Creating Catholics: Catechism and Primary Education in Early Modern France

Chapter 4: The Village Schoolmaster

C H A P T E R F O U R The Village Schoolmaster Another Agent of the Catholic Reformation i At the end of the seventeenth century in the diocese of Reims, two clergymen shared jurisdiction over the teachers of the petites écoles: the archbishop and the écolâtre (one of the cathedral canons). By virtue of his benefice, the écolâtre had the right to both approve and dismiss village schoolmasters and schoolmistresses, and any schoolteacher in the diocese was required to have his written permission in order to open a school.1 Although teachers did not have to receive approval from the archbishop (except during a vacancy in the position of écolâtre), they could be fired by him or his representatives during pastoral visits. Thus, the duties of the archbishop and the écolâtre with regard to the petites écoles overlapped, creating the potential for disputes between the two officeholders. 136 In the early eighteenth century two archbishops of Reims brought two separate cases to court, arguing that control over the petites écoles belonged exclusively to the office of the archbishop. The two cases, one in 1718 and the other in 1736–1737, ended the same way—with the écolâtre maintaining his rights as long as he agreed to grant the archbishop the power to dismiss schoolteachers during pastoral visits.2 The documents for the cases provide no specific information as to why the archbishops wanted to divest the écolâtres of their authority over the petites écoles. The income for the benefice of écolâtre was not large (Louis Joseph de Sugny, who held the office of écolâtre in 1729, listed his income as 634 livres for that year), and schoolteachers usually earned such small salaries that écolâtres certainly could not have expected much in the way of bribes. The cases do show, however, that both archbishops equated control over schoolteachers with control over religious reform at the parish level. Essentially, they hoped to place the petites écoles under a clear authority in the church hierarchy. The écolâtres, despite the fact that they were also cathedral canons and clergymen by definition, represented more individual interests, and the archbishops feared they did not share the same dedication to Catholic reform. Bishops and archbishops, on the other hand, had a vested interest in securing control over village schools since the content of the education provided therein represented a significant component of the church’s reform program. Philip Hoffman has made a convincing argument that French parish priests served as “agents” of the Catholic Reformation, yet they did not act alone: schoolteachers could exert an equally significant in- fluence over the religious and moral life of the parish. Hoffman describes his clerical “agents” as well-trained representatives of the church who spread Tridentine Catholicism to even the most remote parishes throughout France.3 The village schoolmasters (and in some cases schoolmistresses4) of Auxerre, Châlons-sur-Marne, and Reims fulfilled many of the same duties that curés did, thus acting as agents of the Catholic Reformation as well. Not only did the schoolmaster function as a disseminator of moral, religious, and secular education; he was also a semiclerical representative of the church and a community leader. During school hours he taught catechism to his students as well as appropriate moral behavior, and he supervised their participation in the The Village Schoolmaster 137 sacraments of confession and communion. All told, schoolteachers had more regular contact with, and influence over, the children of the parish than curés or any other member of the clergy. As a result, bishops knew the successful reform of their parishes depended on their ability to persuade schoolteachers to operate their schools in accordance with the principles of Tridentine Catholicism. In fact, most of the literature on primary education in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries assumes that the Catholic Reformation movement and the increasing amount of control bishops exerted at the diocesan and parish levels allowed the church to dominate all primary education in the early modern period.5 This is perhaps most clearly demonstrated by the fact that the term petites écoles is often mistranslated as “parish schools” by English-speaking historians, implying that the church itself had established and administered the schools. The curriculum of the petites écoles certainly centered on religion; besides learning the catechism, children...