The Negro world., 1900-03-31
A MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITY.
queer Initiation. student. HAD to Go
ThronKh With In European
Installations.

cDusiueFhbiy younger IHhh the fnoae1H
undergraduate. sometimes, indeed.
mere boy of f2 or Il; but even when
that was the cgse il is quite a mistake
to compare his position to that of the
modern school boy. The medieval
student was to remarkable extent
his own master. Arriving at the uni-
versity town in carriers cart, he
would often be met on the way by
touting masters, or scholars employed
to tout ON their behalf, who solicited
his presence at their lectures with all
the accommodating obseqniousness of
a modern trade sman. lie was free to
choose the lectures which he might
attend. and the hall in which he would
reside; and when he had chosen ID he
found himself-in the early middle
ages-a member of a seif-goyerning
community which elected it's own prin-
cipal. managed its own affairs and was
subject TO no regulations except stat
utes' Of their own making. And in the
medieval world generally there was
much minute regulation of private life,
though the government which enforced
that regulation was originally highly
democratic one. But II is a common
place to say that democracy Is often
tyrannical Before the freshman. or
beiannus (from bes- s-jaune. yellow-bill,
unfledgea bird), could call himself a
student mere was an initiation to be
gone through. lie was made to pay
his footing" by entertaining his new
comrades probably all the inhabitants
of his hall-at a feast. and. further,
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 fero-
cious wild boars removed with a saw,
have his nose ground at a whetstone
and generally be drubbed and licked
into shape. In France the ceremony
was ''purgatio The freshman was
supposed not 20 be beast to be tanned.
but criminal to be solemnly tried
for the offense of 'bejannia. This was
done by the infiction OF certain num-
Der of blows with saucepan or book
(libro super anum). Elsewhere we
hear OF a cpueking or washing, or rid
ing through the streets on a donkey.
At Oxford there was "tucking." The
victim had to sing or make speech in
the hall under pain of being tucked"
II. e., having his lower lip cut out
with thumb nail carefully grown for
the purpose. At first this init iation was
put down under all sorts Of penalties
by university and ecclesiastical author
tiles; then (as is usual with bad Gus
toms) winked at. and finally enforced.
II did not become extinct until the
latter part of the seventeenth century.
In the universities of Italy-and to
some extent of southern Europe gen.
eraily--the student was not only indie
pendent, he was dominant, In these
universities. of which Bologna is the
type. the university itself was formed
by the students. They and they alone
formed the universities-the corpora
tion, or Ruild-or rather (since the
students OF different faculties had sep
arate organizations. while the law stu
dents were divided into ultramontani
and citramontani) the uniyersitates.
The masters were not even members
OF these guilds; they formed n college
OF their cwn, which regulated admis-
sion to the degrees, but they had no au-
thority over the student guilds. The
students elected the rectors and other
officials, made the statutes and (very
often) elected the professors or doc
tors. The latter were compelled TO take
an oath of obedience to the student
rectors ard TO the student statutes,
and the discipline thus enforced was
by no means nominal one.
The professor who required leave OF
absence for a single lecture was re-
quired TO get leave from his own stu
dents as well as from the rector. He
was heavily fined II he was a minute
late in beginning his lecture or IL he
continued IL after the bell began, which
was the signal for its conclusion. To
enforce this latter regulation the stu
dents were required, on pain of be-
ing guilty of perjury, to run out and
leave the professor to address his re-
marks to empty benches. There were
similar fines for being behind time in
concluding the portion of the task for
which a fiSed period had been assigned.
for skipping n difficulty under pretext
of dealing with II later on and for nom
compliance with many other minute
regulations. In some universities a
committee of students known as the
denuncia,ores doctorum was appoint
ed to watch the conduct of the profess
sors and TO keep the rectors informed
Of their dednquencies. Moreover. the
professor was kept TO the mark by be-
ing subject to annual or biennial re-
election. How did all this work? As
far as we can gather, extremely well,
The professors of the southern uni
yersities. everywhere elected either by
the students themselves of by the city
authorities. who were wont to take
counsel With the representatives OF
the students, were the only professors
who did hot habitually cut their work
by devolving Ii upon their bachelors.
No doubt there were plenty of idle
or sham students in the universities,
but the ma aiority wanted TO learn. We
have an instance OF an action being
brought against professor for refus-
ing TO lecture. But then II mus De
remembered that in those days ath-
letieism was unknown. The election
OF reeter by the Studeats in the