The Medieval Church · c. 991–998
The Histories
Richer of Reims
What it is
A monk of Reims on the last Carolingians and the Capetian accession, written for his teacher Gerbert and preserving a long account of Gerbert's own schooling — the abacus, the armillary sphere, the organ, and a public disputation lasting a full day.
Why it lasted
Survives in one manuscript, the author's own, found at Bamberg in 1833. It is the best evidence for what a tenth-century education actually contained, and for how much Latin Europe was already learning from Arabic Spain.
Scripture it works from
Where to read it
This work is in the public domain and can be read in full, free, at the archives below.
These open a search on each archive rather than a direct link, which is the honest way to point at an edition nobody here has checked line by line.
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