Education in Medieval Scotland
Education in Medieval Scotland includes all forms of education within the modern borders of Scotland, between the departure of the Romans from Britain in the fifth century, until the establishment of the Renaissance late fifteenth century and early sixteenth century. Few sources on Scottish education survived the Medieval era. In the early Middle Ages, Scotland was an oral society, with verbal rather than literary education. Though there are indications of a Gaelic education system similar to that of Ireland, few details are known. The establishment of Christianity from the sixth century brought Latin to Scotland as a scholarly and written language. Monasteries served as major repositories of knowledge and education, often running schools.
In the
Those who wished to attend university had to travel to England or the continent, and just over 1,000 students have been identified as doing so between the twelfth century and 1410. Major intellectual figures produced by Scotland with this system included
Sources
Surviving sources for Medieval Scotland are much more limited than for contemporaneous England. The only
Gaelic education and monasteries
In the early Middle Ages, Scotland was overwhelmingly an oral society and education was verbal rather than literary. Fuller sources for Ireland of the same period suggest that there were
The establishment of Christianity from the sixth century brought Latin to Scotland as a scholarly and written language. Monasteries served as major repositories of knowledge and education, often running schools and providing a small, educated and overwhelmingly male, elite, who were essential to create and read documents in a largely illiterate society.[6] Literary life revolved around the contemplation of texts and the copying of manuscripts. Libraries were of great importance to monastic communities. The one at Iona may have been exceptional, but it demonstrates that the monks were part of the mainstream of European Christian culture.[7]
Schools
In the
The new religious orders that became a major feature of Scottish monastic life in this period also brought new educational possibilities and the need to train larger numbers of monks.
Educational provision was probably much weaker in rural areas,
There is documentary evidence for about 100 schools of these different kinds before the Reformation.[2] Most of the schoolmasters of these schools were clergy, and also acted as chaplains of religious foundations, hospitals or private chaplains of noblemen to supplement their merge incomes.[13] To some extent, all education was controlled by different branches of the church, but towards the end of the period there was an increasing lay interest. This sometimes resulted in conflict, as between the burgh of Aberdeen and the cathedral chancellor, when the former appointed a lay graduate as schoolmaster in 1538, and when a married man was appointed to the similar post in Perth.[2] Education began to widen beyond the training of the clergy, particularly as lay lawyers began to emerge as a profession,[14] with a humanist emphasis on educating the future ruling class for their duties.[15] The growing humanist-inspired emphasis on education cumulated with the passing of the Education Act 1496, thought to have been steered through parliament by the Keeper of the Privy Seal William Elphinstone, Bishop of Aberdeen,[15] which decreed that all sons of barons and freeholders of substance should attend grammar schools to learn "perfyct Latyne". All this resulted in an increase in literacy, which was largely concentrated among a male and wealthy elite,[8] with perhaps 60 per cent of the nobility being literate by the end of the period.[14]
Universities
From the end of the eleventh century, universities had been founded across Europe, developing as semi-autonomous centres of learning, often teaching theology, mathematics, law and medicine.
Among these travelling scholars, the most important intellectual figure was
This situation was transformed by the founding of
By the fifteenth century, beginning in northern Italy, universities had become strongly influenced by humanist thinking. This put an emphasis on classical authors, questioning some of the accepted certainties of established thinking and manifesting itself in the teaching of new subjects, particularly through the medium of the Greek language.
References
Notes
- ISBN 0-19-211696-7, pp. 311–14.
- ^ ISBN 0-19-211696-7, pp. 561–3.
- ^ ISBN 0-19-538623-X.
- ^ ISBN 0-521-89088-8, p. 76.
- ISBN 0-7486-1299-8, p. 220.
- ISBN 0-7509-2977-4, p. 128.
- ISBN 0-19-211696-7, pp. 509–10.
- ^ ISBN 1-84384-096-0, pp. 29–30.
- ISBN 1843834138, p. 44.
- ^ ISBN 1-4464-7563-8, pp. 104–7.
- ISBN 9004129294, p. 101.
- ^ ISBN 0748621571, p. 126.
- ^ Lynch, Scotland: A New History, p. 106.
- ^ ISBN 0-7486-0276-3, pp. 68–72.
- ^ ISBN 9004062165, p. 75.
- ISBN 0415019230, pp. 241–3.
- ^ ISBN 0-333-56761-7, pp. 124–5.
- ^ Webster, Medieval Scotland: the Making of an Identity, p. 119.
- ISBN 9004162771, p. 119.
- ISBN 0-19-211696-7, pp. 610–12.
- ISBN 0748616284, p. 34.
- ISBN 0521541131, pp. 452–9.
- ISBN 0-7486-0276-3, pp. 183–4.
- ISBN 0-19-162433-0, pp. 196–7.
- ISBN 038920921X, p. 23.
Bibliography
- Bawcutt, P. J. and Williams, J. H., A Companion to Medieval Scottish Poetry (Woodbridge: Brewer, 2006), ISBN 1-84384-096-0.
- Boynton, S., "Boy singers in Monasteries and Cathedrals", in S. Boynton and E. N. Rice eds, Young Choristers: 650–1700 (ISBN 1843834138.
- Broadie, A., The Tradition of Scottish Philosophy: A New Perspective on the Enlightenment (ISBN 038920921X.
- Brown, K. M., Noble Society in Scotland: Wealth, Family and Culture from the Reformation to the Revolutions (Edinburgh: ISBN 0-7486-1299-8.
- Crawford, R., Scotland's Books: A History of Scottish Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), ISBN 0-19-538623-X.
- Daileader, P., "Local experiences of the Great Western Schism", in ISBN 9004162771.
- Durkan, J., "Universities: to 1720", in M. Lynch, ed., The Oxford Companion to Scottish History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), ISBN 0-19-211696-7.
- Ewen, E., "'Hamperit in ane hony came': sights, sounds and smells in the Medieval town", in E. J. Cowan and L. Henderson, eds, A History of Everyday Life in Medieval Scotland: 1000 to 1600 (Edinburgh: ISBN 0748621571.
- Foggie, J. P., Renaissance Religion in Urban Scotland: The Dominican Order, 1450–1560 (BRILL, 2003), ISBN 9004129294.
- Houston, R. A., Scottish Literacy and the Scottish Identity: Illiteracy and Society in Scotland and Northern England, 1600–1800 (Cambridge: ISBN 0-521-89088-8.
- Lynch, M., Scotland: A New History (London: Pimlico, 1992), ISBN 0712698930.
- Lynch, M., "Historical sources: 1 to 1750", in M. Lynch, ed., The Oxford Companion to Scottish History (Oxford: ISBN 0-19-211696-7.
- Macquarrie, A., Medieval Scotland: Kinship and Nation (Thrupp: Sutton, 2004), ISBN 0-7509-2977-4.
- Markus, G., "Religious life: early medieval", in M. Lynch, ed., The Oxford Companion to Scottish History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), ISBN 0-19-211696-7.
- Murdoch, S., "Schools and schooling: I to 1696", in M. Lynch, ed., The Oxford Companion to Scottish History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), ISBN 0-19-211696-7.
- Ross, I. S., William Dunbar (Brill Archive, 1981), ISBN 9004062165.
- Rüegg, W., "The rise of Humanism", in Hilde de Ridder-Symoens, ed., A History of the University in Europe: Volume 1, Universities in the Middle Ages (Cambridge: ISBN 0521541131.