DEGREE. _kil a•ademie rank or title, originat ing in the mein:twat universities. Scholastic dist iiwt ions of an analogous nature seem to have existed in ancient time... The doctors or teachers of the law i and the scribes of the were products of an organized educa tional submit.., and possessed privileges similar to those couierrerl by the degree of a teaching doctor in the Aliddle .\ges. In the latter part of the classical l;reek period education was well organ ized into inferior and superior conrse•„ and then. existed smile recognized proof that S11111 courses had been completed. educa tional institutions and practices were Imitated by the Romans. and Constantinople, Alexandria, and route vied with Athens in the support of sehools offering elaborate and definite coarse.: of study. the completion of \chid! carried certain distinctions comparable to the degree. Historically, however. there is no conneetion be tween them. The de..•rce as a university dis tinetion originated at Itoloint and Park during the twelfth century, rind. as the titles master and doomr imply, signified at first nothing more than a license to teach. Thus at the University of l'aris in its earliest days, the instructors taught by virtue of it tit iv: issued by the chancellor of the cathedral cm the Ile de la Cit.. This ga‘e them the right. 10 the it le of master. the advanee from their previous :academie rank of bachelor being symbolized by the e reipory of plaeing the or cap of office, upon their heads by their former in strnetors.
(If the different university degrees, that of master came lir-I in point of time. being eon• ferred in the twelfth e.11tOry by the various faellll ie. of the universities in both Erance and Italy. The title doctor. tt, an honorary distinc tion, i, not infr.•quent at this time. It-malty „oh jug it "I'd Dieter \ngelietts. In the thirteenth the doom's degree had quite generally replae•d the master's in the faculties of law, medicine. an 1 tl I c while the ma.ter's degre:.
Mill heid its own in the faculty of arts. In
the fourteenth century, when many universities begaii to be founded by virtue of special net rihnia granted by Pope or Emperor. the right to bestow the doctor's degree \vas often specitie ally granted. and in sonic ea-cs seas Withheld. 1;1Isally, 110 \\ ever, tile founding of a implied the right to confer degrees. Both the l'ope and the Emperor hail the power to confer the honorary title of doetor, or to delegate this power to others, and the doctors thus created were Imuwn as docior.s loMoti, in distinction from the 1/1)00/1 s rile promo!i, those tthu hail successfully undergone the test of the di.-ptita thin. candidate for a degree was required to prepare and read a Latin thesis. which he had to defend against a doctor of the faculty, three opponents appointed. and, as the phrase ran, 'against all comers.' Disputations, which formed one of the most brilliant and pie turesque feature. of in•di:eval university life, continued down to a comparatively bite period. 111 England they were not wholly done away with until ISOO. The degree of bachelor was first brought into use in the thirteenth century. at the University of Bari., and to de.igmate students who had passed certain preliminary tests. In the faculty of philosophy, where the 11.'1111 Of study was shortest, it was of compara tively little importance. In l'aris. in the fif teenth century, the required period was four years in the faculty of philosophy, seven years in law. eight in medicine, and 101111(441 in theology; and in these longer the pre liminary degree conferred certain valuable privi leges. At the present day neither the bachelor's degree nor the master's is of any special im portan•e upon the Continent. In France it is granted in each of the dilti.r,Tit faculties, and every candidate for the degree .4 Bachelor of Scienee, Law, 1\ledicine, or Theology nittst first obtain that of Bachelor of Letter.. In llermany some of the universities. the legrvo of bachelor as a pr•liminary step to that of doctor; but it earri.. with it no -peeial privilege.