Readings in the History of Education | Page 2

The passage requires more explanation by the teacher, or more preliminary knowledge on the part of the student, than any other selection in the book.
The sources from which the selections have been made are indicated in the footnotes to the text My great indebtedness to Mr. Hastings Rashdall's "Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages" is also there indicated. Messrs. G.P. Putnam's Sons and Mr. Joseph McCabe generously gave me permission to quote more extensive passages from the latter's brilliant biography of Abelard than I finally found it possible to use. Mr. Charles S. Moore has been my chief assistant in the preparation of the manuscript; most of the translations not otherwise credited are due to his careful work, but I am responsible for the version finally adopted in numerous passages in which the interpretation depends on a knowledge of detailed historical facts. In conclusion, I have to thank Professor Charles H. Haskins and Professor Leo Wiener for information which has spared me many days of research on obscure details, and Professor Paul H. Hanus for suggestions which have contributed to the clearness of the text.
A.O.N.

CONTENTS
PAGE I. INTRODUCTION 1
II. THE RENAISSANCE OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY 4
III. THE RISE OF UNIVERSITIES 13
1. Teachers and Students of the Twelfth Century (a) Abelard 13 (b) John of Salisbury 25 2. The New Method 35 3. The New Studies 37 (a) The Works of Aristotle 40 (b) Roman Law 49 (c) Canon Law 55 (d) Theology 76 (e) Medicine 78 (f) Other University Text-books 78 4. University Privileges 80 (a) Special Protection by the Sovereign 81 (b) The Right of Trial in Special Courts 86 (c) Exemption from Taxation 88 (d) The Privilege of Suspending Lectures (Cessatio) 92 (e) The Right of Teaching Everywhere (Jus ubique docendi) 96 (f) Privileges Granted by a Municipality 98 (g) The Influence of Mediaeval Privileges on Modern Universities 101 5. Universities Founded by the Initiative of Civil or Ecclesiastical Powers 102
IV. UNIVERSITY EXERCISES 107
(a) The Lecture 107 (b) The Disputation 115 (c) The Examination 124 (d) A Day's Work in 1476 132 (e) Time-table of Lectures at Leipzig, 1519 132
V. REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREES IN ARTS 135
1. Paris, 1254 136 2. Paris, 1366 138 3. Oxford, 1267 and (?) 1408 138 4. Leipzig, A.B., 1410 139 5. Leipzig, A.M., 1410 139 6. Leipzig, A.B. and A.M., 1519 134
VI. ACADEMIC LETTERS 141
1. Letters Relating to Paris 141 2. Two Oxford Letters of the Fifteenth Century 149

READINGS IN THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION

I
INTRODUCTION
The history of education, like all other branches of history, is based upon documents. Historical documents are, in general, "the traces which have been left by the thoughts and actions of men of former times"; the term commonly refers to the original records or sources from which our knowledge of historical facts is derived. The documents most generally used by historians are written or printed. In the history of education alone these are of the greatest variety; as is shown in the following pages, among them are university charters, proceedings, regulations, lectures, text-books, the statutes of student organizations, personal letters, autobiographies, contemporary accounts of university life, and laws made by civil or ecclesiastical authorities to regulate university affairs. Similar varieties of records exist for other educational institutions and activities. The immense masses of such written or printed materials produced to-day, even to the copy-book of the primary school and the student's note-book of college lectures, will, if they survive, become documents for the future historian of education.
The known sources for the history of education in western Europe since the twelfth century--to go no further afield--are exceedingly numerous, and widely spread among various public and private collections; the labor of a lifetime would hardly suffice to examine them all critically. Nevertheless many printed and written documents have been collected, edited, and published in their original languages; and in some instances the collections are fairly complete, or at least fairly representative of the documents in existence. Assuming that they are accurate copies of the original records, many are now easily accessible to students of the subject, since these reproductions may be owned by all large libraries.
These records, rightly apprehended, have far more than a mere antiquarian interest. The history of mediaeval universities is profoundly important, not only for students, but also for administrators, of modern higher education. For to a surprising degree the daily and hourly conduct of university affairs of the twentieth century is influenced by what universities did six centuries ago. On this point the words of Mr. Hastings Rashdall, a leading authority on mediaeval universities, are instructive: "... If we would completely understand the meaning of offices, titles, ceremonies, organizations preserved in the most modern, most practical, most unpicturesque of the institutions which now bear the name of 'University,' we must go back to the earliest days of