Old-Time Makers of Medicine: The Story of The Students And Teachers of the Sciences Related to Medicine During the Middle AgesWalsh, James J. (James Joseph)
History
Old-Time Makers of Medicine: The Story of The Students And Teachers of the Sciences Related to Medicine During the Middle Ages
Walsh, James J. (James Joseph)
Medicine, Medieval; Physicians
This custom seems also to have been transferred to Naples, and licenses
to practise were issued to woman graduates of Naples. This never
achieved anything like the reputation in this department that had been
attained at Salerno. Salerno influenced Bologna and the north Italian
universities profoundly in all branches of medicine and medical
education, particularly in surgery, as can be seen in the chapter on
"Great Surgeons of the Medieval Universities," and the practice of
allowing such women as wished to study medicine to enter the university
medical schools is exemplified in the case of Mondino's assistant in
anatomy, Alessandra Giliani, though there are also others whose names
have come down to us.
The University of Salerno had developed round a medical school. It was
the first of the universities, and, in connection with its medical
school, feminine education obtained a strong foothold. It is not
surprising, then, that with the further development of universities in
Italy, feminine education came to be the rule. This rule has maintained
itself all down the centuries in Italy, so that there has not been a
single century since the twelfth in which there have not been one or
more distinguished women teachers at the Italian universities.
University life gradually spread westward, and Paris came into existence
as an organized institution of learning after Bologna, and, doubtless,
with some of the traditions of Salerno in the minds of its founders.
Feminine education, however, did not spread to the West. This is a
little bit difficult to understand, considering the reverence that the
Teutonic peoples have always had for their women folk and the privileges
accorded them. A single unfortunate incident, that of Abelard and
Heloise, seems to have been sufficient to discourage efforts in the
direction of opportunities for feminine education in connection with the
Western universities. Perhaps, in the less sophisticated countries of
the North and West of Europe, women did not so ardently desire
educational opportunities as in Italy, for whenever they have really
wanted them, as, indeed, anything else, they have always obtained them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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