There was no compulsory education; nor could the system, by reason of the individual character of its foundations, be universal for Mohammedan children. But it may be supposed that any Moslem parent, the inhabitant of a town of some size, who desired his son to learn the rather difficult art of reading and writing Turkish and Arabic, or even to enter upon a learned career, was not devoid of an opportunity. Furthermore, where primary schools existed the instruction was free, and some students were even fed and lodged;[651] the students in the _medressehs_ were also partially supported, and those in the law schools received a sufficiency. This system, which dated back at least to the twelfth century in Moslem lands, probably in the Ottoman Empire in the sixteenth century gave better opportunity for education to Moslem boys than was afforded to Christian children in any land until a much later date. The Ottomans believed thoroughly in education; but, unfortunately, their conservatism was in course of time to turn a beneficent institution into a harmful one. No change of consequence, either in methods of teaching or in subjects of study, was permitted from century to century; hence the training that had once carried its earnest pupils to the forefront of human knowledge was in time to hold them firmly at a stage which the rest of the world had long passed through and left far behind. The _medressehs_ were very numerous in the empire;[652] the mosque of the Conqueror had eight, that of Suleiman five. It was Suleiman who set the gradations of the system in their final form. All who aspired to any official position in the Moslem Institution must pass through a _medresseh_ of some degree. On first entering they were called _Softas_, or more properly _Sukhtas_, as those who were _inflamed_ with the desire for learning. The students were in different grades, but there seems to have been no fixed number of years of study; the instruction being largely individual, each could proceed as rapidly as he was able. On finishing, they received a sort of master’s degree and were called _Danishmend_, which appears in several of the early sources as _Talisman_.[653] Such students as were content to teach primary schools, or to attend to ecclesiastical duties, needed to study no longer.