Who was educated during the Middle Ages?

Answer 1

Education was different in the Byzantine Empire and Western Europe.

The East Roman Empire had started both a primary schools system and more advanced schools, including the University of Constantinople, in the year 425. The Byzantine Empire, as a continuation of the Roman Empire, continued operating these schools through the entire Middle Ages. The primary schools were run at the village level, and are said to have educated both boys and girls, with the result that many people, quite possibly a majority, were literate.

In the West, the decline of the Roman Empire was destructive to educational systems. As a result, the history of education was more complicated in the West than in the Byzantine Empire. During the entire medieval period, many wealthy people were educated at home, by private tutors. There were also schools, and most, but not all, were run by the Church. Most education was in Latin, but much was in vernacular languages, especially as the Middle Ages wore on, a trend that can be seen with the development of secular literature, which was rarely in Latin.

Maybe for convenience we could break the history of education in Western Europe in the Middle Ages into three time periods that are not traditional: Medieval Period I (MPI) the time from the death of Theodosius I to the reign of Charlemagne (395-768 AD), Medieval Period II (MPII) from Charlemagne to the opening of the first universities (768-1088 AD), and Medieval Period III (MPIII), the period of 1088 to 1453.

MPI was characterized by a general breakdown of literacy that had actually begun during the third century AD and been exacerbated by the fall of the Roman Empire of the West, about 476 AD. The recovery from the worst of those times was slow. The Germanic law and customs that replaced Roman law in much of the area of the old empire were maintained by memorization, and little respect was provided by people accustomed to such education for those who needed to record their thoughts in writing. Written law was maintained in those areas that still operated under Roman law, and other writing was done only by the Church in most areas. During this time, education that included literacy was nearly always provided by the Church.

Nevertheless, there were schools that remained open from the times of the Roman Empire, such as Cor Tewdws in Wales, which was opened before Theodosius died in 395 and closed by the English King Henry VIII. Also, there was a system of primary schools opened by the Byzantine Empire starting in 425 AD, and continued until 1453. (see the link below for Cor Tewdws and the link on the history of schools). More schools were beginning to open with increasing frequency as the sixth and seventh century wore on. In fact there are six schools currently operating in the UK that date to this period. One of these, Beverley Grammar School, was supported by the state, and was, for a period of decades, supported by Vikings, as the area it was in was part of the Danelaw. (see link below to List of the oldest schools in the world)

MPII started when Charlemagne became king of France and Emperor of the West. One of the things he did was to send far and wide for scholars to educate the people of his court. (see link below for Charlemagne's policies on education) Alfred the Great repeated this in England, making sure that education was available in English, instead of Latin which was the language of the Church. He saw to it that great books were translated into English, stating as a goal that education be available to all freeborn men who were capable of being educated. (see link below for Alfred the Great's educational policies) The effect was a further spreading of education, and education being available to more people. Seven current UK schools date to this period, and at least an additional seven in Denmark, Germany, Iceland, and Sweden. (see link below to the list of the oldest schools in the world)

In MPIII, beginning in 1088, many more schools were founded, and with them came the great universities. The number of these opening during the Middle Ages is truly impressive, and reflects a need for education in the wealthier members of the middle class, among such people as secular lawyers, physicians, merchants, sailors, military people, bankers, and so on. Although there were only four universities that opened in England, and two of these closed, three universities opened in Scotland, and Europe had a total of nearly sixty during this period. (see links below on universities)

Many more traditional primary and secondary schools were opening during this time. And also, from the 13th century on, schools sprang up that were oriented toward teaching the things most needed for commerce. These included arithmetic using the Arabic numerals that had recently been introduced and reading and writing in the vernacular language. Theses schools were called Abacus Schools. (see link below on Abacus Schools)

Answer 2

Who was educated varied enormously during the course of the Middle Ages, and from country to country.

In most of Europe, and for most of the Middle Ages, most people went without education. There were exceptions. There was a higher standard of education in Spain, from about the ninth century onward, because of the influence of Arabs, Jews, and Christians on each other. Many of our Arab in English loan words come from this source (alcove, algebra, and so on). And Constantinople was always a center of learning throughout the Middle Ages.

As to the history of the Middle Ages, we could look to England as an example. Other areas of Europe were more or less similar, with varied histories.

The fall of the Roman Empire was anticipated by the withdrawal of the Roman garrisons in Britain in the first decade of the fifth century. With it, ability to educate numbers of people collapsed, and education was pretty much reserved for the clergy, especially monks who transcribed texts.

The very early schools in England were established as appendages to abbeys, and the first of these claims to have been established by 597 AD. The oldest extant state supported school, Beverley Grammar School, was established in Northumbria in 700 AD. (It is particularly interesting that this school survived the period in which that area was ruled by Vikings.) During the period of 600 to 871, several additional schools were established, but they were not commonly available. In this period, members of some noble families were beginning to receive educations in addition to the clergy.

