The University of Perugia, 1308–2008

How often does a university have the opportunity to celebrate its 700th anniversary? A team of scholars is celebrating the 700th anniversary of the University of Perugia, founded in 1308, with publications that combine elegance and a great deal of information. These works cover all seven centuries but concentrate on the first five. Although they vary in nature and purpose, all add to our knowledge of the University of Perugia, an institution that deserves to be better known.

The University of Perugia was a medium-sized university not so large or famous as the universities of Bologna and Padua. It became important for legal studies in its first century, because the two best-known professors of Roman law taught there. Bartolo da Sassoferrato (1313–57) studied at Perugia for five or six years, took his degree at Bologna, and then taught at Perugia from 1342 or 1343 until his death. Baldo degli Ubaldi (1327?–1400), a native of Perugia, studied at the University of Perugia and spent the majority of his teaching years there. They were the most famous practitioners of mos italicus (Italian method), a style of teaching Roman law that emphasized its practical applications.

Due papi e un imperatore by Maria Alessandra Panzanelli Fratoni studies the papal and imperial documents that erected the legal framework of the University of Perugia. Beginning in the 1260s the politically independent commune of Perugia, the most important town in the picturesque region of Umbria, began to create a university by appointing a few teachers. At that time the pope and his court resided in Perugia. But when the conclave of 1305 (which met at Perugia) elected a Frenchman who took the name of Clement V, the new pope immediately moved the papal court to Avignon. Perugia then asked the pope, who had a strong interest in education, for a university charter, which Clement V awarded on September 8, 1308. It established a studium generale in all faculties and in perpetuity. Perugia lost the papal court but gained a university.

Clement V’s bull said nothing about degrees. So the Perugians petitioned the next pope, John XXII (1316–34), another Frenchman. On August 1, 1318, he issued a papal breve (letter) authorizing the University of Perugia to award doctorates and licentiates (permission to teach a discipline anywhere in Christendom, the ancestor of today’s master’s degree) in civil and canon law. It should be noted that the breve did not mention bachelor’s degrees. One of the features of Italian universities that divided them from northern European universities is that they did not award bachelor’s degrees in law or medicine. This papal breve may have helped establish this distinction at an early date. In...