A Source Book of Mediaeval History Part 42

Moreover, if any one shall presume to bring a suit against them on account of any business, the choice in this matter shall be given to the scholars, who may summon the accusers to appear before their professors or the bishop of the city, to whom we have given jurisdiction in this matter.[499] But if, indeed, the accuser shall attempt to drag the scholar before another judge, even if his cause is a very just one, he shall lose his suit for such an attempt.

(b)

Concerning the safety of the students at Paris in the future, by the advice of our subjects we have ordained as follows:

[Sidenote: Protection for scholars against crimes of violence]

We will cause all the citizens of Paris to swear that if any one sees an injury done to any student by any layman,[500] he will testify truthfully to this, nor will any one withdraw in order not to see [the act]. And if it shall happen that any one strikes a student, except in self-defense, especially if he strikes the student with a weapon, a club, or a stone, all laymen who see [the act] shall in good faith seize the malefactor, or malefactors, and deliver them to our judge; nor shall they run away in order not to see the act, or seize the malefactor, or testify to the truth.

Also, whether the malefactor is seized in open crime or not, we will make a legal and full examination through clerks, or laymen, or certain lawful persons; and our count and our judges shall do the same. And if by a full examination we, or our judges, are able to learn that he who is accused, is guilty of the crime, then we, or our judges, shall immediately inflict a penalty, according to the quality and nature of the crime; notwithstanding the fact that the criminal may deny the deed and say that he is ready to defend himself in single combat, or to purge himself by the ordeal by water.[501]

[Sidenote: Scholars to be tried and punished under ecclesiastical authority]

Also, neither our provost nor our judges shall lay hands on a student for any offense whatever; nor shall they place him in our prison, unless such a crime has been committed by the student, that he ought to be arrested. And in that case, our judge shall arrest him on the spot, without striking him at all, unless he resists, and shall hand him over to the ecclesiastical judge,[502] who ought to guard him in order to satisfy us and the one suffering the injury. And if a serious crime has been committed, our judge shall go or shall send to see what is done with the student. If, indeed, the student does not resist arrest and yet suffers any injury, we will exact satisfaction for it, according to the aforesaid examination and the aforesaid oath. Also our judges shall not lay hands on the chattels of the students of Paris for any crime whatever. But if it shall seem that these ought to be sequestrated, they shall be sequestrated and guarded after sequestration by the ecclesiastical judge, in order that whatever is judged legal by the Church may be done with the chattels.[503] But if students are arrested by our count at such an hour that the ecclesiastical judge cannot be found and be present at once, our provost shall cause the culprits to be guarded in some student's house without any ill-treatment, as is said above, until they are delivered to the ecclesiastical judge.

[Sidenote: The oath required of the provost and people of Paris]

In order, moreover, that these [decrees] may be kept more carefully and may be established forever by a fixed law, we have decided that our present provost and the people of Paris shall affirm by an oath, in the presence of the scholars, that they will carry out in good faith all the above-mentioned [regulations]. And always in the future, whosoever receives from us the office of provost in Paris, among the inaugural acts of his office, namely, on the first or second Sunday, in one of the churches of Paris--after he has been summoned for the purpose--shall affirm by an oath, publicly in the presence of the scholars, that he will keep in good faith all the above-mentioned [regulations].[504] And that these decrees may be valid forever, we have ordered this doc.u.ment to be confirmed by the authority of our seal and by the characters of the royal name signed below.

