Universities and Theology

Lecture 33

O

ne of the most impressive signs of a mature Christian culture in the
High Middle Ages was the development of universities. As we have
seen, the desire for higher learning within Christianity was never
completely lost, even during the most chaotic periods of life in the West.
Universities, though, were a new invention in the West; they emerged when
they did because of the convergence of a number of factors. In a flash, over
the span of some 80 years, four great universities were founded in Europe
that quickly became important centers of learning and eventually contributed
heavily to social change: Bologna in 1119, Paris in 1150, Oxford in 1167,
and Cambridge in 1200.

Context for the Emergence of Universities
• The convergence of a number of factors set the stage for the
emergence of universities in the 12th and 13th centuries. We have
already noted the increased wealth and security in Europe based on
predictably good weather, steady crops, and successful trade—all
these, plus population growth in urban areas, set the context for
leisure as the basis of culture. Of considerable significance also
was the production of manuscripts in monastery scriptoria, which
reached a point of sufficient dissemination to enable shared learning
at a higher level.

•    The development of a professional clergy, as in the Franciscans

and Dominicans, as well as the development of a professional

diplomatic corps, demanded higher levels of education. The

ordinary clergy would remain woefully undereducated within

Catholicism until the Counter-Reformation of the 16th century, but

both monks and mendicants represented the most learned people of

the medieval world.