Alfred the Great, who ruled from 871 to 899, improved the educational situation in England, establishing schools to educate children of the royal family and the nobility, and "a good many of lesser birth." His stated goal was to make education available to all free born young men of England. He set a standard that established primary education in English, with Latin being a language people could go on to later. And he established a system for translation of important books into English, so they could be as widely available as possible.

The Norman invasion of 1066 brought educational changes, which did not improve the situation of the Anglo Saxons, but did foster improved eduction of those who were of elevated rank. Oxford University was established within 50 years of the invasion, by 1116, and Cambridge by 1209. A number of additional colleges aimed at specific types of education were also formed.

The educational system did, however, continue to spread among common people. A very clear evidence of this is the existence of one of the English Language's greatest pieces of literature, The Canterbury Tales, which were written for English speaking people who were literate. During the Late Middle Ages, a lot of people, not just the wealthy and high born or the clergy, were literate in English. They included new classes of people whose professions required literacy, doctors, lawyers, educators, and merchants, and even a few women, who had no particular reason to read except for the satisfaction of their own native intelligence.

Answer 3

Education developed a lot during the Middle Ages, a period of about a thousand years, subdivided into three distinct periods, the Early Middle Ages, the High Middle Ages, and the Late Middle Ages.

The Early Middle Ages (roughly 500-1000 AD) were marked by a lack of literacy across much of Europe, resulting from the collapse of Roman civilization in Western Europe. There were three notable areas in which this was not true, which were primarily Constantinople, in which the wealthier classes were educated to read and write at least, secondarily Spain, where the confluence of societies produced some very impressive scientific and philosophical activity, after about 900 AD, and Celtic Britain, where monastic organizations worked at keeping the knowledge of Rome alive in the West.

During this time things got so bad that an Islamic guest to Charlemagne's court wrote home that the French nobility was dabbling in the art of signing their own names. Charlemagne and Alfred the Great were among the monarchs who fostered education, encouraging the members of their courts to learn to read and write. Alfred established the Anglo Saxon Chronicle, and established monasteries for transcription and education. Charlemagne brought scribes from Ireland and other places to teach people in his court, and it is partly to this act that we owe our lower case alphabet.

The High Middle Ages saw profound changes in the educational systems in Europe, partly due to the influence of the mini-renaissance going on in Spain, and partly due to the general influence of the Crusades on Europe, with returning crusaders bringing with them both broader knowledge and a greater respect for the learning they found in Islamic societies.

During this time, the ancient Greek writers were translated into Late Latin and other languages, primarily in Spain, where they were translated from Arabic. Improvements in engineering and art gave rise to Gothic Architecture, polyphony developed into counterpoint in music, and, importantly, a large number of universities was established for the general education of people who could afford it. Banking, developing throughout Europe as a result of activity by Templars, required both literacy and better numbering systems. Fibbonacci, the son of a merchant, spread the decimal system in the late twelfth century with his manuscript book, Liber Abaci, much to the fascination of Emperor Frederick II. The new arithmetic required different education, and new schools, called abacus schools, opened to teach both boys and girls, the children of middle class parents, the skills they needed for business; these included arithmetic using Arabic numerals, reading and writing in the vernacular, and other subjects useful in business. So it was during the High Middle Ages that education really took hold as a motivating force in Europe.

During the Late Middle Ages, European educational systems continued to improve, spreading literacy and knowledge throughout Europe. Not only the nobility and clergy, but doctors, lawyers, merchants, and navigators needed to be able to read. By the time the Middle Ages ended even ordinary people were beginning to read (wow!). The cultural effect was an explosion of invention and discovery that fueled construction of more universities, spread knowledge further, and popularized education in a growing middle class.

The Renaissance, which was spread by the printing press, needed three things to move forward, one was abundance of paper, and another was an abundance of literature. But most importantly, the Renaissance required a literate audience for the materials the press was printing. That audience was provided in the Late Middle Ages.

Answer 4

Clerics received education. In fact you will read in some places that the only people in the Middle Ages who were educated were clerics. There is a major problem with this statement, however, which was that there were legal reasons for defining the word cleric as anyone who could read, regardless of any other factor in his life. Under this definition, a king was a cleric, and so was a serf, if the serf could read. Students were legally defined as clerics, regardless of what they were studying or why. Some modern people assume the word applied only to monks and priests, and while it did in normal use, we have to be careful of what it means as regards education.

Clearly, however, nearly all priests, and many or most monks and nuns, were educated.

Clearly, members of royalty and nobility had reasons to be educated, so they could read the documents they signed, keep track of their wealth, and so on. We do not have all that much in the way of records of these people being educated, but we know they were. Henry I of England received the title Beauclerc because he was highly educated, but we have no details about his education. His wife, Matilda of Scotland, was educated in a convent, but we only know this because the wedding was challenged on the basis of her being taken from the convent for the marriage, and people who opposed it claimed, unsuccessfully, that she was a nun. Alfred the Great also made sure all his children, boys and girls, were educated, though again details are lacking. The same is true of Charlemagne.