61. The Foundation of the University of Heidelberg (1386)

Until the middle of the fourteenth century Germany possessed no university. In the earlier mediaeval period, when palace and monastic schools were multiplying in France, Italy, and England, German culture was too backward to permit of a similar movement beyond the Rhine; and later, when in other countries universities were springing into prosperity, political dissensions long continued to thwart such enterprises among the Germans. Germany was not untouched by the intellectual movements of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, but her young men were obliged to seek their learning at Oxford or Paris or Bologna. The first German university was that of Prague, in Bohemia, founded by Emperor Charles IV., a contemporary of Petrarch, and chartered in 1348. Once begun, the work of establishing such inst.i.tutions went on rapidly, until ere long every princ.i.p.ality of note had its own university. Vienna was founded in 1365, Erfurt was given papal sanction in 1379, Heidelberg was established in 1386, and Cologne followed in 1388. The doc.u.ment given below is the charter of privileges issued for Heidelberg in October, 1386, by the founder, Rupert I., Count Palatine of the Rhine. Marsilius Inghen became the first rector of the university. He and two other masters began lecturing October 19, 1386--one on logic, another on the epistle to t.i.tus, the third on the philosophy of Aristotle. Within four years over a thousand students had been in attendance at the university.

Source--Text in Edward Winkelmann, _Urkundenbuch der Universitat Heidelberg_ ["Cartulary of the University of Heidelberg"], Heidelberg, 1886, Vol. I., pp. 5-6. Translated in Ernest F. Henderson, _Select Historical Doc.u.ments of the Middle Ages_ (London, 1896), pp. 262-266.

[Sidenote: The university to be organized on the model of Paris]

=1.= We, Rupert the elder, by the grace of G.o.d count palatine of the Rhine, elector of the Holy Empire,[505] and duke of Bavaria,--lest we seem to abuse the privilege conceded to us by the apostolic see of founding a place of study at Heidelberg similar to that at Paris, and lest, for this reason, being subjected to the divine judgment, we should deserve to be deprived of the privilege granted--do decree, with provident counsel (which decree is to be observed unto all time), that the University of Heidelberg shall be ruled, disposed, and regulated according to the modes and manners accustomed to be observed in the University of Paris.[506] Also that, as a handmaid of Paris--a worthy one let us hope--the latter's steps shall be imitated in every way possible; so that, namely, there shall be four faculties in it: the first, of sacred theology and divinity; the second, of canon and civil law, which, by reason of their similarity, we think best to comprise under one faculty; the third, of medicine; the fourth, of liberal arts--of the three-fold philosophy, namely, primal, natural, and moral, three mutually subservient daughters.[507] We wish this inst.i.tution to be divided and marked out into four nations, as it is at Paris;[508] and that all these faculties shall make one university, and that to it the individual students, in whatever of the said faculties they are, shall unitedly belong like lawful sons to one mother.

[Sidenote: The obligations of the masters]

Likewise [we desire] that this university shall be governed by one rector,[509] and that the various masters and teachers, before they are admitted to the common pursuits of our inst.i.tution, shall swear to observe the statutes, laws, privileges, liberties, and franchises of the same, and not reveal its secrets, to whatever grade they may rise. Also that they will uphold the honor of the rector and the rectorship of our university, and will obey the rector in all things lawful and honest, whatever be the grade to which they may afterwards happen to be promoted. Moreover, that the various masters and bachelors shall read their lectures and exercise their scholastic functions and go about in caps and gowns of a uniform and similar nature, according as has been observed at Paris up to this time in the different faculties.

[Sidenote: Internal government of the university further provided for]

And we will that if any faculty, nation, or person shall oppose the aforesaid regulations, or stubbornly refuse to obey them, or any one of them--which G.o.d forbid--from that time forward that same faculty, nation, or person, if it do not desist upon being warned, shall be deprived of all connection with our aforesaid inst.i.tution, and shall not have the benefit of our defense or protection.

