently provided only board and lodging, and left theirbeneficiaries to find elsewhere the other necessities of life; theyappointed penalties (such as the subtraction of commons for a month)which would have meant starvation to the penniless; they contemplatedentertainments and journeys, and in the case of a New College Doctor, even the maintenance of a private servant, at the personal expense oftheir scholars and Fellows; they prohibited the expenditure of moneyon extravagant dress and amusements. William of Wykeham madeallowances for the expense of proceeding to degrees in the Universitywhen one of his Fellows had no private means and no friends to assisthim ("propter paupertatem, inopiam, et penuriam, carentiamqueamicorum"); but the sum to be thus administered was strictly limitedand the recipient had to prove his poverty, and to swear to the truthof his statement. The very frequent insistence upon provisions for aFounder's kin, suggests that the society, to which he wished a (p.  077)large number of his relations to belong, was of higher social standingthan an almshouse; and the liberal allowances for the food of theFellows, as contrasted with the sums allotted to servants andchoristers, show that life in College was intended to be easy andcomfortable. The fact that menial work was to be done by servants andthat Fellows were to be waited on at table by the "poor boys" is afurther indication of the dignity of the Society. At New College, itwas the special duty of one servant to carry to the schools, the booksof the Fellows and scholars. The possession of considerable means by amedieval Fellow, is illustrated by two wills, printed in "MunimentaAcademica. " Henry Scayfe, Fellow of Queen's College, left in 1449, seven pounds to his father, smaller sums to a large number of friends, including sixpence to every scholar of the College, and also disposedby will of sheep, cattle and horses. In 1457, John Seggefyld, Fellowof Lincoln College, bequeathed to his brother tenements in Kingston byHull, which had been left him by his father, twelve pence to each ofhis colleagues, and thirteen shillings and four pence to his executor. Whether the possessions of these men ought to have led to theresignation of their Fellowships, is a question which may haveinterested their colleagues at the time; to us the facts areimportant, as illustrating the private means of members of a (p.  078)society of "poor and indigent" scholars, and as indicating the classfrom which such scholars were drawn. 

College regulations in other countries add considerably to ourknowledge of medieval student-life. In Paris, where the system had itshumble beginning in the hire of a room for eighteen poor scholars, bya benevolent Englishman returning from a pilgrimage to Palestine in1180, the college ideal progressed slowly and never reached itshighest development. Even when most of the students of Paris came tolive in colleges, the college was not the real unit of universitylife, nor was a Parisian college a self-governing community likeMerton or Peterhouse. The division of the University of Paris intoNations affected its social life, and the Faculties were separated atParis in a manner unknown in England. A college at Paris was organisedin accordance with Faculty divisions, an arrangement so little inharmony with the ideas of English founders, that William of Wykehamprovided that Canonists and Civilists, should be mixed in chamberswith students of other Faculties "ad nutriendam et conservandammajorem dilectionem, amicitiam et charitatem inter eosdem. " Ascolleges at Paris were frequently confined to natives of a particulardistrict, they tended to become sub-divisions of the Nations. The (p.  079)disadvantages of restricting membership of a college to a diocese orlocality, were seen and avoided by the founder of the College ofSorbonne, in the middle of the thirteenth century, and the founder ofthe sixteenth century College of Mans protested against the custom, byinstructing his executors to open his foundation to men, from everynation and province, insisting that association with companions ofdifferent languages and customs, would make the scholars "civiliores, eloquentiores, et doctiores, " and that the friendships thus formedwould enable them to render better service to the State. The tenure ofhis _bursa_ or emolument, by a member of a Paris college, was soprecarious that he could not count upon proceeding to a higher Facultyin his own college, and the existence of an outside body of governorsand of Patrons or Visitors, who had the power of filling up vacanciesfurther checked the growth of corporate feeling and collegepatriotism. The large powers entrusted to an external authority madethe position of the Head of a college at Paris, much less importantthan at Oxford or Cambridge. 

The differences between English and Parisian colleges may best berealised by a reference to the statutes of some early Paris founders. About 1268, Guillaume de Saone, Treasurer of Rouen, founded at Paris, the "Treasurer's College" for natives of his own diocese. It was (p.  080)founded for poor clerks, twelve of whom were to be scholars inTheology, and twelve in Arts. They were to be selected by thearchdeacons of the Cathedral of Rouen, who then resided at Grand-Cauxand Petit-Caux, from natives of these places, or, failing them, fromthe Diocese of Rouen. The scholars were to have rooms and a weeklyallowance, not for the whole year, but for forty-five weeks from thefeast of St Dionysius; no provision was made for the seven weeks ofthe vacation, except for two theologians, who were to take charge ofthe house at Paris. The revenues were collected and distributed by thePrior of the Hospital of St Mary Magdalen at Rouen, and the Archbishopof Rouen was Rector and Patron. The students in Arts never formed partof the foundation, for the Treasurer almost immediately restricted hiscommunity to Theologians, and their tenure of the endowment wasstrictly limited to two years after obtaining their licence. "For wedo not wish to grant them anything more, because our intention is onlyto induce them to proceed to the degree of master in theology. " Theywere furnished with books, which they were forbidden to lend, and theywere placed under the immediate superintendence of the senior Bursaror Foundationer, whose duty it was to call them together once a week, and inquire into their conduct and their progress in their (p.  081)studies. Some general rules were laid down by the Founder, andoffenders against them were to be expelled at these meetings. Theywere permitted to receive a peaceful commoner, who paid for hischamber and was a student of Theology. The interest of the Treasurerof Rouen in Theology is characteristic, and the great College of theSorbonne, founded about the same time, was also restricted totheologians. The College of Navarre, founded in 1304, provided fortwenty students of grammar, twenty in logic and philosophy (Arts) andtwenty in Theology, each Faculty forming a sub-college, with aseparate hall. A doctor in grammar was to superintend both the studiesand the morals of the grammarians and to receive double their weeklyallowance of four shillings, and similarly, a master of Arts was tosupervise the Artists and receive double their weekly allowance of sixshillings. The "Dean and University of the masters of the scholars ofthe theological Faculty at Paris" were to choose a secular clerk to beRector of the College, and to govern it in conjunction with the bodythat appointed him. The masters of the Faculty of Theology, or theirrepresentatives, were to visit the College annually, to inquire intothe financial and domestic arrangements, and into the behaviour of theRector, masters, and scholars, and to punish as they deemed necessary. Membership of the College was restricted to the kingdom of France. (p.  082)Similarly, the College du Plessis, founded in 1322, by Geoffrey duPlessis, Notary Apostolic, and Secretary of Philip the Long, wasrestricted to Frenchmen, with preference to certain northern dioceses. Its forty scholars were in separate societies, with a Grand Master whohad to be a master or, at least, a bachelor in Theology. The affairsof the College, as far as concerned the election, discipline and thedeprivation of its members, were to be administered by two bishops andan abbot, in conjunction with the Master and with the Chancellor ofthe Cathedral of Paris, or, in the absence of the great dignitaries, by the Master and the Chancellor. But the financial administration wasentrusted to a provisor or procurator, who undertook the collectionand distribution of the revenues. 

The details of college statutes at Paris, bear a general resemblanceto the regulations of Oxford and Cambridge founders, and disciplinebecame more stringent as time went on. Attendance at Chapel (the onlymeeting-place of students in different Faculties in the same College)came to be strictly required. Punctuality at meals was frequentlyinsisted upon, under pain of receiving nothing but bread. Silence wasenjoined at meal times and the Bible was read. Latin was, from thefirst, the only lawful medium of conversation. All the members of (p.  083)a college, had to be within the gates when the curfew bell rang. Bearing arms or wearing unusual clothes was forbidden, and singing, shouting and games were denounced as interfering with the studies ofothers, although the Parisian legislators were more sympathetic withregard to games, than their English contemporaries. Even the Founderof the Cistercian College of St Bernard, contemplated that permissionmight be obtained for games, though not before dinner or after thebell rang for vespers. A sixteenth-century code of statutes for theCollege of Tours, while recording the complaints of the neighboursabout the noise made by the scholars playing ball ("de insolentiis, exclamationibus et ludis palmariis dictorum scolarium, qui ludunt . .. Pilis durissimis") permitted the game under less noisy conditions("pilis seu scophis mollibus et manu, ac cum silentio et absqueclamoribus tumultuosis"). The use of dice was, as a rule, absolutelyprohibited, but the statutes of the College of Cornouaille permittedit under certain conditions. It might be played to amuse a sick fellowon feast days, or without the plea of sickness, on the vigils ofChristmas, and of three Holy Days. But the stakes must be small andpaid in kind, not in money ("pro aliquo comestibili vel potabili"). 

Penalties for minor offences were much the same as in England--forfeitureof commons for varying periods, pecuniary fines, and in the (p.  084)sixteenth century, whipping. In the College of Le Mans, bursars whowere not graduates were to be whipped for a first offence in a school, and for a second offence in the Hall ("prout mos est in universitateParisiensi"). The obligation of reporting each other's faults, ofwhich there are indications in English statutes, was almost universalat Paris, where all were bound to reveal offences "sub secreto" to theauthorities. The penalty of "sconcing, " still inflicted at Oxford, foroffences against undergraduate etiquette, finds a place in theParisian statutes among serious punishments. We find it in theStatutes of Cornouaille for minor offences; if a man carries wine outof the College illicitly, he is to pay for double the quantity to bedrunk by the members who were present at the time; if anyone walksthrough the confines or chambers in pattens ("cum calepodiis, id estcum patinis") he is to be mulcted in a pint of wine. If a stranger isintroduced without leave ("ad mensam communitatis ad comedendum velvidendum secretum mensae"), the penalty is a quart of good wine forthe fellows present in Hall. For unseemly noise, especially at meals, and at time of prayers, the ordinary penalty is a quart of ordinarywine ("vini mediocris"). For speaking in the vernacular, there is afine of "the price of a pint of wine, " but, as the usual directionabout drinking it, is omitted, this was probably not a sconce; at (p.  085)the Cistercian College, the penalty for this offence was a sconce. Sofar, the offences for which a sconce is prescribed, might in mostcases, be paralleled in more recent times in an English college, butthe statutes of Cornouaille also make sconcing the penalty for strikinga servant, unless the injury was severe, in which case, more seriouspunishments were imposed. The whole sentence is an illustration of thelack of control over outbursts of bad temper, which is characteristicof medieval life. All the scholars are to be careful not to strike theservants in anger or with ill-will, or to injure them; he who inflictsa slight injury is to be fined a quart of wine; if the injury be moresevere, the master is to deprive him of his burse for one day or more, at his own discretion and that of a majority of the scholars: if thereis a large effusion of blood or a serious injury, the provisor (theBishop of Paris or his Vicar General) is to be informed, and todeprive the offender of his burse, or even punish him otherwise. Atthe Sorbonne, an assault on a servant was to be followed by thedrinking of a quart of specially good wine by the Fellows, at theculprit's expense; for talking too loud in Hall, the sconce was twoquarts (presumably of ordinary wine). Dr Rashdall quotes from the MS. Register of the Sorbonne, actual instances of the infliction ofsconces: "A Doctor of Divinity is sconced a quart of wine for (p.  086)picking a pear off a tree in the College garden, or again, forforgetting to shut the Chapel door, or for taking his meals in thekitchen. Clerks are sconced a pint for 'very inordinately' knocking'at the door during dinner . .. ' for 'confabulating' in the court lateat night, and refusing to go to their chambers when ordered. .. . Thehead cook is sconced for 'badly preparing the meat for supper, ' or fornot putting salt in the soup. " Among the examples given by Dr Rashdallfrom this source are a sconce of two shillings for drunkenness and asconce in wine inflicted upon the head cook for being found "cum unameretrice. " An offence so serious in a bursar, is by many collegestatutes to be followed by expulsion, and Dr Rashdall quotes aninstance of this penalty: but Parisian College Founders, were lesssevere in dealing with moral offences than English Founders. At themonastic College of Marmoutier, it was only on the second offence thatbringing into College ("mulierem suspectam et inhonestam") led toexpulsion, and at the College of Cornouaille, the penalty for a firstoffence was loss of commons or bursa for fifteen days, and for asecond offence a month's deprivation; but even at Cornouaille actualincontinence was to be punished by expulsion. 

