Alcuin and the Schools of the Carolingian Age
Abstract
Of all those who aided Charlemagne in the restoration of learning which took place in Gaul in the eighth century, none can equal Alcuin of York. in order to realise more fully his contribution to this movement, it will be necessary to trace briefly the history of the school, from its Greek and Roman origin up until its decline in Gaul, at the time of the barbarian invasions of the fifth and sixth centuries. The school, fortunately, was preserved from menacing annihilation by the Irish monks, together with the Italian missionaries who christianised Britain in the sixth century. It was by means of this British detour that Latin culture found entrance once again into Gaul in the eighth century, close upon the heels of the Anglo-Saxons who, once converted, undertook the missionary task of rechristianising Western Europe and evangelizing its center.This Latin culture was spread throughout Europe by Alcuin, an Anglo-Saxon clerk, whose direct cultural descent may be traced back to Bede and eventually to Rome, During the Carolingian period, Alcuin's influence can be detected in the laws of Charlemagne, requiring the establishment of schools throughout, the realm. As a result of these ordinances, monastic, episcopal and collegiate schools were multiplied throughout the West; these schools figured in the restoration of learning of the eighth century. Besides this indirect contribution to the scholastic revival, Alcuin participated actively and practically in this intellectual movement especially by his teaching at the palace of Charlemagne and at the monastery of St. Martin at Tours. At the palace, his role was that of master of the school and head of the Academy (that cultural circle of the King's intimates), and here hie influence was as universal as it was great. At Tours, Alcuin established the best monastic school in the civilized West, where he taught (as he had done at the palace ) the liberal arts, which were the basis of medieval learning. Thus the program at St. Martin's surpassed the minimum requirements demanded by the scholastic capitularies of Charlemagne.Alcuin's contribution to Western civilization did not cease at his death in 804. The trivium and quadrivium, salvaged by the monks of the British Isles, which remain even today the foundation stones of classical learning, were disseminated throughout Europe in the ninth and tenth centuries by the disciples of Alcuin. Among his pupils at Tours, were to be found men who propagated the learning imparted to them by the Anglo-Saxon cleric, and who erected schools, modeled on that of Tours. When the truly "dark age" set in, with the disintegration of the Carolingian empire and the barbarian invasions of Horsemen, Magyars and Saracens, the spark of learning was heroically kept burning in these centers and thus passed along from generation to generation until it was mightily rekindled and burst forth into the great flame of the universities of the High Middle Ages.
Subject Area
Education history|Medieval history|European history
Recommended Citation
de Lourdes Ahern, Marie, "Alcuin and the Schools of the Carolingian Age" (1953). ETD Collection for Fordham University. AAI28552967.
https://research.library.fordham.edu/dissertations/AAI28552967