Moreover, we will and ordain that as the university as a whole may do for those a.s.sembled here and subject to it, so each faculty, nation, or province of it may enact lawful statutes, such as are suitable to its needs, provided that through them, or any one of them, no prejudice is done to the above regulations and to our inst.i.tution, and that no kind of impediment arise from them. And we will that when the separate bodies shall have pa.s.sed the statutes for their own observance, they may make them perpetually binding on those subject to them and on their successors. And as in the University of Paris the various servants of the inst.i.tution have the benefit of the various privileges which its masters and scholars enjoy, so in starting our inst.i.tution in Heidelberg, we grant, with even greater liberality, through these presents, that all the servants, i.e., its pedells,[510] librarians, lower officials, preparers of parchment, scribes, illuminators and others who serve it, may each and all, without fraud, enjoy in it the same privileges, franchises, immunities and liberties with which its masters or scholars are now or shall hereafter be endowed.

[Sidenote: The jurisdiction of the bishop of Worms]

[Sidenote: Conditions of imprisonment]

=2.= Lest in the new community of the city of Heidelberg, their misdeeds being unpunished, there be an incentive to the scholars of doing wrong, we ordain, with provident counsel, by these presents, that the bishop of Worms, as judge ordinary of the clerks of our inst.i.tution, shall have and possess, now and hereafter while our inst.i.tution shall last, prisons, and an office in our town of Heidelberg for the detention of criminal clerks. These things we have seen fit to grant to him and his successors, adding these conditions: that he shall permit no clerk to be arrested unless for a misdemeanor; that he shall restore any one detained for such fault, or for any light offense, to his master, or to the rector if the latter asks for him, a promise having been given that the culprit will appear in court and that the rector or master will answer for him if the injured parties should go to law about the matter. Furthermore, that, on being requested, he will restore a clerk arrested for a crime on slight evidence, upon receiving a sufficient pledge--sponsors if the prisoner can obtain them, otherwise an oath if he cannot obtain sponsors--to the effect that he will answer in court the charges against him; and in all these things there shall be no pecuniary exactions, except that the clerk shall give satisfaction, reasonably and according to the rule of the aforementioned town, for the expenses which he incurred while in prison. And we desire that he will detain honestly and without serious injury a criminal clerk thus arrested for a crime where the suspicion is grave and strong, until the truth can be found out concerning the deed of which he is suspected. And he shall not for any cause, moreover, take away any clerk from our aforesaid town, or permit him to be taken away, unless the proper observances have been followed, and he has been condemned by judicial sentence to perpetual imprisonment for a crime.

[Sidenote: Limitations upon power to arrest students]

We command our advocate and bailiff and their servants in our aforesaid town, under pain of losing their offices and our favor, not to lay a detaining hand on any master or scholar of our said inst.i.tution, nor to arrest him or allow him to be arrested, unless the deed be such that that master or scholar ought rightly to be detained. He shall be restored to his rector or master, if he is held for a slight cause, provided he will swear and promise to appear in court concerning the matter; and we decree that a slight fault is one for which a layman, if he had committed it, ought to have been condemned to a light pecuniary fine. Likewise, if the master or scholar detained be found gravely or strongly suspected of the crime, we command that he be handed over by our officials to the bishop or to his representative in our said town, to be kept in custody.

[Sidenote: Students exempted from various imposts]

=3.= By the tenor of these presents we grant to each and all the masters and scholars that, when they come to the said inst.i.tution, while they remain there, and also when they return from it to their homes, they may freely carry with them, both coming and going, throughout all the lands subject to us, all things which they need while pursuing their studies, and all the goods necessary for their support, without any duty, levy, imposts, tolls, excises, or other exactions whatever. And we wish them and each one of them, to be free from the aforesaid imposts when purchasing corn, wines, meat, fish, clothes and all things necessary for their living and for their rank. And we decree that the scholars from their stock in hand of provisions, if there remain over one or two wagonloads of wine without their having practised deception, may, after the feast of Easter of that year, sell it at wholesale without paying impost. We grant to them, moreover, that each day the scholars, of themselves or through their servants, may be allowed to buy in the town of Heidelberg, at the accustomed hour, freely and without impediment or hurtful delay, any eatables or other necessaries of life.

