The University of Freiburg: From the Charter of 1457 to Early Teaching

The University of Freiburg was initiated by the Habsburg Archduke Albrecht VI of Austria in Freiburg im Breisgau. On April 20, 1455, Pope Callixtus III authorized its establishment and commissioned the Bishop of Constance to investigate and carry it forward. Financial arrangements and imperial confirmation followed in 1456. This process brought together territorial ruler, Church, and city; teaching did not begin immediately on the strength of a single order.

The founding charter of September 21, 1457, defined the institution's rights, and Matthäus Hummel was appointed its first rector on the same day. The formal opening, however, came on April 26–27, 1460: an election of the rector in Freiburg Minster was followed by public religious celebrations, with inaugural lectures in the different subjects scheduled from April 28 to May 1. The year 1457 therefore identifies the charter stage, not a year in which classes were already fully operating.

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The archduke's planned revenues came chiefly from ecclesiastical benefices and parish income in Freiburg, Breisach, Ensisheim, Winterthur, and elsewhere. In 1456, he assigned implementation to Hummel and Thüring von Hallwyl. Revenues would be received as the relevant benefices became vacant, clergy carrying out religious duties would first be paid, and the surplus would support university teachers. The number of chairs was consequently tied to the income actually obtainable.

Another arrangement in 1457 assigned part of Villingen's tithe revenues to the institution and provided Hummel with seventy Rhenish gulden annually in return for teaching and administrative duties. Revenues designated on paper still required the necessary legal and ecclesiastical procedures. A major obstacle was overcome only in November 1459, when Freiburg guaranteed the recruitment and salaries of teachers. The risk assumed by the city was an important condition of the opening.

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The charter treated teachers and students as a specially protected corporation. Those traveling to Freiburg to study, residing there, or departing were to receive safe passage and judicial protection within the archduke's territories. The university and its faculties could establish and amend internal regulations. Although Hummel's first appointment came from the archduke, subsequent rectors, deans, and relevant officers were to be chosen under the university's rights. The rectorial election of 1460 selected him again.

Such autonomy also involved discipline. The rector handled certain disputes involving university members, and civic officials were required to respect the corresponding jurisdiction. Sworn assessors were to determine rents for student housing, while lending and the purchase and sale of books were regulated. These arrangements protected scholars' living conditions but remained embedded in the powers of ruler, bishop, and city. They consisted of specific judicial, economic, and status privileges and cannot simply be equated with university autonomy today.

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Hummel came from Villingen, studied at Heidelberg, and later earned qualifications in canon law and medicine at Pavia. Albrecht appointed him an adviser in 1455 and involved him in establishing the university. Familiar with different institutions, he handled finance and negotiations while also teaching in the new one, bringing the roles of organizer and professor together.

The backgrounds of early teachers reveal scholarly connections between cities. Kilian Wolf of the arts faculty came from Heidelberg's academic circle, while Johann Seulnhofer, Johann Mölfeld, and Konrad Arnold had studied in Vienna. They taught, respectively, the old logic, Aristotle's ethics, Peter of Spain's logic textbook, and the Physics. The new institution therefore did not invent its curriculum from nothing, but brought established teachers, texts, and qualifications together in a new location.

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Drawing on early registers, Schreiber records that the first entrants came not only from Freiburg but also from the Breisgau, Black Forest, Swabia, the Rhineland, and Swiss towns, including parish clergy. Entrants swore obedience to the rector and regulations and promised to uphold the university's peace and interests. Admission both attracted students from elsewhere and brought existing clerics and local young men under a shared legal status.

Hummel published disciplinary regulations in 1460 and continued to supplement them. The university restricted weapons, walking in the streets at night without a light, and damage to others' property. Teachers were also forbidden knowingly to teach unregistered students. Dress, residence, and conduct were supervised. The regulations collected in the history span several years, reflecting a gradual definition of membership rather than a complete code fixed on opening day.

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The arts faculty organized daily instruction through lectures, exercises, and disputations. Under the early arrangements reconstructed by Schreiber, teachers first read a text slowly so students could correct their copies, then explained it and finally summarized its arguments. Works on logic, natural philosophy, and ethics formed important parts of study. Before receiving a degree, students had to demonstrate attendance at prescribed courses and disputations and pass examinations arranged by the faculty.

Books also belonged to this teaching order. The arts faculty maintained its own collection under the care of a master. Important chained books could not leave the library, and borrowing and the issue of keys were restricted. Traveling teachers brought experience from afar to Freiburg; regulations, examinations, and library management turned it into sustainable everyday work. The university took shape through these recurrent activities beyond the founding charter itself.

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