A late code of statutes of the fourteenth-century College of (p.  087)Dainville, give us a picture of a student's day. The hour of risingwas five o'clock, except on Sundays and Feast days when an hour'sgrace was allowed. Chapel service began at 5. 30, prayers, meditation, and a New Testament lesson being followed by the mass of the Collegeat six. All students resident in the College had to be present. Thereception of commoners, an early instance of which we noted in theCollege of the Treasurer, had developed to such an extent, that allColleges had, in addition to their bursars or foundations, a largenumber of "foranei scholares, " who paid their own expenses but weresubject to College discipline, and received a large part of theireducation in College. After mass, the day's work began; attendance atthe Schools and the performance of exercises for their master inCollege. Dinner was about twelve o'clock, when either a bursar or anexternal student read, "first Holy Scripture, then a book appointed bythe master, then a passage from a martyrology. " After dinner, an hourwas allowed for recreation--walking within the precincts of theCollege, or conversation--and then everyone went to his own chamber. Supper was at seven, with reading as at dinner, and the interval until8. 30 was again free for "deambulatio vel collocutio. " At 8. 30 thegates of the College were closed, and evening Chapel began. Rulesagainst remaining in Hall after supper occur in Parisian as well (p.  088)as in English statutes, and we find prohibitions against carrying offwood to private rooms. The general arrangement of Parisian collegechambers, probably resembled those of Oxford, or Cambridge, and wefind references to "studies. " The statutes of the monastic college ofClugny order that "because the mind is rendered prudent by sittingdown and keeping quiet, the said students at the proper and wontedhours for study shall be, and sit, alone in their cells and at theirstudies. " Parisian statutes are stricter than English statutes ininsisting upon frequent inspections of students' chambers, and asixteenth-century code for a Parisian college orders the officials tosee their pupils every night before bed time, and to make sure, beforethey themselves retire for the night, that the students are asleep andnot wandering about the quadrangles. 

Strict supervision is found in colleges in other French universities, even in those which belong to the student type. It was, of course, especially strict in monastic colleges, which carried their owncustoms to the University; in the College of Notre Dame de Pitié, atAvignon, the master of the novices lived in a room adjoining theirdormitory, and had a window, through which he might watch theirproceedings. Supervision was sometimes connected with precautionsagainst fire, _e. G. _ at the College of Saint Ruf, at Montpellier, (p.  089)an officer was appointed every week to go round all chambers and roomsat night, and to warn anyone who had a candle or a fire in a dangerousposition, near his bed or his study. He was to carry a pail of waterwith him to be ready for emergencies. A somewhat similar precautionwas taken in the Collegium Maius at Leipsic, where water was kept inpails beside the dormitories, and leather pails, some centuries old, are still to be seen at Oxford. As a rule, the dormitories seem tohave contained a separate bed for each occupant, but in the College ofSt Nicholas de Pelegry at Cahors, students in arts (who entered aboutthe age of fourteen) were to sleep two in a bed. Insistence on the useof Latin is almost universal; the scholars of the College de Foix atToulouse are warned that only ploughmen, swineherds and other rustics, use their mother tongues. Silence and the reading of the Bible atmeals was usual, and students are sometimes told to make their needsknown, if possible, by signs. Fines for lateness at meals are common, and there are injunctions against rushing into Hall with violence andgreed: no one is to go near the kitchen to seize any food, and thosewho enter Hall first, are to wait till the rest arrive, and all are tosit down in the proper order. Prohibitions against dogs are infrequentin the French statutes; at the College des Douze Medecins atMontpellier, one watchdog was allowed to live in College. Women (p.  090)were often forbidden to enter a college, "quia mulier caput estpeccati, arma dyaboli, expulsio paradysi, et corruptio legisantiquae. " The College of Saint Ruf at Montpellier, in the statutes ofwhich this formula occurs, did, however, allow women to stand in theChapel at mass, provided that they did not enter the choir. Themonastic institution of Our Lady of Pity at Avignon, went so far as tohave a matron for the young boys, an old woman, entitled "MaterNovitiorum Collegiatorum. " At the College of Breuil at Angers, a womanmight visit the College by day if the Principal was satisfied that noscandal could arise. Penalties for going about the town in maskedbands and singing or dancing, occur in many statutes, but processionsin honour of saints and choruses to celebrate the taking of degrees, are sometimes permitted. Blasphemy and bad language greatly troubledthe French statute-makers, and there are many provisions againstblaspheming the Blessed Virgin. At the College of Breuil at Angers, afine of twopence, was imposed for speaking or singing "verba inhonestatam alte, " especially in public places of the College; in Germany, theCollegium Minus at Leipsic provides also against writing "impudentiadicta" on the walls of the College. The usual penalties for minoroffences are fines and subtraction of commons: references to (p.  091)flogging are rare, though it is found in both French and Germancolleges. More serious crimes were visited with suspension andexpulsion. At the College of Pelegry, at Cahors, to enter the collegeby a window or otherwise after the great gate was closed, involvedrustication for two months for the first offence, six months for thesecond offence, and expulsion for a third. At the College de Verdale, at Toulouse, expulsion was the penalty for a list of crimes whichincludes theft, entering the college by stealth, breaking into thecellar, bringing in a meretrix, witch-craft, alchemy, invoking demonsor sacrificing to them, forgery, and contracting "carnale velspirituale matrimonium. "

We may close our survey of the Medieval College, with a glimpse of aFrench college in the fourteenth century. We have the record of avisitation of the Benedictine foundation of St Benedict, atMontpellier, partly a monastery and partly a college. The Prior isstrictly questioned about the conduct of the students. He gives a goodcharacter to most of them: but the little flock contained some blacksheep. Peter is somewhat light-headed ("aliquantulum est leviscapitis") but not incorrigible; he has been guilty of employing "verbainjuriosa et provocativa, " but the Prior has corrected him, and he hastaken the correction patiently. Bertrand's life is "aliquantulum (p.  092)dissoluta, " and he has made a conspiracy to beat (and, as some think, to kill) Dominus Savaricus, who had beaten him along with the rest, when he did not know his lessons. (Bertrand says he is eighteen andlooks like twenty-one, but this is a monastic college and the beatingis monastic discipline. ) The Prior further reports that Bertrand isquarrelsome; he has had to make him change his bed and his chamber, because the others could not stand him; he is idle and often saysopenly, that he would rather be a "claustralis" than a student. Bresois simple and easily led, and was one of Bertrand's conspirators. William is "pessimae conversationis" and incorrigible, scandalous inword and deed, idle and given to wandering about the town. Correctionis vain in his case. After the Prior has reported, the students areexamined _viva voce_ upon the portions of the decretals, which theyare studying, and the results of the examination bear out generallythe Prior's views. Bertrand, Breso and William, are found to knownothing, and to have wasted their time. The others acquit themselveswell, and the examiners are merciful to a boy who is nervous in _vivavoce_, but of whose studies Dominus Savaricus, who has recovered fromthe attack made upon him, gives a good account. Monks, and especiallynovices, were human, and the experience of St Benedict's atMontpellier was probably similar to that of secular colleges in (p.  093)France and elsewhere. Even in democratic Bologna, it was foundnecessary in the Spanish College (from the MS. Statutes of which, DrRashdall quotes) to establish a discipline which included a penalty offive days in the stocks and a meal of bread and water, eaten sittingon the floor of the Hall, for an assault upon a brother student; ifblood was shed, the penalty was double. The statutes of the SpanishCollege were severe for the fourteenth century, and they penaliseabsence from lecture, unpunctuality, nocturnal wanderings and soforth, as strictly as any English founder. 

CHAPTER V (p.  094)

UNIVERSITY DISCIPLINE

The growing tradition of strict college discipline ultimately led todisciplinary statutes in the universities. From very early times, universities had, of course, made regulations about the curriculum, and the border-line between a scholar's studies and his manners andmorals, could not be absolutely fixed. At Paris, indeed, it is notuntil the fifteenth century that we find any detailed code ofdisciplinary statutes; but fourteenth-century regulations about dresswere partly aimed at checking misdeeds of students disguised aslaymen, and in 1391 the English Nation prohibited an undue number of"potationes et convivia, " in celebration of the "jocund advent" of afreshman or on other occasions. It was not till the middle of thefifteenth century that the University of Paris, awoke to therealisation of its own shortcomings in manners and morals; CardinalWilliam de Estoutville was commissioned by Nicholas V. To reform it, and internal reform, the necessity of which had been recognised forsome years, began about the same time with an edict of the Faculty ofArts ordering a general improvement, and especially forbidding the (p.  095)celebration of feasts "cum mimis seu instrumentis altis. "Estoutville's ordinances are largely concerned with the curriculum, hewas at least as anxious to reform the masters as the pupils, and hisexhortations are frequently in general or scriptural terms. The pointsof undergraduate discipline on which he lays stress are feasting, dressing improperly or wearing the clothes of laymen, quarrelling, andgames and dances "dissolutas et inhonestas. " Four masters or doctorsare to inspect annually the colleges and pedagogies, in which thestudents live, and are to see that proper discipline is maintained. From time to time, similar regulations were made by the Faculty ofArts, _e. G. _ in 1469, it is ordered that no student is to wear thehabit of a fool, except for a farce or a morality (amusementspermitted at this period). Any one carrying arms or wearing fools'dress is to be beaten in public and in his own hall. These lastregulations are doubtless connected with town and gown riots, forwhich the Feast of Fools afforded a tempting opportunity. 

The absence of disciplinary regulations in the records of theUniversity of Paris, is largely to be explained by the fact thatcriminal charges against Parisian scholars were tried in the Bishop'sCourt, and civil actions in the Court of the Provost of Paris. AtOxford, where the whole jurisdiction belonged to the Chancellor of (p.  096)the University, disciplinary statutes are much more numerous. We find, from the middle of the thirteenth century onwards, a series of edictsagainst scholars who break the peace or carry arms, who entercitizens' houses to commit violence, who practise the art of sword andbuckler, or who are guilty of gross immorality. A statute of 1250forbids scholars to celebrate their national feast days disguised withmasks or garlands, and one of 1313 restricts the carrying of arms tostudents who are entering on, or returning from, long journeys. Offenders who refuse to go to prison, or who escape from it, are to beexpelled. As early as the middle of the thirteenth century, it was theduty of the proctors and of the principals of halls, to investigateinto, and to report the misdeeds of scholars who broke the rules ofthe University or lived evil lives. A list of fines drawn up in 1432(a period when in the opinion of the University a pecuniary penaltywas more dreaded than anything else) prescribes fines of twelve pencefor threatening violence, two shillings for wearing arms, fourshillings for a violent shove with the shoulders or a blow with thefist, six shillings and eight pence for a blow with a stone or stick, ten shillings for a blow with a sword, a knife, a dagger or anysimilar "bellicose weapon, " twenty shillings for carrying bows andarrows with evil intent, thirty shillings for collecting an (p.  097)assembly to break the peace, hinder the execution of justice, or makean attack upon anyone, and forty shillings for resisting the executionof justice or wandering about by night. In every case damages havealso to be paid to any injured person. The device of overaweing acourt (familiar in Scottish history) is prohibited by a regulationthat no one shall appear before the Chancellor with more than twocompanions. 

The records of the Chancellor's Court furnish us with instances of theenforcement of these regulations. In 1434, a scholar is found wearinga dagger and is sentenced to be "inbocardatus, "[1] _i. E. _ imprisonedin the Tower of the North Gate of the city, and another offender, in1442, suffers a day's imprisonment, pays his fine of two shillings, and forfeits his arms. In the same year, John Hordene, a scholar ofPeckwater Inn, is fined six shillings and eightpence for breaking thehead of Thomas Walker, manciple of Pauline Hall, and Thomas Walker isfined the like sum for drawing his sword on Hordene and for gambling. In 1433, two scholars, guilty of attacking Master Thomas Rygby inBagley Wood and stealing twelve shillings and sevenpence from him, fail to appear, and are expelled from the University, their goods(estimated to be worth about thirteen shillings) being (p.  098)confiscated. In 1457, four scholars are caught entering with weaponsinto a warren or park to hunt deer and rabbits; they are released ontaking an oath that, while they are students of the University, theywill not trespass again, in closed parks or warrens. In 1452, ascholar of Haburdaysh Hall is imprisoned for using threateninglanguage to a tailor, and is fined twelvepence and imprisoned; thetailor insults the prisoner and is fined six shillings and eightpence. We have quoted instances of undergraduate offences, but the evil-doersare by no means invariably young students, _e. G. _ in 1457 the Vicar ofSt Giles has to take an oath to keep the peace, his club is forfeited, and he is fined two shillings; and in the same year the Master of StJohn's Hospital, who has been convicted of divers enormous offences, is expelled the University for breaking prison. 

