Matriculation Books at Medieval Universities

Abstract

MATRICULATION BOOKS AT MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITIES Review Article by AsTRiK L. Gabriel Les Matricules Universitaires. By Jacques Paquet. [Typologie des Sources du Moyen Âge Occidental, Fase. 65.] (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols. 1992. Pp. 149- Paperback.) The medieval college or university Matricula is the Latin name {Matrikel in German, matricule in French) of an official register or roll where the names of subjects admitted to membership and privileges of the institution were inscribed by the rector or official and thus they became matriculated into Faculties , Nations, Colleges of Doctors, or just a simple student under a master. The author, Jacques Paquet, has masterfully described the matriculation records of medieval universities. Registers strictly qualified as matriculae survived in the universities of Prague (1372), Cracow (1400), and St. Andrews (1473), and fourteen from mostly German-speaking territories: Vienna (1377), Heidelberg (1386), Erfurt (1392), Cologne (1392), Leipzig (1409), Rostock (1419), Louvain [Leuven] (1426), Greifswald (1456), Freiburg/Br. (1460), Basel (1460), Ingolstadt (1472), Tübingen (1477), Wittenberg (1502), and Frankfurt /a.d. Oder (1506). Fragments only survived of such unsuccessful foundations as Würzburg,Trier, and Mainz for the years of 1373-1375 and 1382-1383· Important data were obtained, however, from registers of Italian universities: Bologna, Pavía, Ferrara, Florence, Padua, Pisa, Perugia, and naturally from Paris, Oxford, and Cambridge. French universities' records of Montpellier, Avignon, Caen, Dole, Toulouse, Nantes, Bordeaux, and Valence were also examined. No signs of matriculation are from Aberdeen, Copenhagen, or Uppsala. The author, Jacques Paquet, is a distinguished expert on the history of medieval universities. He is one of the two representatives of Belgium in the International Commission on History of Universities, which was founded in I960 at the Stockholm meeting of the International Congress of Historical Sciences. Professor Sven Stelling-Michaud of the University of Genève was founding president . Paquet published the bibliography of the University of Louvain [Leuven] (1973), several studies on poverty of medieval students (1978, 1982), and as an introduction to his present book, a study on matriculation of students at the me459 460 MATRICULATION BOOKS AT MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITIES dieval universities in the Festschrift (1983) in honor of the Belgian historian J. M. De Smet. He edited also, with J. IJsewin, the communications given at the 550th anniversary of the foundation of the University of Louvain. He published the introducing article on the features of the medieval university. Paquet has divided his publication into five chapters: in the first, he offers information about the synonyms of the matricula (rotulus; registrum; liber; carta-membrana; album; cathalogus; annales; even with the penetration of teaching Greek in universities: Leucoma Rotuli); the subject inscribed (registrare ) was considered matriculated (intitulatus). In the Iberian peninsula, there is no trace of matriculation before the end of the fifteenth (Huesca) or middle of the sixteenth centuries. No trace of it can be found in such small universities as Pecs (Quinqueecclesiensis) (1367), Buda (1395, 1465), Pozsony (Pressburg, Istropolitana) (1465), Aberdeen (1494), Würzburg (1402/1410), Copenhagen (1478), and Uppsala (1477). Paquet carefully enumerates those sources which could furnish information when matriculation registers are lacking on subjects enlisted into universities or colleges. These are: statutes, acts of rectors and registers of chancellors, acts of the deans and procurators of the Nations, archives ofthe colleges, lists ofparticipants at examinations, the rotulus of those requesting benefices, etc. In 1403, the rotulus of the university of Paris counted 2,090 subjects. At the University of Paris, the registers of chancellors (we must add "en bas," meaning Notre Dame,"en haut," the chancellor oftheAbbey ofSaint Geneviève) furnish rich information. The accounts of the colleges also shed light on the enrolled members of the university. If I may add, a good example is P. A. Ford,"The Medieval Account Books of the Parisian College of Dainville," Manuscripta, 9 (1965), 155-166. Besides sources of academic and ecclesiastical nature Paquet punctiliously enumerates civil sources such as royal or princely and urban archives. He also clearly outlines the process of matriculation: first, the candidate hacl to take an oath (Juramentum),to respect and obey the Statutes; second,he had to pay his dues (solvatprofisco). If he was poor, as in Paris, he did not have to pay, only to take an oath...