[Sidenote: How rates for lodging should be fixed]

4. Lest the masters and scholars of our inst.i.tution of Heidelberg may be oppressed by the citizens, moved by avarice, through extortionate prices of lodgings, we have seen fit to decree that henceforth each year, after Christmas, one expert from the university on the part of the scholars, and one prudent, pious, and circ.u.mspect citizen on the part of the citizens, shall be authorized to determine the price of the students' lodgings.

Moreover, we will and decree that the various masters and scholars shall, through our bailiff, our judge and the officials subject to us, be defended and maintained in the quiet possession of the lodgings given to them free or of those for which they pay rent.

Moreover, by the tenor of these presents, we grant to the rector and the university, or to those designated by them, entire jurisdiction concerning the payment of rents for the lodgings occupied by the students, concerning the making and buying of books, and the borrowing of money for other purposes by the scholars of our inst.i.tution; also concerning the payment of a.s.sessments, together with everything that arises from, depends upon, and is connected with these.

In addition, we command our officials that, when the rector requires our and their aid and a.s.sistance for carrying out his sentences against scholars who try to rebel, they shall a.s.sist our clients and servants in this matter; first, however, obtaining lawful permission to proceed against clerks from the lord bishop of Worms, or from one deputed by him for this purpose.

62. Mediaeval Students' Songs

"When we try to picture to ourselves," says Mr. Symonds in one of his felicitous pa.s.sages, "the intellectual and moral state of Europe in the Middle Ages, some fixed and almost stereotyped ideas immediately suggest themselves. We think of the nations immersed in a gross mental lethargy; pa.s.sively witnessing the gradual extinction of arts and sciences which Greece and Rome had splendidly inaugurated; allowing libraries and monuments of antique civilization to crumble into dust; while they trembled under a dull and brooding terror of coming judgment, shrank from natural enjoyment as from deadly sin, or yielded themselves with brutal eagerness to the satisfaction of vulgar appet.i.tes. Preoccupation with the other world in this long period weakens man's hold upon the things that make his life desirable....

Prolonged habits of extra-mundane contemplation, combined with the decay of real knowledge, volatilize the thoughts and aspirations of the best and wisest into dreamy unrealities, giving a false air of mysticism to love, shrouding art in allegory, reducing the interpretation of texts to an exercise of idle ingenuity, and the study of nature to an insane system of grotesque and pious quibbling.

The conception of man's fall and of the incurable badness of this world bears poisonous fruit of cynicism and asceticism, that two-fold bitter almond hidden in the harsh monastic sh.e.l.l. Nature is regarded with suspicion and aversion; the flesh, with shame and loathing, broken by spasmodic outbursts of lawless self-indulgence."[511]

All of these ideas are properly to be a.s.sociated with the Middle Ages, but it must be borne in mind that they represent only one side of the picture. They are drawn very largely from the study of monastic literature and produce a somewhat distorted impression. Though many conditions prevailing in mediaeval times operated strongly to paralyze the intellects and consciences of men, the fundamental manifestations and expressions of human instinct and vitality were far from crushed out. The life of many people was full and varied and positive--not so different, after all, from that of men and women to-day. That this was true is demonstrated by a wealth of literature reflecting the jovial and exuberant aspects of mediaeval life, which has come down to us chiefly in two great groups--the poetry of the troubadours and the songs of the wandering students. "That so bold, so fresh, so natural, so pagan a view of life," continues Mr. Symonds in the pa.s.sage quoted, "as the Latin songs of the Wandering Students exhibit, should have found clear and artistic utterance in the epoch of the Crusades, is indeed enough to bid us pause and reconsider the justice of our stereotyped ideas about that period. This literature makes it manifest that the ineradicable appet.i.tes and natural instincts of men and women were no less vigorous in fact, though less articulate and self-a.s.sertive, than they had been in the age of Greece and Rome, and than they afterwards displayed themselves in what is known as the Renaissance. The songs of the Wandering Students were composed for the most part in the twelfth century. Uttering the unrestrained emotions of men attached by a slender tie to the dominant clerical cla.s.s and diffused over all countries, they bring us face to face with a body of opinion which finds in studied chronicle or labored dissertation of the period no echo. On the one side, they express that delight in life and physical enjoyment which was a main characteristic of the Renaissance; on the other, they proclaim that revolt against the corruption of Papal Rome which was the motive force of the Reformation. Who were these Wandering Students? As their name implies, they were men, and for the most part young men, traveling from university to university in search of knowledge. Far from their homes, without responsibilities, light of purse and light of heart, careless and pleasure-seeking, they ran a free, disreputable course, frequenting taverns at least as much as lecture-rooms, more capable of p.r.o.nouncing judgment upon wine or woman than upon a problem of divinity or logic. These pilgrims to the shrines of knowledge formed a cla.s.s apart. According to tendencies prevalent in the Middle Ages, they became a sort of guild, and with pride proclaimed themselves an Order."[512]