 [Footnote 1: The prison was called "Bocardo" because, like the mood known as "Bocardo" in the syllogism, it was difficult to get out of. ]

The increased stringency of disciplinary regulations at Oxford in theend of the medieval period is best illustrated by the statutes which, in the fifteenth century, the University enforced upon members of theunendowed Halls. Students who were not members of a College lived, forthe most part, in one of the numerous Halls which, up to theReformation, were so important a feature of the University. A code ofthese statutes, printed for the first time by Dr Rashdall, shows thatthe liberty of the earlier medieval undergraduate had largely (p.  099)disappeared, and that the life of a resident in a Hall, in the end ofthe fifteenth century, was almost as much governed by statute andregulation as if he were the partaker of a founder's bounty. He musthear mass and say matins and vespers every day, under pain of a fineof a penny, and attend certain services on feast days. His tablemanners are no longer regulated by the customs and etiquette of hisfellows, but by the rules of the University. His lapses from goodmorals are no longer to be visited with penalties imposed by his ownsociety; if he gambles or practises with sword and buckler, he is topay fourpence; if he sins with his tongue, or shouts or makes melodywhen others wish to study or sleep, or brings to table an unsheathedknife, or speaks English, or goes into the town or the fieldsunaccompanied by a fellow-student, he is fined a farthing; if he comesin after 8 P. M. In winter or 9 P. M. In summer, he contracts a gatebill of a penny; if he sleeps out, or puts up a friend for the night, without leave of his Principal, the fine is fourpence; if he sleepswith another student in the Hall but not in his own bed, he pays apenny; if he brings a stranger to a meal or a lecture or any other"actum communem" in the Hall, he is fined twopence; if he is pugnaciousand offensive and makes odious comparisons, he is to pay sixpence;if he attacks a fellow-member or a servant, the University has (p.  100)appointed penalties varying with the severity of the assault, and fora second offence he must be expelled. He has to obey his Principalmuch as members of a College obey their Head, and, in lieu of thepecuniary penalties, the Principal may flog him publicly on Saturdaynights, even though his own master may certify that he has alreadycorrected him, or declare his willingness to correct him, for hisbreaches of the statutes. The private master or tutor was, as DrRashdall suggests, probably a luxury of the rich boy, to whom hiswealth might thus bring its own penalty. 

It is startling to the modern mind to find University statutes anddisciplinary regulations forbidding not only extravagant andunbecoming dress, but sometimes also the wearing of distinctiveacademic costume by undergraduates, for distinctive academic costumewas the privilege of a graduate. The scholar wore ordinary clericaldress, unless the Founder of a College prescribed a special livery. The master had a _cappa_ or cope, such as a Cambridge Vice-Chancellorwears on Degree Days, with a border and hood of minever, such asOxford proctors still wear, and a _biretta_ or square cap. In 1489, the insolence of many Oxford scholars had grown to such a pitch thatthey were not afraid to wear hoods in the fashion of masters, whereasbachelors, to their own damnation and the ruin of the University, (p.  101)were so regardless of their oaths as to wear hoods not linedthroughout with fur. Penalties were prescribed for both kinds ofoffenders; but though the Oxford undergraduate never succeeded inannexing the hood, he gradually acquired the _biretta_, which hissuccessor of to-day is occasionally fined for not wearing. The moderngown or toga is explained by Dr Rashdall as derived from the robe orcassock which a medieval Master of Arts wore under his _cappa_. 

The disciplinary regulations of fifteenth-and sixteenth-century Oxfordmay be paralleled from other universities. At Louvain there was a kindof proctorial walk undertaken by the University official known as thePromotor. On receiving three or four hours' notice from the Rector, the Promotor, with a staff of servants, perambulated the streets atnight, and he and his "bulldogs" received a fine from anyone whom theyapprehended. Offending students caught _in flagrante delicto_ heconducted to the University prison, and others he reported to theRector. "Notabiles personæ" might be incarcerated in a monasteryincorporated with the University. Arms found upon anyone wereforfeited. The Promotor was also the University gaoler, and wasresponsible for the safe custody of prisoners, and he might place infetters dangerous prisoners or men accused of serious crimes. (p.  102)Interviews with captives had to take place in his presence; malevisitors had to give up their knives or other weapons before beingadmitted, and female visitors had to leave their cloaks behind them. Students were forbidden to walk in the streets at night after the bellof St Michael's Church had been rung at nine o'clock in winter, andten o'clock in summer, unless they were accompanied by a doctor or a"gravis persona" and were bearing a torch or lantern. The list ofoffences at Louvain are much the same as elsewhere, but aneighteenth-century code of statutes specially prohibits bathing andskating. The laws against borrowing and lending were unusually strict, and no student under twenty-five years was allowed to sell bookswithout the consent of his regent, the penalty for a sixteenth-centurystudent in Arts being a public flogging in his own college. 

At Leipsic, the University was generally responsible for thediscipline, sometimes even when the offences had been committed in thecolleges; and a record of the proceedings of the Rector's Court from1524 to 1588, which was published by Friedrich Zarncke, the learnedhistorian of Leipsic, gives us a large variety of incidents ofUniversity life in sixteenth-century Germany. Leipsic possessed aUniversity prison, and we find, in 1524, two students, Philippus (p.  103)Josman and Erasmus Empedophillus, who had quarrelled, and insultedeach other, sentenced to perform, in the prison, impositions for theRector. Six or eight days' imprisonment is a frequent penalty for adrunken row. A college official brings to the Rector's Court in 1545one of his pupils, John Ditz, who had lost much money by gambling. Ditz and one of his friends, Caspar Winckler, who had won six florinsand some books from him, have already been flogged by theirpreceptors; they are now sentenced to imprisonment, but as the weatheris very cold, they are to be released after one day's detention, andsent back to their preceptors to be flogged again. Their companionsare sentenced to return any money, books or garments which they hadwon in gambling games. A student of the name of Valentine Muffcomplains to the Rector that his pedagogue has beaten and reproved himundeservedly: after an inquiry he is condemned to the rods "once andagain. " For throwing stones at windows a student is fined one florinin addition to the cost of replacing them. For grave moral offencesfines of three florins are imposed, and the penalty is notinfrequently reduced. A month's imprisonment is the alternative of thefine of three florins, but if the weather is cold, the culprit, whohas been guilty of gross immorality, is let off with two florins. Adrunken youth who meets some girls in the evening and tries to (p.  104)compel them to enter his college, is sentenced to five days'imprisonment, but is released on the intercession of the girls andmany others. An attack on a servant with a knife is punished byforfeiture of the knife and a fine of half a florin, and a penalty ofa florin (divided among the four victims) is inflicted for entering ahouse with arms and wounding the fingers of some of its inhabitants. Aruffian of noble birth, who had been guilty of gross immorality and ofviolence, declines to appear in the Rector's Court, and is dulysentenced to expulsion. But his father promises to satisfy theUniversity and the injured party, and seven nobles write asking thathe should be pardoned, and a compromise is made, by which he appearsin court and pays a fine. For the University offence of having as anattendant a boy who is not enrolled, Valentine Leo is fined threeflorins, which were paid. "But since he appeared to be good andlearned, and produced an excellent specimen of his singular erudition, and wrote learned verses and other compositions to the Rector and hisassessors, by which he begged pardon and modestly purged his offence, and especially as a doctor, whose sons he taught, and othersinterceded for him, he easily procured that the florins, should bereturned to the doctor who had paid them for him. "

The leniency of the punishments for grave moral offences, as (p.  105)contrasted with the strict insistence upon the lesser matters of thelaw, cannot fail to impress modern readers, but this is not acharacteristic peculiar to Leipsic. Fines, and in the fifteenth andsixteenth centuries, whippings were frequently inflicted in alluniversities for violent attacks upon the person. Dr Rashdall quotes acase at Ingolstadt where a student who had killed another in a drunkenbout was let off with the confiscation of his goods, and the penaltyof expulsion was remitted; and the eighteenth-century history ofCorpus Christi College at Oxford supplies more recent instances ofpunishments which could scarcely be said to fit the crime. 

The statutes of the French universities outside Paris and of the threemedieval Scottish universities (St Andrews, Glasgow, and Aberdeen)supply many illustrations of the regulations we have noted elsewhere, but contain little that is unusual. St Andrews, which allowed hawking, forbade the dangerous game of football. The Faculty of Arts at Glasgowin 1532 issued an edict which has a curious resemblance to the Etoncustom of "shirking. " Reverence and filial fear were so important, said the masters, that no student was to meet the Rector, the Dean, orone of the Regents openly in the streets, by day or by night;immediately he was observed he must slink away and escape as best (p.  106)he could, and he must not be found again in the streets withoutspecial leave. The penalty was a public flogging. Similarly, even alawful game must not be played in the presence of a regent. Floggingwas a recognised penalty in all the Scottish universities; it foundits way into the system at St Andrews and Glasgow, and was introducedat once at Aberdeen. The early statutes of Aberdeen University (King'sCollege) unfortunately exist only in the form in which they wereedited in the seventeenth century. They include a rhymed series ofrules for behaviour at table, which, though post-medieval in date, give us some clue to the table manners of the medieval students:--

 Majorem ne praevenia- } Locum assignatum tenea- } Mensae assignatae accumba- } Manibus mundis nudis eda- } Aperientes caput faciem ne obtega- } Vultus hilares habea- } Rite in convictu comeda- } Sal cultello capia- } Salinum ne dejicia- } Manubrium haud aciem porriga- } tis Tribus cibos digitis prehenda- } Cultro priusquam dente tera- } . . . . . } Ossa in orbem depona- } Vel pavimentum jacia- } Modeste omnia facia- } Ossa si in convivas jacia- } Nedum si illos vulnera- } Ne queramini si vapula- } . . . . . } Post haustum labia deterga- } (p.  107) Modicum, sed crebro biba- } . . . . . } Os ante haustum evacua- } Ungues sordidulos fugia- } tis . . . . . } Ructantes terga reflecta- } Ne scalpatis cavea- } . . . . . } Edere mementote ut viva- } Non vivere ut comed- }

The Economist's accounts at Aberdeen have been preserved for part ofthe year 1579, and show that the food of a Scottish student, justafter the medieval period, consisted of white bread, oat bread, beef, mutton, butter, small fish, partans (crabs), eggs, a bill of farecertainly above the food of the lower classes in Scotland at the time. The drinks mentioned are best ale, second ale, and beer. His victualsinterested the medieval student; the conversation of two Germanstudents, as pictured in a "students' guide" to Heidelberg (_cf. _ p. 116), is largely occupied with food. "The veal is soft and bad: thecalf cannot have seen its mother three times: no one in my countrywould eat such stuff: the drink is bitter. " The little book shows usthe two students walking in the meadows, and when they reach theNeckar, one dissuades the other from bathing (a dangerous enterpriseforbidden in the statutes of some universities, including Louvain (p.  108)and Glasgow). They quarrel about a book, and nearly come to blows; onecomplains that the other reported him to the master for sleeping inlecture. Both speak of the "lupi, " the spies who reported studentsusing the vernacular or visiting the kitchen. The "wolves" were partof the administrative machinery of a German University; a statute ofLeipsic in 1507 orders that, according to ancient custom, "lupi" or"signatores" be appointed to note the names of any student who talkedGerman ("vulgarisantes") that they might be fined in due course, themoney being spent on feasts. One of the two Heidelberg studentscomplains of having been given a "signum" or bad mark "pro sermonevulgariter prolato, " and the other has been caught in the kitchen. They discuss their teachers; one of them complains of a lecturebecause "nimis alta gravisque materia est. " The little book gives, insome ways, a remarkable picture of German student life, with itsinterests and its temptations; but it raises more problems than itsolves, and affords a fresh illustration of the difficulty ofattempting to recreate the life of the past. 

CHAPTER VI (p.  109)

THE JOCUND ADVENT

The medieval student began his academic career with an initiationceremony which varied in different countries and at different dates, but which, so far as we know, always involved feasting and generallyimplied considerable personal discomfort. The designation, "bejaunus"or bajan, which signifies yellow-beak ("bec jaune"), seems to havebeen given almost everywhere to the freshman, and the custom ofreceiving the fledgeling into the academic society was, towards theclose of the Middle Ages, no mere tradition of student etiquette, butan acknowledged and admitted academic rite. The tradition, which datesfrom very early times, and which has so many parallels outsideUniversity history, was so strong that the authorities seem to havedeemed it wisest to accept it and to be content with trying to limitthe expense and the "ragging" which it entailed. 

