The appearance of universities in Christian Europe around the 12th and 13th centuries it is among the main events of the Middle Ages. The universities of the Middle Ages became the most significant educational institutions and intellectuals from the classical period, a period in which the Lyceum in Athens and other institutions stood out notorious. What characterized universities in the Middle Ages was the form of organization, as well as the freedom to study different topics, universals, as the name suggests.
As ecclesiastical creations, that is, which were born from the initiative of the Catholic Church, the universities, of course, In this way, they originated as extensions of episcopal colleges, in which young students learned mastery. of the seven liberal arts, which were the basis of middle age education. However, universities only began to stand out as a more complex education and research system than episcopal colleges around the 13th century. In fact, the encyclical letter dates from this century
parentsscientiarum, by Pope Gregory IX, who legitimized the university as an ecclesiastical institution.The triumph of medieval scholastic thought, which permeated the most advanced studies of the universities in all their fields of research, from canon law and medicine to theology, astronomy, logic and rhetoric. The organization of universities was guided by the ecclesiastical body. Thus, its intellectual foundations, such as fundamental works and the programmatic axes of studies, as well as its professors, were part of the Church's structure. As the historian Regine Pernoud puts it, in her work “Light on the Middle Ages”:
“[…] Created by the Papacy, the University has an entirely ecclesiastical character: the professors all belong to the Church, and the two great orders that illustrate, in the thirteenth century, Franciscan and Dominican, go there, soon to cover themselves with glory, with a S. Boaventura and an S. Aquinas; students, even those who are not destined for the priesthood, are called clerics, and some of them wear the tonsure – which is not to say that only theology is taught there, since its program encompasses all the major scientific and philosophical disciplines, from grammar to dialectic, passing through music and geometry.” (PERNOUD, Regine. light on age Average. Europe-America Publications, 1996. pp. 98)
O graduating from the medieval university was called artist, referring to the idea that whoever dominates the liberal arts. The first universities commonly cited are Paris (France), Bologna (Italy), Oxford and Cambridge (England). The University of Paris stood out in the 13th century for its advanced studies in theology and arts, while Bologna, at the same time, developed high studies in law.
The University of Paris stood out in the Middle Ages for its studies in theology and arts *
The method of scholastic study and discussion, the dispute, was the main method employed in the debates of advanced studies in medieval universities. THE Theological summary, written by Saint Thomas Aquinas, is completely anchored in this method. Other fields of study that stood out were natural philosophy (generally anchored in metaphysics and Aristotle's physics), music and astrology.
*Image credits: Shutterstock and JBDesing
By Me. Cláudio Fernandes
Source: Brazil School - https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/historia/universidades-na-idade-media.htm
