Student life and customs

We lack sufficient evidence to make many statements about student life in ancient times. It was in the medieval universities that we first hear of those student groups which gave colour to a real student life such as we know it. The freshman was then, as until recently in our own colleges and universities, the particular object of attack on the part of those who had been in the institution longer than he. He was likely to be waylaid and thorougly pummeled before arrival.

A master who delivered his lecture too rapidly was interrupted with all kinds of noises. The lecture-rooms were wholly unheated in winter and the windows unglazed. The floors were covered with straw on which the students sat. The rooms in which the students lodged were equally uncomfortable and the sanitary arrangements negligible. The ecclesiastical gowns which they were required to wear afforded them scant protection against cold, unless they were fortunate enough to be able to buy furs. Many of the students were well-to-do and others exteremly poor. The poorer students frequently begged and were sometimes officially licensed to do so.

So many of their natural inclinations for the amusements and sports of youth were repressed by strict prohibitions that the natural consequences followed. Not having any outlet for their youthful spirits, they indulged in riotous conduct. Brawls amongst the individual students and those of different national groups were frequent, and occasionally a whole group of them would get into conflict with the town-folk, so that “Town and Gown” fights became infamous. As the students as well as the town-folk went about armed, these battles frequently ended in bloodshed and death.

The hold, which student customs have, brought many of them down into modern times, not only in Europe but also in America. Curious survivals in the treatment of freshmen, fagging, the confloct between the freshmen and the sophomores represented at Harvard until a short time ago by “Bloody Monday Night”, and at other colleges by cane rushes, bear wtness to this conservatism.

The popularizing of college education and removal by university authorities of many of the restrictions on the natural impulses of youth for activity have led to the gradual disappearance of the many so-called medieval customs. In their place has grown up a bewildering variety of activities for the student, which form a large part of his life. A perusal of the daily or weekly paper, or monthly, or annual periodicals published by the students reveals not only the literary activity, but in the notices, which they publish, they bear witness to the existence of an extended variety of sports, numerous clubs, debating oganizations, etc.

On the social side, dancing and singing in large choruses, both during term time and at graduation exercises, occupy a prominent place.

Though in America student life has gone far beyond anything in the way of student life and customs, such as they exist in France and Italy, the British universities are a very close second. In the latter, as well as in America, there is that love of the “Alma Mater” which is not at all to be found on the continent of Europe.

The establishment of the academies and later, colleges for girls in America in the 19-th century led to their own development of college life and customs. These very rapidly took on the colour of the almost exact imitations of those which had grown in the institutions for men. The publications, literary clubs and even athletic contests resembled those of the men.

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