We have no detailed knowledge of the initiation of the Parisianstudent, but a statute made by the University in 1342 proves that thetwo elements of bullying the new-comer and feasting at his expensewere both involved in it. It relates that quarrels frequently (p.  110)arise through the custom of seizing the goods of simple scholars onthe occasion of their "bejaunia, " and compelling them to expend onfeasting the money on which they intended to live. Insults, blows, andother dangers are the general results of the system, and theUniversity orders that no one shall exact money or anything else frombajans except the "socii" with whom they live, and they may take onlya free-will offering. Bajans are to reveal, under heavy penalties, thenames of any who molest them by word or blow, threatening them oroffering them insults. Offenders are to be handed over to the Provostof Paris to be punished, but not "ad penam sanguinis. "

A fifteenth-century code of statutes of the Cistercian College atParis (generally much less stern than one would expect in a house ofthat severe Order) refers to the traditions that had grown up in theCollege about the initiation of a bajan, and to the "insolentias etenormitates multas" which accompanied their observance. The whole ofthe ceremonies of initiation are therefore forbidden--"omnesreceptiones noviter venientium, quos voluntaria opinione Bejanosnuncupare solent, cum suis consequentiis, necnon bajulationes, fibrationes . .. Tam in capitulo, in dormitorio, in parvis scholis, injardinis, quam ubiubi, et tam de die quam de nocte. " With these evilcustoms is to go the very name of the Abbas Bejanorum, and all (p.  111)"vasa, munimenta, et instrumenta" used for these ceremonies are to begiven up. New-comers in future are to be entrusted to the care ofdiscreet seniors, who will instruct them in the honourable customs ofthe College, report their shortcomings in church, in walks, and ingames, supervise their expenditure, and prevent their being overcharged"pro jocundo adventu" or in other ways. So strong was the tradition ofthe "jocund advent" that it thus finds a place even in a reformer'sconstitution, and we find references to it elsewhere in the statutesof Parisian colleges. An undated early code, drawn up for theTreasurer's College, orders the members to fulfil honestly theirjocund advent in accordance with the advice of their fellow students. At Cornouaille, the new-comer is instructed to pay for his jocundadvent neither too meanly nor with burdensome extravagance, but inaccordance with his rank and his means. At the College of Dainvillethe expense of the bajan-hood is limited to a quart of good wine("ultra unum sextarium vini non mediocris suis sociis pro novo subingressu seu bejanno non solvat"). At the College of Cambray, a bursaris to pay twenty shillings for utensils, and to provide a pint of goodwine for the fellows then present in hall. Dr Rashdall quotes from theRegister of the Sorbonne an instance in which the Abbot of the Bajanswas fined eight shillings (to be expended in wine) because he had (p.  112)not fulfilled his duties in regard to the cleansing of the bajansby an aspersion of water on Innocents' Day. The bajans were not onlywashed, but carried in procession upon asses. 

The statutes of the universities of Southern France, and especially ofAvignon and Aix, give us some further information, and we possess arecord of the proceedings at Avignon of the Court of the Abbot of theBajans, referred to in the passage we have quoted from the regulationsof the Cistercian College at Paris. Similar prohibitions occur inother College statutes. 

At Avignon, the Confraternity of St Sebastian existed largely for thepurgation of bajans and the control of the abuses which had grown upin connection with the jocund advent. One of its statutes, dated about1450, orders that no novice, commonly called a bajan, shall beadmitted to the purgation of his sins or take the honourable name ofstudent until he has paid the sum of six _grossi_ as entrance money tothe Confraternity. There is also an annual subscription of three_grossi_, and the payment of these sums is to be enforced by theseizure of books, unless the defaulter can prove that he is unable topay his entrance fee or subscription, as the case may be. The Priorand Councillors of the Fraternity have power to grant a dispensationon the ground of poverty. After providing his feast, and taking an (p.  113)oath, the bajan is to be admitted "jocose et benigne, " is to lose hisbase name, and after a year is to bear the honourable title ofstudent. Noblemen and beneficed clergy are to pay double. The bajan isimplored to comply with these regulations "corde hilarissimo, " and his"socii" are adjured to remember that they should not seek their ownthings but the things of Christ, and should therefore not spend onfeasts anything over six _grossi_ paid by a bajan, but devote it tothe honour of God and St Sebastian. The Court of the Abbot of theBajans, at the College of Annecy, in the same University, throws alittle more light on the actual ceremony of purgation. The bajans aresummoned into the Abbot's Court, where each of them receives, _proforma_, a blow from a ferule. They all stand in the Court, withuncovered heads and by themselves ("Mundus ab immundo venitseparandus"); under the penalty of two blows they are required to keepsilence ("quia vox funesta in judiciis audiri non debet. ") The bajanwho has patiently and honestly served his time and is about to bepurged, is given, in parody of an Inception in the University, apassage in the Institutes to expound, and his fellow-bajans, underpain of two blows, have to dispute with him. If he obtains licence, the two last-purged bajans bring water "pro lavatione et purgatione. "The other rules of the Abbot's Court deal with the duties to be (p.  114)performed by the youngest freshman in Chapel (and at table if servantsare lacking), and order bajans to give place to seniors and not to gonear the fire in hall when seniors are present. No one, either senioror freshman, is to apply the term "Domine" to a bajan, and no freshmanis to call a senior man a bajan. The Court met twice a week, and itcould impose penalties upon senior men as well as bajans, but corporalpunishment is threatened only against the "infectos et fetidissimosbejannos. "

At Aix, a fifteenth-century code of statutes orders every bajan to payfees to the University, and to give a feast to the Rector, theTreasurer, and the Promotor. The Rector is to bring one scholar withhim, and the Promotor two, to help "ad purgandum bejaunum, " and thebajan is to invite a bedel and others. Dispensations on the ground ofpoverty could be obtained from the Rector, and two or three freshmenmight make their purgation together, "cum infinitas est vitanda, " evenan infinity of feasts is to be avoided. The Promotor gives the firstblow with a frying-pan, and the scholars who help in the purgation arelimited to two or three blows each, since an infinity of blows is alsoto be avoided. The Rector may remit a portion of the penalty at therequest of noble or honourable ladies who happen to be present, (p.  115)for it is useless to invite ladies if no remission is to be obtained. If the bajan is proud or troublesome, the pleas of the ladies whom hehas invited will not avail; he must have his three blows from each ofhis purgators, without any mercy. If a freshman failed to make hispurgation within a month, it was to take place "in studio sub librosuper anum"; the choice between a book and a frying-pan as a weapon ofcastigation is characteristic of the solemn fooling of the jocundadvent. The seizure of goods and of books, mentioned in some of thestatutes we have quoted, is frequently forbidden. At Orleans thestatutes prohibit leading the bajan "ut ovis ad occisionem" to atavern to be forced to spend his money, and denounce the custom asprovocative of "ebrietates, turpiloquia, lascivias, pernoctationes"and other evils. They also forbid the practice of compelling him tocelebrate the jocund advent by seizing books, one or more, or byexacting anything from him. There are numerous other references inFrench statutes, some of which denounce the _bejaunia_ as sufficientlyexpensive to deter men from coming to the University, but details aredisappointingly few. 

The initiation of the bajan attained its highest development in theGerman universities, where we find the French conception of the bajan, as afflicted with mortal sin and requiring purification, combined (p.  116)with the characteristic German conception of him as a wild animal whohas to be tamed. His reformation was accomplished by the use ofplanes, augers, saws, pincers and other instruments suitable forremoving horns, tusks and claws from a dangerous animal, and theDeposition, or "modus deponendi cornua iis qui in numerum studiosorumco-optari volunt, " became a recognised University ceremony. Thestatutes attempt to check it, _e. G. _ at Vienna the bajan is not to beoppressed with undue exactions or otherwise molested or insulted, andat Leipsic the insults are not to take the form of blows, stones, orwater. At Prague, "those who lay down (deponent) their rustic mannersand ignorance are to be treated more mildly and moderately than inrecent years (1544), and their lips or other parts of their bodies arenot to be defiled with filth or putrid and impure substances whichproduce sickness. " But the Prague statute contemplates a Depositionceremony in which the freshman is assumed to be a goat with horns tobe removed. A black-letter handbook or manual for German students, consisting of dialogues or conversational Latin (much on the principleof tourists' conversational dictionaries), opens with a description ofthe preparations for a Deposition. The book, which has been reprintedin Zarncke's _Die Deutschen Universitäten im Mittelalter_, is (p.  117)(from internal evidence) a picture of life at Heidelberg, but it iswritten in general terms. 

The new-comer seeks out a master that he may be entered on the roll ofthe University and be absolved from his bajan-ship. "Are your parentsrich?" is one of the master's first questions, and he is told thatthey are moderately prosperous mechanics who are prepared to do thebest for their son. The master takes him to the Rector to be admitted, and then asks him, "Where do you intend to have your 'deposition' as abajan?" The boy leaves all arrangements in the master's hands, reminding him of his poverty, and it is agreed to invite threemasters, two bachelors, and some friends of the master to theceremony. With a warning that he must not be afraid if strangers comeand insult him, for it is all part of the tradition of a bajan'sadvent, the master goes to make arrangements for the feast. Twoyouths, Camillus and Bartoldus, then arrive, and pretend to be greatlydisturbed by a foul smell, so strong that it almost drives them fromthe room. Camillus prepares to go, but Bartoldus insists upon aninvestigation of the cause. Camillus then sees a monster of terribleaspect, with huge horns and teeth, a nose curved like the beak of anowl, wild eyes and threatening lips. "Let us flee, " he says, "lest itattack us. " Bartoldus then guesses that it is a bajan, a creature (p.  118)which Camillus has never seen, but of whose ferocity he has heard. Thebold Bartoldus then addresses the bajan. "Domine Joannes, " he says, "whence do you come? Certainly you are a compatriot of mine, give meyour hand. " Joannes stretches out his hand, but is met with theindignant question, "Do you come to attack me with your nails? Why doyou sit down, wild ass? Do you not see that masters are present, venerable men, in whose presence it becomes you to stand?" Joannesstands, and is further insulted. His tormentors then affect to besorry for him and make touching references to his mother's feelings("Quid, si mater sciret, quae unice eum amat?"), but relapse intoabuse (O beane, O asine, O foetide hirce, O olens capra, O bufo, Ocifra, O figura nihili, O tu omnino nihil). "What are we to do withhim?" says Camillus, and Bartoldus suggests the possibility of hisreformation and admission into their society. But they must have adoctor. Camillus is famous and learned in the science of medicine, andcan remove his horns, file down his teeth, cure his blindness, andshave his long and horrible beard. While he goes for the necessaryinstruments, Bartoldus tells the victim to cheer up, for he is aboutto be cured from every evil of mind and body, and to be admitted tothe privileges of the University. Camillus returns with ointment, (p.  119)and they proceed to some horseplay which Joannes resists (Compesceeius impetus et ut equum intractatum ipsum illum constringe). Tusksand teeth having been removed, the victim is supposed to be dying, andis made to confess to Bartoldus a list of crimes. His penance is toentertain his masters "largissima coena, " not forgetting the doctorwho has just healed him, and the confessor who has just heard hisconfession, for they also must be entertained "pingui refectione. " Butthis confessor can only define the penance, he cannot give absolution, a right which belongs to the masters. Joannes is then taken to hismaster for the Deposition proper. Dr Rashdall describes the scene, from a rare sixteenth-century tract, which contains an illustration ofa Deposition, and a defence of it by Luther, who justified his takingpart in one of these ceremonies by giving it a moral and symbolicalmeaning. The bajan lies upon a table, undergoing the planing of histusks, "while a saw lies upon the ground, suggestive of the actualde-horning of the beast. The work itself and later apologies for theinstitution mention among the instruments of torture a comb andscissors for cutting the victim's hair, an _auriscalpium_ for hisears, a knife for cutting his nails; while the ceremony furtherappears to include the adornment of the youth's chin with a beard bymeans of burned cork or other pigment, and the administration, (p.  120)internal or external, of salt and wine. "

In the English universities we have no trace of the "jocund advent"during the medieval period, but it is impossible to doubt that thiskind of horseplay existed at Oxford and Cambridge. The statutes of NewCollege refer to "that most vile and horrid sport of shaving beards";it was "wont to be practised on the night preceding the Inception of aMaster of Arts, " but the freshmen may have been the victims, as theywere in similar ceremonies at the Feast of Fools in France. Antony àWood, writing of his own undergraduate days in the middle of theseventeenth century, tells that charcoal fires were made in the Hallat Merton on Holy Days, from All Saints' Eve to Candlemas, and that

 "at all these fires every night, which began to be made a little after five of the clock, the senior undergraduates would bring into the hall the juniors or freshmen between that time and six of the clock, there make them sit downe on a forme in the middle of the hall, joyning to the declaiming desk; which done, every one in order was to speake some pretty apothegme, or make a jest or bull, or speake some eloquent nonsense, to make the company laugh. But if any of the freshmen came off dull, or not cleverly, some of the forward or pragmatised seniors would "tuck" them, that is, set the nail of their thumb to their chin, just (p.  121) under the lower lipp, and by the help of their other fingers under the chin, they would give him a mark, which sometimes would produce blood. "

