France

Although small towns and villages in France were hardly aware of humanistic education, the new curriculum was welcomed at the court of Francis I and by the urban elite. The exciting new studies promulgated by the Italian governing class were viewed as a means to revivify France and pay homage to the king. Some French teachers, however, were wary of a program that emphasized Latin, which they found Italianate. Texts in French thus remained part of the program of study. Many municipal and several university grammar schools called colleges (colleges) that followed the humanistic curriculum were established by the 1530s. In Paris some of the university colleges incorporated the study of classical authors as the basis for the curricula of liberal arts and theology. The humanist and jurist Guillaume Bude (1467-1540) was one of the driving forces in French humanistic education. Appointed as the first royal librarian (see chapter 5), Bude also was in charge of the study groups that later evolved into the College de France. A serious Hellenist, he translated Plutarch, and his classical philology provided texts useful for students, such as Commentarii linguae Graecae (Commentaries on the Greek language, 1529). Bude also improved the study of Roman law by advocating close textual analysis and the study of legal history through humanistic sources.

A few of the cathedral schools also accepted the humanistic educational program, for example, at Carpentras, under the auspices of Cardinal Jacopo Sadoleto (1477-1547). Educated as a humanist, Sadoleto had been a papal secretary writing perfectly Ciceronian letters and copying them in the preferred humanistic script (chancery cursive, or cancelleresca corsivo). Assigned by the pope in 1542 to negotiate a truce between the king of France and Emperor Charles V (1500-1556), Sadoleto spent must of his time in France on this futile mission. Sadoleto wrote a pedagogical treatise entitled De pueris recte instituendis (On the education of boys), using classical authors. The cathedral school at Carpentras benefited from his expertise and interest. By the latter 16th century, however, religious conflicts and a lack of well-trained teachers caused the quality of teaching to deteriorate in many of the schools across France. Counter-Reformation dogma increasingly emphasized religious education and French chauvinism rejected the Latin culture of classical Rome. Jesuit private schools (for boys only, of course) applied a highly disciplined classical curriculum; however, their main emphasis was on religious history and spiritual doctrine.