The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1899-12-23
MEDIAEVAL UNIVERSITIES.

wi EI)IAEN AL UNIVERSITIES.
Their Sports and Studies limitations
and Lectures-Quaint, but Not I'm
like To-day's.
The Rev Hastings Rashdall, writing
In The Magnet the organ of Universe
ty College, Bristol, says the medieval
student was often considerably young
er than the modern undergraduate
sometimes indeed mere boy of twelve
or fourteen but even when that was the
case it Is quite a mistake to compare
his position to that of the modern
schoolboy. The medieval student was
to remarkable extent his own mast
er. Arriving at the university town In
a carriers cart, he would often be met
on the way by touting masters, or
scholars employed to tout on their be-
half who solicited his presence at their
lectures with all the accommodating OBJ
sequiousness Of modern tradesman.
| He was free to choose the lectures
which he might attend, and the hall in
which he would reside; and when no had
J chosen it, he found himself--in the early
, middle ages--a member of a self-gov-
erning community which elected it's
wv iIldlld}oCd llS wv tildIl6I
and was subject to no regulations ex-
cept statutes Of their own making
As in the medieval world generally
there was much minute regulation of
private life though the government
which enforced that regulation was or
iginally q highly democratic one. But
it is commonplace to say that democ-
racy is often tyrannical. Before the
freshman or bejannus (from bestjaune,
yellow BILL unfedged bird) could call
himself student, there was an initia-
tion to be gone through. He was made
to pay his footing by entertaining his
new comrades--probabl all the inbabi-
tants of the hall--at a feast, and fur
Their there was a painful ceremony of
some kind which varied with the taste
and ingenuity of different nationalities
In Germany he had to go through the
ceremony of deposition" namely, have
the horns of the supposed ferooious wild
boars removed with a saw, have his
nose ground at milestone, and gene
rally be drubbed and licked into shape.
In France the ceremony was 'purga-
ito" the freshman was supposed to be
not beast to be tanned, but a criminal
to be solemnly tried for the offense Of |
"bejannia"; this was done by the in
Fiction Of a certain number Of blows
with a saucepan or book, Qibro super
annum.) Elsewhere we hear of duck
ing or washing, or riding through the !
streets on a donkey. At Oxford there
was "tucking'' the victim had to sing
or make a speech In the hall under pain |
of being tucked t. e. having his low
er lip cut over with a thumb nail care
fully grown for the purpose. At first
this initiation was put down under all
sorts of penalties by university and &C.
authorities; then (as Is usual
with bad customs) winked at, and final
ly enforced 1t did not become extinct /
till the latter part Of the seventeenth
century. In the universities Of Italy
and to some extent Of Southern Europe
student was not only in
dependent he was dominant. In these
Of which Bologna Is the
type, the university itself was formed
by the students. They, and they alone,
formed the Universitas--the Corporation
Or Guild-or rather (since the students
IF different Faculties had separate or
CARNATIONS, while the law students were
divided into utramontani and citamon-
.anD the Universities The masters
were not even members of these guilds;
hey formed a college of their own,
which regulated admission to the de-
yrees, but they had no authority over
he student guilds. The students elect
I'd the rectors and other officials made
he statues, and very often) elected
he professors or doctors The latter
we're compelled to take an oath Of obtdi-
nee to the student rectors and to the
student statutes, and the discipline thus
was by no means nominal
me.
The professor who required leave of
bsenee for a single lecture was requir- =
ID to get leave from his own students
Is well as from the rector. He was
heavily fined IL he was a minute late
n beginning his lecture, or If he con-
inued it after the bell began which
vas the signal for it's conclusion. TO
nforce this latter regulation the STU
ents were required, on pain Of being +
Utility of perjury, to run out and leave
he professor to address his remarks
o empty benches. There were similar
mes for being behind time in conclud-
ng the portion Of the task for which
fixed period had been assigned, for
Ripping a difficulty under pretext of u
ealing with 1t later on, and for nom 0
with many other minute Z
equations. In some universities :
ommittee Of students, known as the
Doctorum was appoint
4 to watch the conduct of the profess
ors, and to keep the rectors inform
ne professor was kept to the mark by
cling subject to annual or biennial re-
Iectinn How did Sill this work? As j