Without being, as the legend let it believe, the creator of the school in France, Charlemagne establishes a true elementary program of Christian elimination of illiteracy. Under the authority of the bishops, from 1079 the school-cathedrals open. Teaching is given to it in Latin and the pupils have the statute of clerks.
The universities result from the school centers most important, as of the end of XIIe century. Supported by the pope, they often do not obtain their privileges (right to strike, seal, freedom of recruitment) that at the conclusion of conflicts with the communal or royal authorities. Placed under the authority of the vice-chancellor and his seniors, the university is often divided into faculties which give him a particular identity. Thus, in Montpellier France is directed towards the right and medicine, Paris towards theology.
The students, gathered in nations, are often poor. It is with their intention that the colleges are open, like that of Robert de Sorbon, founded in Paris in 1257. They set up a social group which it is necessary to take into account, because they are proportionally very numerous. At the end of XIIIe century, in Paris, 5000 students for a population estimated at 200 ' 000 inhabitants live. Goliards, kinds of “intellectual tramps”, sometimes a great freedom of thought and manners post, and cause readily disorders.
The ancient model of the literary culture strongly impregnated the teaching, based on the seven liberal arts. The trivium (grammar, rhetoric and dialectical) generally carries it on the quadrivium, which gathers the scientific disciplines (arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music). State educations, where teaching is exempted in vulgar language, i.e. in French, train notaries and merchants.