§ 91. The University of Bologna.
LITERATURE : MURATORI : Antiqq. Ital., III. 884 sqq. Important documents bearing on the state of learning in Italy. — Acta nationis Germanicce univ. Bononiensis, ed. E. FfiiEDLANDERet C. MALAGOLA, Berl., 1887. — CARLO MALAGOLA : Statuti della universita e del collegi dello studio Bolognese, p. 524, Bologna, 1888. — DENIFLE : D. Statutem d. Juristen Univ. Bo logna, 1317-1347, in Archiv. fur Lit.- und Kirchengesch., III. 196-409,
1887. Superseded by MALAGOLA. — GIACOMO CASSANI (Prof, of Canon Law, Bologna) : DeW antico Studio di Bologna e sua origine, Bologna,
1888. — H. FITTING : Die Anfdnge der Eechtsschule zu Bologna, Berl., 1888. — SAVIGNY (see above) gives a full account with special reference to the- study of Roman law, but must be supplemented and corrected by DENIFLE : Universitaten, etc. — For publications called forth by the
1 Compayr6, p. 271.
564 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1049-1294.
eighth centenary, 1888, see P. SCHAFF : Lit. and Poetry, p. 278. For full Lit., see RASHDALL, I. 89-91.
Bologna is the most venerable of European universities. Salerno, which preceded it in time, became sufficiently famous as a medical school to call forth from Petrarch the praise of being the fountain-head of medicine, — fons medicince, — but its career was limited to two centuries.1 The origin of Sa lerno is lost in obscurity. There seems to be no sufficient evidence to show that the school owed its origin to the con vent of Monte Cassino which was eighty miles away. It was the outgrowth of the awakened interest in medicine in South ern Italy in which Greek and Arabic influences had a part.
In 1888, Bologna celebrated its eight hundredth anniversary and continues to be one of the most flourishing schools of Southern Europe. As early as the thirteenth century, the tradition was current that Theodosius II., in 433, had granted to it a charter. But its beginnings go no further back than the latter part of the eleventh or the earlier years of the twelfth century. At that period Irnerius, d. about 1130, was teach ing the code of Justinian 2 and a little later the Camaldulensian monk, Gratian, taught canon law in the convent of St. Felix. These two masters of jurisprudence, civil and ecclesiastical, are looked upon as the fathers of the university.
Bologna became the chief school for the study of both laws in Europe. The schools of arts added 1221, of medicine 1260, and theology 1360 — by a bull of Innocent VI. — never obtained the importance of the school of law.
On a visit to the city in 1155 Frederick Barbarossa granted the university recognition and in 1158, on the field of Roncaglia, gave it its first charter.3 This is the oldest piece of university
1 See Laurie, p. 123 sqq. ; Rashdall, I. 80 sqq.
2 Rashdall, 1. 120, associates an " epoch in the study of law " with Irnerius, but insists upon the activity of law teachers before his day. When Laurie, p. 128, still calls Irnerius the " rediscoverer " of the Roman law, the title is only relatively true.
3 The document of 1155 is known as the Aitthentica Habita. A historical poem discovered and published by Giesebrecht, 1879, describes Frederick's visit of 1155. The document of 1158 is addressed to "all scholars and especially the professors of divine and sacred law." Denifle, p. 49 sqq.
§ 91. THE UNIVERSITY OF BOLOGNA. 565
legislation. Thenceforth Bologna was a second and better Bery tus, the nurse of jurisprudence, legum nutrix, and adopted the proud device, Sonoma docet — "Bologna teaches." To papal patronage she owed little or nothing, and in this respect as in others her history did not run parallel with the University of Paris.1 Students flocked to her by hundreds and thousands from all parts of Western Europe.
The student body, which was in control, was at first divided into four "universities" or guilds. The statutes of the Ger man "nation " have been preserved and declare as its object fraternal charity, mutual association, the care of the sick and support of the needy, the conduct of funerals, the termi nation of quarrels, and the proper escort of students about to take the examination for the degree of doctor.2 By the fourteenth century, the four " universities " had given place to the two groups called the Ultramontanes and the Cismontanes, each of which was subdivided into smaller groups pre sided over by counsellors, conciliarii.
The rectors of the faculties were elected for two years and were required to be secular clerics, unmarried, and wearing the clerical habit. The ceremonies of installation included the placing of a hood on their heads. The two rectors of the two jurist " universities " gave place to a single rector after the middle of the fourteenth century.
The professors took oaths to the student bodies, to follow their codes. If they wished to be absent from their duties, they were obliged to get leave of absence from the rectors. They were required to begin and close their lectures promptly at the ringing of the bell under penalty of a fine and were forbidden to skip any part of the text-books or postpone the answer to questions to the end of the lecture hour. An other rule required them to cover a certain amount of ground
1 The first papal bull was that of Clement III., 1189, forbidding masters and scholars making a bid for a house already occupied by students.
2 Denifle, p. 130, makes the scholastic guilds to have originated with the Germans. As a mercantile organization the guild was in existence in Bologna before studies began to flourish there. Foreign merchants residing there had their own societies. Also Rashdall, I. 160.