On Shrove Tuesday, 1648, Merton freshmen entertained the otherundergraduates to a brass pot "full of cawdel. " Wood, who was afreshman, describes how

 "every freshman according to seniority, was to pluck off his gowne and band and if possible to make himself look like a scoundrell. This done, they conducted each other to the high table, and there made to stand on a forme placed thereon; from whence they were to speak their speech with an audible voice to the company; which if well done, the person that spoke it was to have a cup of cawdle and no salted drink; if indifferently, some cawdle and some salted drink; but if dull, nothing was given to him but salted drink or salt put in college beere, with tucks to boot. Afterwards when they were to be admitted into the fraternity, the senior cook was to administer to them an oath over an old shoe, part of which runs thus: 'Item tu jurabis quod penniless bench (a seat at Carfax) non visitabis' &c. The rest is forgotten, and none there are now remembers it. After which spoken with gravity, the Freshman kist the shoe, put on his gown and band and took his place among the seniors. "

"This, " says Wood, "was the way and custom that had been used in (p.  122)the college, time out of mind, to initiate the freshmen; but betweenthat time and the restoration of K. Ch. 2 it was disused, and now sucha thing is absolutely forgotten. " His whole description, andespecially the parody of the master's oath not to visit Stamford, goesto show that he was right in attributing the ceremonies to remoteantiquity, and there are indications that the initiation of freshmenwas practised elsewhere in Oxford. Hearne speaks of similar customs atBalliol and at Brasenose, and an eighteenth-century editor of Woodasserts, that "striking traces" of the practice "may be found in manysocieties in this place, and in some a very near resemblance of it hasbeen kept up till within these few years. " Our quotation from Wood maytherefore serve to illustrate the treatment of the medieval freshmanat Oxford. We possess no details of the jocund advent at Cambridge, but in the medieval Scottish universities, where the name of bajanstill survives, there were relics of it within recent times. At StAndrews, a feast of raisins was the last survival of the bajan's"standing treat, " and attacks made by "Semis" (second year men) upon abajan class emerging from a lecture-room were an enlivening feature ofstudent life at Aberdeen up to the end of the nineteenth century. Theweapons in use were notebooks, and the belabouring of Aberdeen (p.  123)bajans with these instruments may be historically connected with thechastisement which we have found in some of the medieval initiationceremonies. It would be fanciful to connect the gown-tearing, whichwas also a feature of these attacks, with the assaults upon theRector's robe at Bologna. 

CHAPTER VII (p.  124)

TOWN AND GOWN

The violence which marked medieval life as a whole was not likely tobe absent in towns where numbers of young clerks were members of acorporation at variance with the authorities of the city. Universityrecords are full of injuries done to masters and students by thetownsfolk, and of privileges and immunities obtained from Pope or Kingor Bishop at the expense of the burgesses. When a new University wasfounded, it was sometimes taken for granted that these conflicts mustarise, and that the townsmen were certain to be in the wrong. Thus, when Duke Rudolf IV. Founded the University of Vienna in 1365, heprovided beforehand for such contingencies by ordaining that an attackon a student leading to the loss of a limb or other member of the bodywas to be punished by the removal of the same member from the body ofthe assailant, and that for a lesser injury the offender's hand was tobe wounded ("debet manus pugione transfigi"). The criminal mightredeem his person by a fine of a hundred silver marks for a seriousinjury and of forty marks for slighter damages, the victim to (p.  125)receive half of the fine. Assailants of students were not to havebenefit of sanctuary. Oxford history abounds in town and gown riots, the most famous of which is the battle of St Scholastica's Day (10thFebruary) 1354. The riot originated in a tavern quarrel; some clerksdisapproved of the wine at an inn near Carfax, and (in Antony Wood'swords) "the vintner giving them stubborn and saucy language, theythrew the wine and vessel at his head. " His friends urged theinn-keeper "not to put up with the abuse, " and rang the bell of StMartin's Church. A mob at once assembled, armed with bows and arrowsand other weapons; they attacked every scholar who passed, and evenfired at the Chancellor when he attempted to allay the tumult. Thejustly indignant Chancellor retorted by ringing St Mary's bell and amob of students assembled, also armed (in spite of many statutes tothe contrary). A battle royal raged till nightfall, at which time thefray ceased, no one scholar or townsman being killed or mortallywounded or maimed. If the matter had ended then, little would havebeen heard of the story, but next day the townsmen stationed eightyarmed men in St Giles's Church, who sallied out upon "certain scholarswalking after dinner in Beaumont killed one of them, and woundedothers. " A second battle followed, in which the citizens, aided by somecountrymen, defeated the scholars, and ravaged their halls, (p.  126)slaying and wounding. Night interrupted their operations, but on thefollowing day, "with hideous noises and clamours they came and invadedthe scholars' houses . .. And those that resisted them and stood upontheir defence (particularly some chaplains) they killed or else in agrievous sort wounded. .. . The crowns of some chaplains, that is, allthe skin so far as the tonsure went, these diabolical imps flayed offin scorn of their clergy. "

The injured University was fully avenged. The King granted itjurisdiction over the city, and, especially, control of the market, and the Bishop of Lincoln placed the townsmen under an interdict whichwas removed only on condition that the Mayor and Bailiffs, for thetime being, and "threescore of the chiefest Burghers, shouldpersonally appear" every St Scholastica's Day in St. Mary's Church, toattend a mass for the souls of the slain. The tradition that they wereto wear halters or silken cords has no authority, but they were each"to offer at the altar one penny, of which oblation forty pence shouldbe distributed to forty poor scholars of the University. " The custom, with some modifications, survived the Reformation, and it was not tillthe nineteenth century that the Mayor of Oxford ceased to have causeto regret the battle of St Scholastica's Day. 

The accounts of St Scholastica's Day and of most other riots which (p.  127)have come down to us are written from the standpoint of the scholars, but the records of the city of Oxford give less detailed but not lesscredible instances of assaults by members of the University. On theeve of St John Baptist's Day in 1306, for example, the tailors ofOxford were celebrating Midsummer "cum Cytharis Viellis et aliisdiversis instrumentis. " After midnight, they went out "de shoppissuis" and danced and sang in the streets. A clerk, irritated by thenoise, attacked them with a drawn sword, wounded one of them, and washimself mortally wounded in the skirmish. Of twenty-nine coroners'inquests which have been preserved for the period 1297-1322, thirteenare murders committed by scholars. Attacks on townsmen were not mereundergraduate follies, but were countenanced and even led by officialsof the University, _e. G. _ on a March night in 1526 one of the proctors"sate uppon a blocke in the streete afore the shoppe of one RobertJermyns, a barber, havinge a pole axe in his hand, a black cloake onhis backe, and a hatt on his head, " and organised a riot in which manytownsmen were "striken downe and sore beaten. " Citizens' houses wereattacked and "the saide Proctour and his company . .. Called for fire, "threatening to burn the houses, and insulting the inmates withopprobrious names. When such an incident as this was possible, it (p.  128)was of little use for the University to issue regulations or even topunish less exalted sinners, and the town must have suffered much fromthe outrages of scholars and of the "chamber-dekens" or pretendedscholars of the University, who were responsible for much of themischief. At Paris things became so bad that the Parlement had toissue a series of police regulations to suppress the bands ofscholars, or pretended scholars, who wandered about the streets atnight, disguised and armed. They attacked passers-by, and if they werewounded in the affray, their medical friends, we are told, dressedtheir wounds, so that they eluded discovery in the morning. Thehistory of every University town provides instances of streetconflicts--the records of Orleans and Toulouse abound in them--but wemust be content with a tale from Leipsic. 

The pages of the "Acta Rectorum" at Leipsic are full of illustrationsof the wilder side of student life, from which we extract the story ofone unhappy year. The year 1545 opened very badly, says the "Rector'sChronicle, " with three homicides. On Holy Innocents' Day, a bachelorwas murdered by a skinner in a street riot, and the murderer, thoughhe was seen by some respectable citizens, was allowed to escape. Astudent who killed a man on the night of the Sunday after the (p.  129)Epiphany was punished by the University in accordance with itsstatutes (_i. E. _ by imprisonment for life in the bishop's prison). Thethird murder was that of a young bachelor who was walking outside thecity, when two sons of rustics in the neighbourhood fell on him andkilled him. Their names were known, but the city authorities refusedto take action, and the populace, believing that they would not bepunished, pursued the members of the University with continued insultsand threats. After an unusually serious attack _cum bombardis_, (inwhich, "by the divine clemency, " a young mechanic was wounded), theUniversity, failing to obtain redress, appealed to Prince Maurice ofSaxony, who promised to protect the University. A conference betweenthe University and the city authorities took place, and edicts againstcarrying arms were published, but the skinners immediately indulged inanother outrage. One of them, Hans von Buntzell on Whitsunday, attacked, with a drawn sword, the son of a doctor of medicine, "ayouth (as all agree) most guiltless, " and wounded him in the arm, andif another student had not unexpectedly appeared, "would without doubthave killed this excellent boy. " The criminal was pursued to the houseof a skinner called Meysen, where he took refuge. The city authorities, inspired by the Prince's intervention, offered to impose three (p.  130)alternative sentences, and the University was asked to say whetherHans von Buntzell should lose one of his hands, or be publicly whippedand banished for ten years, or should have a certain stigma ("quodesset manus amittendae signum") burned in his hand and be banished. The University replied that it was for the city to carry out thecommands of the Prince, and declined to select the penalty. On thefollowing Monday a scaffold was erected in the market-place, on whichwere placed rods and a knife for cutting off the hand, "whichapparatus was thought by the skinners to be much too fierce and cruel, and a concourse began from all parts, composed not of skinners alone, but of mechanics of every kind, interceding with the Council for thecriminal. " The pleadings of the multitude gained the day, and all thepreparations were removed from the market-place amid the murmurs ofthe students. After supper, three senior members of the skinners cameto the Rector, begging for a commutation of the punishment, and offeringto beat Hans themselves in presence of representatives of theUniversity and the Town Council, with greater ferocity than the publicexecutioner could do if he were to whip him three times in public. TheRector replied that he must consult the University, and the proposalwas thrown out in Congregation. On the Saturday after the Feast of (p.  131)Trinity, the stigma was burned on the criminal's hand, and as anecessary consequence he was banished. 

Town riots do not complete the tale of violence. There were struggleswith Jews, and a Jewish row at Oxford in 1268 resulted in the erectionof a cross, with the following inscription:--

 Quis meus auctor erat? Judaei. Quomodo? Sumptu Quis jussit? Regnans. Quo procurante? Magistri. Cur? Cruce pro fracta ligni. Quo tempore? Festo Ascensus Domini. Quis est locus? Hic ubi sisto. 

Clerks' enemies were not always beyond their own household. Thehistory of Paris, the earlier history of Oxford, and the record ofmany another University give us instances of mortal combats betweenthe Nations. The scholars of Paris, in the thirteenth and fourteenthcenturies, had to face the mortal enmity of the monks of the Abbey ofSt Germain, the meadow in front of which was claimed by the Faculty ofArts. The sight of Paris students walking or playing on thePré-aux-clercs had much the same effect upon the Abbot and monks asthe famous donkeys had upon the strong-minded aunt of DavidCopperfield, but the measures they took for suppressing the nuisancewere less exactly proportioned to the offence. One summer day in 1278, masters and scholars went for recreation to the meadow, when the (p.  132)Abbot sent out armed servants and retainers of the monastery to attackthem. They came shouting "Ad mortem clericorum, " death to the clerks, "verbis crudelibus, _ad mortem ad mortem_, inhumaniter pluriesrepetitis. " A "famous Bachelor of Arts" and other clerks were seriouslywounded and thrown into horrible dungeons; another victim lost an eye. The retreat into the city was cut off, and fugitives were pursued farinto the country. Blood flowed freely, and the scholars who escapedreturned to their halls with broken heads and limbs and their clothestorn to fragments. Some of the victims died of their wounds, and themonks were punished by King and Pope, the Abbot being pensioned offand the Abbey compelled to endow two chaplains to say masses forscholars. Forty years later the University had again to appeal to thePope to avenge assaults by retainers of the Abbey upon scholars whowere fishing in the moat outside the Abbey walls. The monks, ofcourse, may have given a different version of the incidents. 