Our knowledge of the mediaeval students' songs is derived from two princ.i.p.al sources: (1) a richly illuminated thirteenth-century ma.n.u.script now preserved at Munich and edited in 1847 under the t.i.tle _Carmina Burana_; and (2) another thirteenth-century ma.n.u.script published (with other materials) in 1841 under the t.i.tle _Latin Poems commonly attributed to Walter Mapes_. Many songs occur in both collections. The half-dozen given in translation below very well ill.u.s.trate the subjects, tone, and style of these interesting bits of literature.

Source--Texts in Edelestand du Meril, _Poesies Populaires Latines du Moyen Age_ ["Popular Latin Poetry of the Middle Ages"], Paris, 1847, _pa.s.sim_. Translated in John Addington Symonds, _Wine, Women, and Song: Mediaeval Latin Students'

Songs_ (London, 1884), pp. 12-136, _pa.s.sim_.

The first is a tenth century piece, marked by an element of tenderness in sentiment which is essentially modern. It is the invitation of a young man to his mistress, bidding her to a little supper at his home.

"Come therefore now, my gentle fere, Whom as my heart I hold full dear; Enter my little room, which is Adorned with quaintest rarities: There are the seats with cushions spread, The roof with curtains overhead: The house with flowers of sweetest scent And scattered herbs is redolent: A table there is deftly dight With meats and drinks of rare delight; There too the wine flows, sparkling, free; And all, my love, to pleasure thee.

There sound enchanting symphonies; The clear high notes of flutes arise; A singing girl and artful boy Are chanting for thee strains of joy; He touches with his quill the wire, She tunes her note unto the lyre: The servants carry to and fro Dishes and cups of ruddy glow; But these delights, I will confess, Than pleasant converse charm me less; Nor is the feast so sweet to me As dear familiarity.

Then come now, sister of my heart, That dearer than all others art, Unto mine eyes thou shining sun, Soul of my soul, thou only one!

I dwelt alone in the wild woods, And loved all secret solitudes; Oft would I fly from tumults far, And shunned where crowds of people are.

O dearest, do not longer stay!

Seek we to live and love to-day!

I cannot live without thee, sweet!

Time bids us now our love complete."

The next is a begging pet.i.tion, addressed by a student on the road to some resident of the place where he was temporarily staying. The supplication for alms, in the name of learning, is cast in the form of a sing-song doggerel.

I, a wandering scholar lad, Born for toil and sadness, Oftentimes am driven by Poverty to madness.

Literature and knowledge I Fain would still be earning, Were it not that want of pelf Makes me cease from learning.

These torn clothes that cover me Are too thin and rotten; Oft I have to suffer cold, By the warmth forgotten.

Scarce I can attend at church, Sing G.o.d's praises duly; Ma.s.s and vespers both I miss, Though I love them truly.

Oh, thou pride of N----,[513]

By thy worth I pray thee Give the suppliant help in need, Heaven will sure repay thee.