The Medieval University

Extract

Professor Astrik Gabriel perhaps comes nearest to being the present-day successor to Charles Homer Haskins. Not that they could for a moment be confused. For one thing Professor Gabriel's main focus of activity is the high and later middle ages, whereas for Haskins it centered on the twelfth century: a difference in the intellectual history of the period between maturity verging on old age and youth. Again Haskins touched lightly on the borderland of intellectual and social history, throwing out a stream of elegant and seminal suggestions and sketches, while Professor Gabriel has mainly concentrated on the social and institutional facets of university life, above all in the colleges. Yet, although their styles of presentation are also very different, both take one into the heart of university life as it was lived with a zest and sympathy which is distinctive.