CHAPTER VIII (p.  133)

SUBJECTS OF STUDY, LECTURES AND EXAMINATIONS

The student of a medieval University was, as we have seen, expected toconverse in Latin, and all instruction was given in that language. Itwas therefore essential that, before entering on the Universitycurriculum, he should have a competent knowledge of Latin. Collegefounders attempted to secure this in various ways, sometimes by anexamination (_e. G. _ at the College of Cornouaille, at Paris no one wasadmitted a bursar until he was examined and found to be able to read)and sometimes by making provision for young boys to be taught by amaster of grammar. The Founder of New College met the difficulty bythe foundation of Winchester College, at which all Wykehamists (exceptthe earliest members of New College) were to be thoroughly grounded inLatin. It was more difficult for a University to insist upon such atest, but in 1328, the University of Paris had ordered that before ayouth was admitted to the privileges of "scholarity" or studentship, he must appear before the Rector and make his own application incontinuous Latin, without any French words. Formulae for this (p.  134)purpose would, doubtless, soon be invented and handed down bytradition, and the precaution cannot have been of much practicalvalue. There were plenty of grammar schools in the Middle Ages, and aclever boy was likely to find a patron and a place of education in theneighbourhood of his home. The grammar schools in University towns hadtherefore originally no special importance, but many of theundergraduates who came up at thirteen or fourteen required sometraining such as William of Waynflete provided for his younger demiesin connexion with the Grammar School which he attached to Magdalen, orsuch as Walter de Merton considered desirable when he ordained thatthere should be a Master of Grammar in his College to teach the poorboys, and that their seniors were to go to him in any difficultywithout any false shame ("absque rubore"). Many universities extendedcertain privileges to boys studying grammar, by placing their names onmatriculation rolls, though such matriculation was not part of thecurriculum for a degree. Masters in Grammar were frequently, but notnecessarily, University graduates; at Paris there were grammarmistresses as well as grammar masters. The connexion between thegrammar schools and the University was exceptionally close at Oxfordand Cambridge, where degrees in grammar came to be given. The (p.  135)University of Oxford early legislated for "inceptors" who were takingdegrees in grammar, and ordered the grammar masters who were graduatesto enrol, _pro forma_, the names of pupils of non-graduates, and tocompel non-graduate masters to obey the regulations of the University. A meeting of the grammar masters twice a term for discussions abouttheir subject and the method of teaching it was also ordered by theUniversity, which ultimately succeeded in wresting the right oflicensing grammar masters from the Archdeacon or other official towhom it naturally belonged. A fourteenth-century code of statutes forthe Oxford grammar schools orders the appointment of two Masters ofArts to superintend them, and gives some minute instructions about theteaching. Grammar masters are to set verses and compositions, to bebrought next day for correction; and they are to be specially carefulto see that the younger boys can recognise the different parts ofspeech and parse them accurately. In choosing books to read with theirpupils, they are to avoid the books of Ovid "de Arte Amandi" andsimilar works. Boys are to be taught to construe in French as well asin English, lest they be ignorant of the French tongue. The study ofFrench was not confined to the grammar boys: the University recognisedthe wisdom of learning a language necessary for composing (p.  136)charters, holding lay-courts, and pleading in the English fashion, andlectures in French were permitted at any hour that did not interferewith the regular teaching of Arts subjects. Such lectures were underthe control of the superintendents of the grammar masters. 

The degrees which Oxford and Cambridge conferred in Grammar did notinvolve residence or entitle the recipients to a vote in Convocation;but the conferment was accompanied by ceremonies which were almostparodies of the solemn proceedings of graduation or inception in arecognised Faculty, a birch taking the place of a book as a symbol ofthe power and authority entrusted to the graduand. A sixteenth-centuryEsquire Bedel of Cambridge left, for the benefit of his successors, details of the form for the "enteryng of a Master in Gramer. " The"Father" of the Faculty of Grammar (at Cambridge the mysteriousindividual known as the "Master of Glomery") brought his "sons" to StMary's Church for eight o'clock mass. "When mass is done, fyrst shallbegynne the acte in Gramer. The Father shall have hys sete made beforethe Stage for Physyke (one of the platforms erected in the church fordoctors of the different faculties, etc. ) and shall sytte alofte underthe stage for Physyke. The Proctour shall say, Incipiatis. When theFather hath argyude as shall plese the Proctour, the Bedeyll in (p.  137)Arte shall bring the Master of Gramer to the Vyce-chancelar, delyverynghym a Palmer wyth a Rodde, whych the Vyce-chancelar shall gyve to theseyde Master in Gramer, and so create hym Master. Then shall theBedell purvay for every master in Gramer a shrewde Boy, whom themaster in Gramer shall bete openlye in the Scolys, and the master inGramer shall give the Boy a Grote for Hys Labour, and another Grote tohym that provydeth the Rode and the Palmer &c. De singulis. And thusendythe the Acte in that Facultye. " We know of the existence ofsimilar ceremonies at Oxford. "Had the ambition to take these degreesin Grammar been widely diffused, " says Dr Rashdall, "the demand forwhipping boys might have pressed rather hardly upon the youth ofOxford; but very few of them are mentioned in the UniversityRegister. "

The basis of the medieval curriculum in Arts is to be found in theSeven Liberal Arts of the Dark Ages, divided into the _Trivium_(Grammar, Rhetoric and Dialectic) and the _Quadrivium_ (Music, Arithmetic, Geometry and Astronomy). The _Quadrivium_ was ofcomparatively little importance; Geometry and Music received smallattention; and Arithmetic, and Astronomy were at first chiefly usefulfor finding the date of Easter; but the introduction of mathematicallearning from Arabian sources in the thirteenth century greatly (p.  138)increased the scope of Geometry and Arithmetic, and added the study ofAlgebra. 

The Grammar taught in the universities assumed a knowledge of such atext-book as that of Alexander de Villa Dei, and consisted of ananalysis of the systems of popular grammarians, based on the section_De barbarismo_ in the _Ars Grammatica_ of Ælius Donatus, afourth-century grammarian, whose work became universally usedthroughout Europe. Latin poets were read in the grammar schools, andserved for grammatical and philological expositions in theuniversities, and the study of Rhetoric depended largely on thetreatises of Cicero. The "Dialectic" of the _Trivium_ was the realinterest of the medieval student among the ancient seven subjects, butthe curriculum in Arts came to include also the three Philosophies, Physical, Moral, and Metaphysical. The arms of the University ofOxford consist of a book with seven clasps surrounded by three crowns, the clasps representing the seven Liberal Arts and the crowns thethree Philosophies. The universities were schools of philosophy, mental and physical, and the attention of students in Arts was chieflydirected to the logic, metaphysics, physics, and ethics of Aristotle. Up to the twelfth century, Aristotle was known only through thetranslations into Latin of the sections of the _Organon_, (p.  139)entitled _De Interpretatione_ and _Categoriae_, and through thelogical works of Boethius. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries therange of medieval studies was greatly enlarged by the introduction ofother works of Aristotle from translations partly from the Arabic andpartly direct from the Greek. The conservatism of the University ofParis at first forbade the study of the new Aristotle, but it soonbecame universal in the medieval universities. In addition to theworks of Aristotle, as they were known in the Middle Ages, medievalstudents read such books as Porphyry's _Isagoge_, or Introduction toAristotle; the criticism of Aristotle's _Categories_, by Gilbert de laPorrée, known as the _Sex Principia_; the _Summulae Logicales_, asemi-grammatical, semi-logical treatise by Petrus Hispanus (Pope JohnXXI. ); the _Parva Logicalia_ of Marsilius of Inghen; the _Labyrinthus_and _Grecismus_ of Eberhard; the Scriptural commentaries of Nicolausde Lyra; the _Tractatus de Sphaera_, an astronomical work by athirteenth-century Scotsman, John Holywood (Joannes de Sacro Bosco);and they also studied Priscian, Donatus, Boethius, Euclid, andPtolemy. In 1431 the _Nova Rhetorica_ of Cicero, the _Metamorphoses_of Ovid, and the works of Virgil were prescribed at Oxford asalternatives to the fourth book of the _Topica_ of Boethius. By theend of the century Humanism had found a place in the universities, (p.  140)and sixteenth-century colleges at Oxford and Cambridge provided forthe study of the literatures of Greece and Rome. In Scotland themedieval teaching of Aristotle reigned supreme in all its threeuniversities until the appointment of Andrew Melville as Principal atGlasgow in 1574, and in 1580 he had some difficulty in persuading themasters at St Andrews to "peruse Aristotle in his ain language. "

Lectures were either "ordinary" or "cursory, " a distinction which, asDr Rashdall has shown, corresponded to the "ordinary" and"extra-ordinary" lectures at Bologna. The ordinary lectures were thestatutable exercises appointed by the Faculty, and delivered by itsproperly accredited teachers in the hours of the morning, which weresacred to the prelections of the masters. Cursory lectures weredelivered in the afternoon, frequently by bachelors; but as Collegeteaching became more important than the lectures given in the Schools, the distinction gradually disappeared. Ordinary lectures weredelivered "solemniter" and involved a slow and methodical analysis ofthe book. The statutes of Vienna prescribe that no master shall readmore than one chapter of the text "ante quaestionem vel etiamquaestione expedita. " Various references in College and Universitystatutes show that the cursory lecture was not regarded as the (p.  141)full equivalent of an ordinary lecture. At Oxford, attendance on alecture on the books or any book of the Metaphysics, or on thePhysics, or the Ethics, was not to count for a degree, except in thecase of a book largely dealing with the opinions of the ancients. Thethird and fourth books of the Metaphysics were excepted from the rule, "they being usually read cursorily, that the ordinary reading of theother books might proceed more rapidly. " The cursory lecture wasclearly beloved of the pupil, for Oxford grammar masters are reprovedfor lecturing "cursorie" instead of "ordinarie" for the sake of gain;and at Vienna, the tariff for cursory lectures is double that forordinary lectures. At Paris the books of Aristotle de Dialectica wereto be read "ordinarie et non ad cursum, " and students of medicine hadto read certain books "semel ordinarie, bis cursorie. " The statutes ofHeidelberg contrast "cursorie" with "extense. " In the Faculty of CanonLaw there was an additional distinction, the ordinary lecture beinggenerally restricted to the Decretum; at Oxford, the book of Decretalsis to be read at the morning hours at which the doctors of law arewont to deliver ordinary lectures, and at Vienna the doctors areforbidden to read anything but the Decretals in the morning atordinary lectures. The instructions given to the Vienna doctors of (p.  142)law illustrate the thoroughness of the medieval lecture in allfaculties. They are first to state the case carefully, then to readthe text, then to restate the case, then to remark on "notabilia, " andthen to discuss questions arising out of the subject, and finally, todeal with the Glosses. So, at Oxford, the Masters in Arts are to readthe books on logic and the philosophies "rite, " with the necessary andadequate exposition of the text, and with questions and argumentspertinent to the subject-matter. 

A problem, still unsolved, about the methods of lecturing disturbedthe minds of the Parisian masters. Were they to dictate lectures or tospeak so fast that their pupils could not commit their words towriting? From the standpoint of teachers who delivered frequentlectures, all of the same type, and on a few set books, it wasprobably desirable that there should not be opportunities ofpossessing such copies of a professor's lectures as used to circulate, not many years ago, in Scottish and in German universities. In 1229the Faculty of Arts at Paris made a statute on the methods oflecturing. It explains that there are two ways of reading books in theliberal arts. The masters of philosophy may deliver their expositionsfrom their chairs so rapidly that, although the minds of theiraudience may grasp their meaning, their hands cannot write it (p.  143)down. This, they say, was the custom in other faculties. The other wayis to speak so slowly that their hearers can take down what they say. On mature reflection, the Faculty has decided that the former is thebetter way, and henceforth in any lecture, ordinary or cursory, or inany disputation or other manner of teaching, the master is to speak asin delivering a speech, and as if no one were writing in his presence. A lecturer who breaks the new rule is to be suspended for a year, andif the students showed their dislike to it, by shouting, hissing, groaning, or throwing stones, they were to be sent down for a year. More than two hundred years later, in 1452, the statute was rescindedby Cardinal Estoutville, but it was probably never operative. Estoutville permitted either method of lecturing, and contentedhimself with forbidding lecturers to use questions and lectures whichwere not of their own composition, or to deliver their lectures(however good) to be read by one of their scholars as a deputy. Heinstructs the masters to lecture regularly according to the statutesand to explain the text of Aristotle, "de puncto in punctum, " and, holding that fear and reverence are the life-blood of scholasticdiscipline, he repeats an injunction which we find in 1336, that thestudents in Arts are to sit not on benches or raised seats, but on (p.  144)the floor, "ut occasio superbiae a juvenibus secludatur. " The name ofthe street in which lectures were given, Vicus Stramineus, is said tohave been derived from the straw on which the students sat. Thequestion whether lectures should be committed to writing or not, troubled the masters of other universities besides Paris, and thestatutes of the College de Verdale at Toulouse accept, in 1337, theview taken at Paris a hundred years earlier. Since study is a vehementapplication of the mind, and requires the whole man, the scholars areforbidden to fatigue themselves with too many lectures--not more thantwo or three a day--and in lecture they are not to take down thelecturer's words, nor, trusting in writings of this kind, to blunttheir "proprium intellectum. " In the Schools, they must not use"incausta" or pencils except for correcting a book, etc. And what theyhave been able to retain in their memory they must meditate on withoutdelay. 

