In the Middle Ages, education in Western Europe was VERY poor. In fact, about the only people who COULD read and write were priests and monks, and the highest levels of royalty. During the Cluny Reform Movement of the tenth and eleventh centuries, the Catholic Church made it a requirement for priests to go to seminaries, and so schools for priests attached to cathedrals became quite common. From time to time, royalty or a few wealthy merchants would ask to “sit in” on these classes, as it was one of the only ways to receive an education. As Europe revived, more and more secular students started joining the seminaries, and by the mid-eleventh century, the pope decreed that universities for lay people would be branched off of many of these seminaries. The University of Bologna was the first in 1158, but others included Oxford and Cambridge in England, Salamanca in Spain, Heidelberg in Germany, and the University of Paris (the Sorbonne) in France (which, in fact, was once part of Notre Dame’s seminary). These institutions were still run by the church, but they were designed for a lay education.