Members of merchant families had reasons to be educated, including keeping accounts and inventories. When Arabic numerals were introduced into Europe and their advantages became known, there was an immediate demand among merchants to learn them. The result was that schools called abacus schools were opened to teach the new arithmetic. The abacus schools also taught a good deal of value for business, including reading and writing vernacular languages. They were open for both boys and girls, because women in merchant families often had to take over control of businesses, and so needed education.

Anyone who was a poet or minstrel had good reason to be educated, at least to read and write. Vernacular poetry was often written down, and though most of it has been lost, some remains. An example is Beowulf, which was written in Old English, for people who could read Old English. We have records of literally hundreds of poets and singers who composed in dozens of languages in the Middle Ages. Christine de Pizan was so successful at selling poetry that she employed her own scribes to copy it. Some of what she wrote was commissioned by people who wanted to use it for courtship; this would not have been of much use if they and the objects of their desire were illiterate.

Soldiers always have use of an education, and this was recognized in ancient and medieval times. The East Roman Empire opened the worlds first system of primary education in 425 AD for the purpose of making sure soldiers could read and write. This system, which operated at the village level and educated both boys and girls, remained in operation under the Byzantine Empire until it fell in 1453.

Medieval physicians were educated. The implications of this are often lost on people who do not understand medieval medicine, which was far more advanced and scientific than is generally known. It was not until the 19th century that medical practice went much beyond what it was in the 12th century. Of course, architects and engineers needed to be educated. Interestingly, we have records of women being physicians (for example, Trotula of Salerno) and architects (for example Sabina von Steinbach), so clearly some women were educated to do these things.

Some common people were educated for no particular reason that we can see. Margery Kempe, whose Book of Margery Kempe is the oldest example of an autobiography written in English, is an example.

As a rule, Jewish and Muslim populations in Europe were educated in the Middle Ages.

There is a link to a related question below.

Answer 5

This question seems to want an answer saying that clergy were educated, but nearly no one else. This was the case in some times and places of the Middle Ages, but it was not true in others.

Part of the problem that we have with this idea is that the word cleric, the source or the words clergy and clerk, had different definitions, even at the same time. A cleric, as the word was usually used, meant a member of the clergy. But legally, there were times when the word cleric meant anyone who could read. The idea that clerics were anyone who could read was important because it was the determining factor in deciding whether an accused commoner was to be tried by an ecclesiastical court or a secular court. But from a historical perspective, it means that we can justifiably state that only clerics could read at these times, and while the statement can be justified, it is also easily taken wrongly. Among the people defined as clerics, were a number of rather impious and thoroughly secular troubadours and ladies who wrote poems about courtly love.

There is a link below to a related question.

Answer 6

In Western Europe:

Traditional schools for primary education were run by the Church in most places, though in the Late Middle Ages there were an increasing number that were opened and run by the state. State schools were most noticeable in more backward areas, where the Church had few resources and the local leaders wanted to improve trade. Most people who went through the universities began their educations in the traditional schools. Many of these schools, both state and church run, still exist, especially in the UK.

In the Late Middle Ages, the university system was nearly completely defined and uniform throughout Western Europe. Education went to the doctoral level, for those who could afford it. The universities almost entirely in Latin, and the undergraduate curriculum was a narrowly defined set of subjects, divided into the trivium, which included grammar, logic, and rhetoric, and the more advanced quadrivium, which included arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy. University education was mostly unavailable to women.

There were many schools that were outside the university system. One famous and very old example was the Medical School at Salermo, Italy. This school was formed from an amalgam of other schools that had fled to Salermo during the time when the West Roman Empire was collapsing. It had become and important educational facility during the Early Middle Ages, and remained as one of the best medical schools in Europe into modern times. Today it is the University of Salermo.

Business schools that taught reading and writing in the vernacular languages, and mathematics using Arabic numerals, started to open during the 13th century, and these were common during the Late Middle Ages. They were called abacus schools because the mathematics they taught was appropriate to the abacus. Merchant businesses belonged to families, and the women had to be as able as the men to run them, especially as they had to continue operation when the men were travelling. The result was that the women were often as well educated as the men, and the abacus schools were coeducational.

Wealthy people were often tutored.

In eastern Europe:

Byzantine educational systems were established in 425, when both the national primary education system and the University of Constantinople came into being. These systems were in place until 1453, when the Byzantine Empire was destroyed by the Ottoman Turks.

The primary education was operated at the village level and was originally intended to make it possible for all soldiers to be able to read and write. In time, however, it came to be open to everyone except slaves. It included basic arithmetic skills.

The University system was opened at Constantinople, but included universities at other cities as well. It had a somewhat broader curriculum than the universities of Western Europe. Originally, the curriculum was taught in Latin and Greek, according to the subject, but the Byzantine Empire abandoned the use of Latin during the Early Middle Ages. The university was influenced heavily by advances in medicine and science that were made in Islamic countries.

There are links below for further reading.

Answer 7

The education and knowledge was really bad because they did not know much and in the medieval ages they where not a lot of school