The insistence on meditation was a useful educational method, but asteaching became more organised, the student was not left withoutguidance in his meditations. The help which he received outsidelectures was given in Repetitions or Resumptions. The procedure atRepetitions may be illustrated from the statutes of the College ofDainville at Paris: "We ordain that all bursars in grammar and (p.  145)philosophy speak the Latin tongue, and that those who hear the samebook ordinarily and cursorily shall attend one and the same master(namely, one whom the master [of the College] assigns to them), andafter the lecture they shall return home and meet in one place torepeat the lecture. One after another shall repeat the whole lecture, so that each of them may know it well, and the less advanced shall bebound daily to repeat the lectures to the more proficient. " A latercode of the same College provides that "All who study humane lettersshall, on every day of the schools read in the morning a composition, that is a speech in Latin, Greek or the vernacular, to their master, being prepared to expound the writer or historian who is being read indaily lecture in their schools. At the end of the week, that is onFriday or Saturday, they shall show up to their master a résumé of allthe lectures they have learned that week, and every day before they goto the schools they shall be bound to make repetitions to one of thephilosophers or of the theologians whom the [College] master shallchoose; for this work. " At Louvain, the time between 5 A. M. And thefirst lecture (about seven) was spent in studying the lesson that thestudents might better understand the lecture; after hearing it, theyreturned to their own rooms to revise it and commit it to memory. After dinner, their books were placed on a table, and all the (p.  146)scholars of one Faculty repeated their lesson and answered questions. A similar performance took place in the two hours before supper. Aftersupper, the tutor treated them for half an hour to a "jocum honestum, "and before sending them to bed gave them a light and pleasantdisputation. The disputation was a preparation for the disputationswhich formed part of what we should now term the degree examinations. A thesis was propounded, attacked, and defended ("impugned andpropugned") with the proper forms of syllogistic reasoning. 

The teaching, both in lectures and in disputations, was originallyUniversity teaching, and the younger Masters of Arts, the "necessaryregents, " were bound to stay up for some years and lecture in theSchools. They were paid by their scholars, and the original meaning ofthe word "Collections, " still in frequent use at Oxford, istraditionally supposed to be found in the payments made for lecturesat the end of each term. Thus, at Oxford, a student paid threepence aterm (one shilling a year) to his regent for lectures in Logic, andfourpence a term for lectures in Natural Philosophy. The system wasnot a satisfactory one, and alike in Paris, in Oxford, and inCambridge, it succumbed to the growth of College teaching. The Head ofa Parisian College, from the first, superintended the studies of (p.  147)the scholars, and, although this duty was not required of an Oxford orCambridge Head, provision was gradually made in the statutes ofEnglish colleges for the instruction of the junior members by theirseniors. The first important step in this direction was taken byWilliam of Wykeham, who ordered special payment to be made by theCollege to Fellows who undertook the tuition of the younger Fellows. His example was followed in this, as in other matters, by subsequentfounders both at Oxford and at Cambridge, and gradually Universityteaching was, in the Faculty of Arts, almost entirely superseded byCollege tuition. In other universities, lectures continued to be givenby University officials. 

The medieval undergraduates had a tendency to "rag" in lectures, atradition which is almost unknown at Oxford and Cambridge, but whichpersisted till quite recent times in the Scottish universities. Prohibitions of noise and disturbance in lecture-rooms abound in allstatutes. At Vienna, students in Arts are exhorted to behave likeyoung ladies (more virginum) and to refrain from laughter, murmurs, and hisses, and from tearing down the schedules in which the mastersgive notice of their lectures. At Prague, also, the conduct of youngladies was held up as a model for the student at lecture, and, atAngers, students who hissed in contempt of a doctor were to beexpelled. 

The career of a student was divided into two parts by his (p.  148)"Determination, " a ceremony which is the origin of the Bachelor'sdegree. At Paris, where, at all events in the earlier period of itshistory, examinations were real, the "Determination" was preceded by"Responsions, " and no candidate was admitted to determine until he hadsatisfied a Regent Master in the Schools, in public, "de Questionerespondens. " The determination itself was a public disputation, afterwhich the determiner might wear the bachelor's "cappa" and lecture onthe Organon. He continued his attendance on the lectures in theSchools up to the time of his "Inception" as a master. The Inceptionwas preceded by an examination for licence and by a disputation knownas the Quodlibetica, at which the subject was chosen by the candidate. The bachelor who was successful in obtaining the Chancellor's licenceproceeded to the ceremony of Inception, and received his master's_biretta_. 

The stringency of examinations varied in different universities and atdifferent times. The proportion of successful candidates seems to havebeen everywhere very large, and in some universities rejection musthave been almost unknown. We do find references to disappointedcandidates, _e. G. _ at Caen, where medical students who have been"ploughed" have to take an oath not to bring "malum vel damnum" uponthe examiners. But even at Louvain, where the examination system (p.  149)was fully developed in the Middle Ages, and where there were classlists in the fifteenth century (the classes being distinguished as_Rigorosi_, _Transibiles_, and _Gratiosi_), failure was regarded as anexceptional event ("si autem, quod absit, aliqui inveniantursimpliciter gratiosi seu refutabiles, erunt de quarto ordine"). Theregulations for examinations at Louvain prescribe that the examinersare not to ask disturbing questions ("animo turbandi aut confundendipromovendos") and forbid unfair treatment of pupils of particularmasters and frivolous or useless questions; although at hisQuodlibeticum, the bachelor might indulge in "jocosas questiones adauditorii recreationem. " The element of display implied in the lastquotation was never absent from medieval examinations, and at Oxford, there seems to have been little besides this ceremonial element. Acandidate had to prove that he had complied with the regulations aboutattendance at lectures, etc. , and to obtain evidence of fitness from anumber of masters. A bachelor had to dispute several times with amaster, and these disputations, which were held at the AugustinianConvent, came to be known as "doing Austins. " The medieval system, asit lingered at Oxford in the close of the eighteenth century, is thusdescribed by Vicesimus Knox. 

 "The youth whose heart pants for the honour of a Bachelor of (p.  150) Arts degree must wait patiently till near four years have revolved. .. . He is obliged during this period, once to oppose and once to respond. .. . This opposing and responding is termed, in the cant of the place, _doing generals_. Two boys or men, as they call themselves, agree to _do generals_ together. The first step in this mighty work is to procure arguments. These are always handed down, from generation to generation, on long slips of paper, and consist of foolish syllogisms on foolish subjects, of the foundation or significance of which the respondent and opponent seldom know more than an infant in swaddling cloaths. The next step is to go for a _liceat_ to one of the petty officers, called the Regent-Master of the Schools, who subscribes his name to the questions and receives sixpence as his fee. When the important day arrives, the two doughty disputants go into a large dusty room, full of dirt and cobwebs. .. . Here they sit in mean desks, opposite to each other from one o'clock till three. Not once in a hundred times does any officer enter; and, if he does, he hears a syllogism or two, and then makes a bow, and departs, as he came and remained, in solemn silence. The disputants then return to the amusement of cutting the desks, carving their names, or reading Sterne's Sentimental Journey, or some other edifying novel. When the exercise is duly performed by both parties, they have a right to the title and insignia of _Sophs_: but not before they have been formally _created_ (p.  151) by one of the regent-masters, before whom they kneel, while he lays a volume of Aristotle's works on their heads, and puts on a hood, a piece of black crape, hanging from their necks, and down to their heels. .. . There remain only one or two trifling forms, and another disputation almost exactly similar to _doing generals_, but called _answering under bachelor_ previous to the awful examination. Every candidate is obliged to be examined in the whole circle of the sciences by three masters of arts _of his own choice_. .. . _Schemes_, as they are called, or little books containing forty or fifty questions on each science, are handed down from age to age, from one to another. The candidate employs three or four days in learning these by heart, and the examiners, having done the same before him, know what questions to ask, and so all goes on smoothly. When the candidate has displayed his universal knowledge of the sciences, he is to display his skill in philology. One of the masters therefore asks him to construe a passage in some Greek or Latin classic, which he does with no interruption, just as he pleases, and as well as he can. The statutes next require that he should translate familiar English phrases into Latin. And now is the time when the masters show their wit and jocularity. .. . This familiarity, however, only takes place when the examiners are pot-companions of the candidate, which indeed is usually the case; for it is reckoned good management to get acquainted with two or three jolly (p.  152) young masters of arts, and supply them well with port previously to the examination. If the vice-chancellor and proctors happen to enter the school, a very uncommon event, then a little solemnity is put on. .. . As neither the officer, nor anyone else, usually enters the room (for it is reckoned very _ungenteel_), the examiners and the candidates often converse on the last drinking-bout, or on horses, or read the newspapers or a novel. "

The supply of port was the eighteenth-century relic of the feastswhich used to accompany Determination and Inception, and with which somany sumptuary regulations of colleges and universities are concerned. There is a reference to a Determining Feast in the Paston Letters, inwhich the ill-fated Walter Paston, writing in the summer of 1479, afew weeks before his premature death, says to his brother: "And yf yewyl know what day I was mead Baschyler, I was maad on Fryday wassevynyth, and I mad my fest on the Munday after. I was promysydvenyson ageyn my fest of my Lady Harcort, and of a noder man to, but Iwas desevyd of both; but my gestes hewld them plesyd with such mete asthey had, blyssyd be God. Hoo have yeo in Hys keeping. Wretyn at Oxon, on the Wedenys day next after Seynt Peter. "

A few glimpses of the life of this fifteenth-century Oxonian may (p.  153)conclude our survey. Walter Paston had been sent to Oxford in 1473, under the charge of a priest called James Gloys. His mother did notwish him to associate too closely with the son of their neighbour, Thomas Holler. "I wold, " she says, "Walter schuld be copilet with abetter than Holler son is . .. Howe be it I wold not that he schuldmake never the lesse of hym, by cause he is his contre man andneghbour. " The boy was instructed to "doo welle, lerne well, and be ofgood rewle and disposycion, " and Gloys was asked to "bydde hym that hebe not to hasty of takyng of orderes that schuld bynd him. " To takeOrders under twenty-three years of age might lead, in MargaretPaston's opinion, to repentance at leisure, and "I will love hymbetter to be a good secular man than to be a lewit priest. " We nexthear of Walter in May 1478 when he writes to his mother recommendinghimself to her "good moderchypp, " and asking for money. He hasreceived £5, 16s. 6d. , and his expenses amount to £6, 5s. 5d. "Thatcomth over the reseytys in my exspenses I have borrowed of MasterEdmund and yt draweth to 8 shillings. " He might have applied for aloan to one of the "chests" which benevolent donors had founded forsuch emergencies, depositing some article of value, and receiving atemporary loan: but he preferred to borrow from his new tutor, (p.  154)Edmund Alyard. By March 1479, Alyard was able to reassure the anxiousmother about her boy's choice of a career; he was to go to law, takinghis Bachelor's degree in Arts at Midsummer. His brother, Sir John, whowas staying at the George at Paul's Wharf in London, intended to bepresent at the ceremony, but his letter miscarried: "Martin Brown hadthat same tyme mysch mony in a bage, so that he durst not bryng ytwith hym, and that same letter was in that same bage, and he hadforgete to take owt the letter, and he sent all togeder by London, sothat yt was the next day after that I was maad Bachyler or than theletter cam, and so the fawt was not in me. " This is the last we hearof Walter Paston. On his way home, on the 18th August 1479, he died atNorwich, after a short illness. He left a number of "togae" to hisOxford friends, including Robert Holler, the son of his Norfolkneighbour, to whom he also bequeathed "unum pulvinar vocatum _lebolstar_. " The rest of his Oxford goods he left to Alyard, but hissheep and his lands to his own family. The cost of his illness andfuneral amounted to about thirty shillings. No books are mentioned inthe will; possibly they were sold for his inception feast, or he maynever have possessed any. As a junior student, he would not have beenallowed to use the great library which Humphrey of Gloucester had (p.  155)presented to the University; but there were smaller libraries to whichhe might have access, for books were sometimes chained up in St Mary'sChurch that scholars might read them. 

