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Presidential Address: Some Problems in the History of the Medieval University

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 June 2009

Extract

The questions which, I imagine, are most frequently asked about the medieval University run something like this: What was the value of all this intellectual activity? Was there any sequence or permanence in it? What kind of degree did scholars take? Was it a mere form, or did it involve a serious mental discipline? We can best get some ideas about the answers to such questions—I do not say that we can ever get very satisfying answers—by looking at Paris in the middle of the fourteenth century.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Historical Society 1934

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References

page 2 note 1 The University used the Sorbonne for disputations from at least the early years of the fourteenth century; see the Chartularium, ii, 693, with Denifle's note, p. 695. The Sorbonica or disputation, held on Saturdays between members of the College, was carefully regulated in 1344. The statutes issued by the provisor of the College in this year suggest that this domestic exercise was a new departure, different from the disputations mentioned in the University statutes (Chartularium, ii, no. 1096).

page 2 note 2 E. Wickersheimer, Commentaires de la Faculty de Midecine de I'Université de Paris, 1395–1516 (Doc. inedits sur l'histoire de France), Paris, 1915.

page 2 note 3 Chatelain, Denifle Et, Auctarium chartularii Universitatis Parisiensis, vols. i, ii (Paris, 1894, 1896).Google Scholar

page 2 note 4 Bonnerot, Cf. J., “L'ancienne Université de Paris, centre international d'études,” in the Bulletin of the International Committee of Historical Sciences, i, 672 (July, 1928).Google Scholar

page 3 note 1 Chatelain, Denifle Et, Chartularium Univ. Paris, i (1889), pp. xxxii–vi.Google Scholar

page 5 note 1 Auctarium, ii, col. 643 (1446).

page 5 note 2 Chartularium, iii, no. 1486.

page 6 note 1 Chartularium, iii, pp. 409, 410.

page 6 note 2 E.g., the sentences of censure pronounced by the Faculty of Theology before 1735 fill the three folio volumes of the Collectio judiciorum de novis erroribus, made by the Bishop of Tulle, C. du Plessis d'Argentre (Paris, 1724–36; new edition, 1755).

page 7 note 1 In his Repertoire des maitres en thiologie de Paris au XIIIe siècle (Palis, 1933), Father P. Glorieux deals with 71 Dominican and 233 secular masters of theology. In a forthcoming section he will deal with 51 Franciscan masters.

page 8 note 1 D'irsay's, S. recent Histoire des Universités, vol. i (Paris, 1933)Google Scholar, although it adds nothing to our knowledge of University organisation, rightly emphasises this side of University life.

page 9 note 1 Grabmann, M., “Die Aristoteleskommentare des Simon von Faver-sham” (from the Sitzungsberichte der bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philos.-hist. Abt. 1933), pp. 1113.Google Scholar

page 13 note 1 Rashdall, i, 471; cf. 456 seqq. Since this paper was written, the publication of the volume Oxford Theology and Theologians, c. 1282–1302, by A. G. Little and F. Pelster (Oxford Historical Society, vol. xcvi, Oxford, 1934), has greatly facilitated the understanding of the academic exercises at Paris and Oxford; see pp. 29–56.

page 13 note 2 Chartularium, iii, nos. 1528–31.

page 14 note 1 Edited by Frati, L., in Studi e Memorie per la Storia dell' Universita di Bologna, vi (1926), 25–9.Google Scholar

page 14 note 2 Cf. Lehmann, P., “Mitteilungen aus Handschriften, IV” (from the Sitz. d. bayerisch. Akad. d. Wissenschaften, 1933), pp. 10Google Scholar, n, 15, 16.

page 15 note 1 Cf. the study of the references (allegationes) and abbreviations in legal texts, by Kantorowicz, H., “Die Allegationes im Späteren Mittelalter,” in Archiv für Urkundenforschung, xiii (1933), 1529.Google Scholar

page 16 note 1 In a commentary on Giles of Corbeil, edited by Sudhoff, K. in Archiv für Geschichte der Medizin, xx (1928), 5162.Google Scholar

page 16 note 2 Revue néo-scolastique, xxxvi (1934), 211–29, from Ripoll MS. 109 in the archives at Barcelona. For another text in Kassel MS. Philos. 39, see Grabmann's paper on Simon of Faversham, cited above, p. 20. Virgilius Wellendorfer, who wrote a most interesting and detailed account of his studies at Leipzig (1481–7), gives a list of the questions which he had to answer at his preliminary examination (tentamen) and examen proper for the licence in 1487; see the valuable essay of R. Helssig, Die wissenschaftlichen Vorbedingungen für Baccalaureat in artibus und Magisterium, especially pp. 80 sqq. (Beiträge zur Geschichte der Universität Leipzig im fünfzehnten Jahrhundert, Leipzig, 1909).

page 16 note 3 See Grauert, H. in A bhandlungen der bayerischen A kademie der Wissenschaften, Philos.-hist. Kdasse, xxvii (1912), 296–9.Google Scholar

page 17 note 1 Ehrle, F., I più antichi statuli della facolià teologica dell' università di Bologna (Bologna, 1932), pp. 34–6.Google Scholar For the examinations in law at Bologna, cf. Rashdall, i. 226–8.