Gothic Cathedrals and the First Universities

In the twelfth century the towns grow, and building changes with them: the pointed arch, the ribbed vault and the flying buttress let walls rise higher and give way to stained glass—so Saint-Denis, Chartres and Notre-Dame are built. In the same years the cathedral schools and student guilds turn into universities: in Bologna they study law, in Paris theology and the liberal arts, with Oxford and others to follow. Teaching is in Latin, disputation follows strict rules, Aristotle is read in translations from Arabic. The university receives statutes and self-government—an institution that had never existed before.