APPENDIX (p.  157)

My attention has been called (too late for a reference in the text) toa medieval Latin poem giving a gloomy account of student life in Parisin the twelfth century. The verses, which have been printed in the_American Journal of Philology_ (vol. Xi. P. 80), insist upon thehardships of the student's life, and contrast his miserable conditionwith the happier lot of the citizens of Paris. For him there is norejoicing in the days of his youth, and no hope even of a competencein the future. His lodgings are wretched and neglected; his dress ismiserable, and his appearance slovenly. His food consists of peas, beans, and cabbage, and

 "libido Mensæ nulla venit nisi quod sale sparsa rigorem Esca parum flectit. "

His bed is a hard mattress stretched on the floor, and sleep bringshim only a meagre respite from the toils of the day:--

 "Sed in illa pace soporis Pacis eget studii labor insopitus, et ipso Cura vigil somno, libros operamque ministrat Excitæ somnus animæ, nec prima sopori Anxietas cedit, sed quæ vigilaverat ante Sollicitudo redit, et major summa laboris Curarum studiis in somnibus obicit Hydram. "

In the early hours of the morning he goes to his lectures, and the (p.  158)whole of his day is given to study. The description of the student atlecture is interesting:--

 "Aure et mente bibit et verba cadentia promo Promptus utroque levat, oculique et mentis in illo Fixa vigilque manet acies aurisque maritat Pronuba dilectam cupida cum meute Minervam. "

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY (p.  159)

Savigny: Geschichte der römischen Rechts im Mittelalter. (Heidelberg, 1834. )

Sir William Hamilton: Discussions on Philosophy and Literature, Education, and University Reform. (London, 1852. )

Denifle: Die Entstehung der Universitäten des Mittelalters bis 1400. (Berlin, 1885. )

Rashdall: The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages. (Oxford, 1895. )

Kaufmann: Geschichte der Deutschen Universitäten. (Stuttgart, 1888. )

Article on Universities in the _Encyclopædia Britannica_. 

Archiv für Lit. U. Kirchengeschichte des Mittelalters. Jurist Statutesof Padua (1331) in vol. Vi. ; Salamanca documents in vol. V. 

Malagola: Statuti della università e dei collegi dello studiobolognese. (Bologna, 1888. )

Denifle and Chatelain: Chartularium Universitatis Parisiensis. (Paris, 1889-1897. )

(Many of the statutes of the Colleges of Paris will be found scatteredthrough Felibien: Histoire de la Ville de Paris. Paris, 1725. )

Antony Wood: History and Antiquities of the University of Oxford. (Ed. Gutch. Oxford, 1792-6. )

---- History and Antiquities of the Colleges and Halls in theUniversity of Oxford. (Ed. Gutch. Oxford, 1786. )

Anstey: Munimenta Academica. (Rolls Series, 1868. )

Statutes of the Colleges of Oxford. (London, 1853. )

Clark: The Colleges of Oxford. (London, 1892. )

(The best account of Oxford will be found in vol. Ii. , Part ii. , of DrRashdall's "Universities of Europe. " There are two short histories(p.  160) of the University by Maxwell Lyte (London, 1886) and Brodrick(London, 1886. ). )

Documents relating to the University and Colleges of Cambridge. (London, 1852. )

Mullinger: The University of Cambridge from the Earliest Times to theRoyal Injunctions of 1535. (Cambridge, 1873. )

In two subsequent volumes Mr Mullinger has continued the narrative tothe latter half of the seventeenth century, and he has also written ashort "History of the University of Cambridge. " (Epochs of ChurchHistory. London, 1888. )

Gherardi: Statuti della università e studio Fiorentino. (Florence, 1881. )

Villanueva: Statutes of the University of Lerida in "Viage Literario álas Iglesias de España. " T. Xvi. (Madrid, 1851. )

Marcel Fournier: Les Statuts et Privilèges des Universités françaisesdepuis leur fondation jusqu'en 1789. (Paris, 1890-92. )

Dittrich und Spirk: Monumenta Historica Universitatis Pragensis. (Prague, 1830. )

Kink: Geschichte der Kaiserl. Univ. Zu Wien. (Vienna, 1854. )

Hautz: Geschichte der Universität Heidelberg. (Mannheim, 1862. )

Vernulæus: Academia Lovaniensis. (Louvain, 1667. )

Molanus: Historiæ Lovaniensium, ed. De Ram. (Brussels, 1861. )

Zarncke: Die Statutenbücher der Univ. Leipzig. (Leipzig, 1861. )

---- Acta Rectorum Univ. Lipsiensis. (Leipzig, 1858. )

Evidence taken and received by the Scottish Universities Commissionersof 1826. (London, 1837. )

Innes: Fasti Aberdonenses. Spalding Club. (Aberdeen, 1854. )

INDEX (p.  163)

 Abelard, 6. 

 Aberdeen, Univ. Of, 105, 106, 107, 122-3. 

 Ælius Donatus, 138. 

 Aix, Univ. Of, 39, 112, 114. 

 Alexander de Villa Dei, 138. 

 Alfonso the Wise, 9. 

 Alyard, Edmund, 153-4. 

 Angers, Univ. Of, 7, 147. 

 ---- Coll. Of Breuil at, 90. 

 Anselm, St, 6. 

 Arezzo, Studium at, 7. 

 Aristotle, 138-143. 

 Arts, The Seven Liberal, 137-9. 

 Avignon, Univ. Of, 88, 112. 

 ---- College of Annecy at, 113. 

 ---- College of Notre Dame de Pitié at, 88, 90. 

 ---- Confraternity of St Sebastian at, 112. 

 Bagley Wood, 97. 

 Bateman, Bishop, 70. 

 Boethius, 139. 

 Bologna, Spanish College at, 19, 34, 93. 

 ---- Studium Generale at, 6, 8, 9. 

 ---- Universities of, 11-34, 44, 46-7, 48, 140. 

 Caen, Univ. Of, 148. 

 Cahors, College of St Nicholas de Pelegry at, 89, 91. 

 Caius, Dr, 61, 68. 

 Cambridge, Univ. Of, 3, 7, 10, 120, 136-7, 146-7. 

 ---- College discipline at, 49-78. 

 ---- Colleges of-- Caius, 61, 68, 70; Christ's, 66, 69, 71; Clare, 59; Jesus, 67; King's, 62, 64, 66; Peterhouse, 58, 62, 63, 69, 72; Trinity, 68; Trinity Hall, 70. 

 Chaucer, Prologue to Canterbury Tales, 1-3, 73, 74, 75. 

 Chichele, Archbishop, 73. 

 Cicero, 138, 139. 

 College, meaning of word, 5. 

 Cologne, Univ. Of, 48. 

 Dôle, Univ. Of, 39. 

 Eberhard, 139. 

 Ely, Bishop of, 47. 

 Erfurt, Univ. Of, 48. 

 Estoutville, Cardinal, 94-5, 143-4. 

 Euclid, 139. 

 Farleigh, 51, 52. 

 Florence, Univ. Of, 34-7. 

 France, Universities of, 12. 

 Frederick Barbarossa, 24-5. 

 Frederick II. , 8. 

 Germany, Universities of, 47-8, 142. 

 Gilbert de la Porrée, 139. 

 Glasgow, Univ. Of, 105, 106, 140. 

 Gloys, James, 153. 

 Gregory IX. , 9. 

 Hearne, Thomas, 122. 

 Heidelberg, Univ. Of, 48, 107-8, 117, 141. 

 Henry II. , 6. 

 Henry VI. , 58, 61, 63, 66. 

 Henry VIII. , 58. 

 Holler, Thomas, 153. 

 ---- Robert, 154. 

 Holywood, John, 139. 

 Ingolstadt, Univ. Of, 105. 

 Innocent III. , 42, 43. 

 ---- IV. , 7, 9. 

 John XXI. , 139. 

 ---- XXII. , 10. 

 ---- King, 7, 45. 

 Knox, Vicesimus, 149. 

 Leipsic, Univ. Of, 48. 

 ---- Collegium Maius at, 89. 

 ---- Collegium Minus at, 90. 

 ---- University discipline at, 102-5, 108. 

 ---- "Town and Gown" at, 128-131. 

 Lerida, Univ. Of, 37-8. 

 Lincoln, See of, 45, 46. 

 Louvain, Univ. Of, 48, 145-6, 149. 

 ---- University, discipline at, 101-2, 116. 

 Lyons, Studium at, 7, 9. 

 Lyra, Nicolaus de, 139. 

 Maldon, 51, 52, 54. 

 Marsilius, 139. 

 Melville, Andrew, 140. 

 Modena, Studium at, 7, 9. 

 Merton, Walter de, 50-6, 134. 

 Montpellier, Univ. Of, 7. 

 ---- College of Douze Medecins at, 89. 

 ---- College of St Benedict at, 91-3. 

 ---- College of Saint Ruf at, 89, 90. 

 Naples, Univ. Of, 8. 

 "Nations, " 14, 15, 18, 19, 20, 43, 44, 46, 78, 79, 131. 

 Nicholas IV. , 9, 10. 

 Orleans, Univ. Of, 7, 115, 128. 

 Ovid, 139. 

 Oxford, Univ. Of, 6, 10, 39, 45, 47, 49, 120, 133-142, 146, 147, 149-155. 

 ---- College discipline at, 49-78. 

 ---- University discipline at, 95-101. 

 ---- "Town and Gown" at, 124-128. 

 Oxford, Colleges of-- Balliol, 71, 122; Brasenose, 66, 67, 122; Christ Church, 68; Corpus Christi, 60, 67, 68, 72, 105; Jesus, 59; Lincoln, 77; Magdalen, 62, 66, 134; Merton, 50-6, 60, 67, 120, 121, 122, 134; New College, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 66, 67, 71, 76, 77, 120, 133, 147; Pembroke, 68; Queen's, 59, 61, 63, 74, 77; Worcester, 68. 

 Oxford, Halls of-- Haburdaysh Hall, 98; Pauline Hall, 97; Peckwater Inn, 97. 

 Padua, Univ. Of, 7, 10, 34. 

 Palencia, Studium at, 7. 

 Paris, Univ. Of, 6, 7, 9, 11, 40, 41-5, 49, 128, 133, 134, 139, 141, 142-6, 148, 157-8. 

 ---- College discipline at, 78-88. 

 ---- "Jocund Advent" at, 109-112. 

 ---- Univ. Discipline at, 94-5. 

 Paris, Colleges of-- Cambray, 111; Clugny, 88; Cornouaille, 83, 84, 85, 86, 111, 133; Dainville, 87, 111, 144-6; Le Mans, 79, 84; Marmoutier, 86; Plessis, 82; St Bernard, 83, 85, 86, 110; Sorbonne, 81, 85, 86, 111, 112; Tours, 83; Treasurer's, 79, 80, 87, 111. 

 Paston, John, 154. 

 ---- Margaret, 153. 

 ---- Walter, 152-5. 

 Peckham, Archbishop, 55-6. 

 Perpignan, Univ. Of, 38. 

 Petrus Hispanus, 139. 

 Philip Augustus, 42. 

 Plessis, Geoffrey du, 82. 

 Porphyry, 139. 

 Prague, Univ. Of, 48, 116, 147. 

 Priscian, 139. 

 Ptolemy, 139. 

 Reggio, Studium at, 7. 

 Reims, Studium at, 7. 

 Rostock, Univ. Of, 48. 

 Rouen, 79, 80, 81. 

 Rudolf IV. , 124. 

 St Andrews, Univ. Of, 105, 106, 122. 

 St Scholastica's Day, 125-6. 

 Salamanca, Studium at, 7, 9, 39. 

 Salerno, Univ. Of, 9. 

 Saone, Guillaume de, 79. 

 Scayfe, Henry, 77. 

 Scotland, Universities of, 48, 105, 140, 142. 

 Seggefyld, John, 77. 

 Studium Generale, meaning of, 5-12. 

 Toulouse, Univ. Of, 7, 9, 128. 

 ---- College de Foix at, 89. 

 ---- College de Verdale at, 91, 144. 

 Universitas, meaning of, 4, 5, 10, 11. 

 Valladolid, Studium at, 7. 

 Vicenza, Studium at, 7. 

 Vienna, Univ. Of, 48, 124, 140, 141, 142, 147. 

 Virgil, 139. 

 Waynflete, William of, 66, 134. 

 Wingfield, Sir E. , 57. 

 Wood, Antony à, 120-2, 125-126. 

 Wolsey, Cardinal, 68. 

 Würzburg, Univ. Of, 48. 

 Wykeham, William of, 58, 60, 62, 63, 64, 67, 76, 147. 

 Zarncke, Friedrich, 102. 

TURNBULL AND SPEARS, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH