Dénes Dienes: History of the Reformed Church Collég in Sárospatak (Sárospatak, 2013)
FLOURISHING AND SCATTERING THE REFORMED COLLEGE IN THE 17TH CENTURY - School life
the wine sales, organizing the work in the vineyards and overseeing the alumnus meal program. In later decades, this position is referred to as contrascriba and by then included oversight in matters of finance and discipline, the latter especially touching upon absenteeism. The praebitor position was later divided into a vini praebior (who managed the wine supplies) and a libi praebitor (who managed the bread supplies). The biblithecarius was the guardian of the library. The oath included having to vow that “without discrimination I will hand out the books of the school to the citizens of the school and retrieve them and return them to their proper place". The oeconomus organized the school’s daily life. His first task of the day was to sound the morning wake-up call; in the wintertime he had the further duty of lighting the candles in the darkness of the early and later hours; he ensured that the common rooms and the courtyard were orderly, did the daily roll-call, recorded the names of those who were absent and of those who had contravened some regulation and selected the students who were to participate at the church devotions and funerals; he gave the signal for any given event to get underway; he had to enforce the prohibition of students not being allowed to swim in or row boats on the Bodrog River (or to skate on it in wintertime) due to the high potential of accidents. In all liklihood, this person was not very popular. He shared his unpopularity with the coryceus whose job was to report those who conversed not in Latin but in their mother tongue, those who used inappropriate language and curse words, those who got involved in fights, swam in the river without permission, played in the vineyards or climbed onto trees, fences or rocks. On the basis of written records, it seems that it was mostly the younger students who needed to be watched in this way. The custos had similar tasks, but his duties were more directed to recess intervals and leisure activities. The senior, praebitor and the librarian were elected for terms of one year, the others for the duration of one week at a time. All such officers handed over their positions to their successor in the context of a festive speech. The association of the primarius students (also called the school’s senate) did not exist at the beginning of the century but records indicate its presence in 1642. This body consisted of nine members and the senior as president. Only students with excellent academic standing could be elected to the post of primarius whose tasks were to assist the senior in managing school affairs and to be the honorable president of the collatio groups. It is worthwhile observing matters from the perspective of the regulations to better understand the everyday life of the College in light of the different prescribed reprimands. The regulations at several turns prescribe reprimands for those who converse in their mother tongue. All instruction was done in Latin and it was a requirement that students refrain from using their native language during extra-curricular activities and mealtimes in order to practice and better learn the Latin language to eventually become fluent. Disobeying the teachers, neglecting one’s studies, skipping classes or devotions were all punishable. Suspicious persons, strangers, non-citizens were not allowed to be put up overnight and even conversing with disreputable persons was frowned upon. (The term “disreputable person” as used at this period in time refers to prostitutes). The regulations extended to the protection of privacy and to individual rights; slandering and mocking were punished severely. In less severe cases, the punishment involved paying a fine of a smaller amount. Younger students could 31 The bibliothecarius (librarian) had books such as this (Mária Széchy’s personal copy of the Vizsoly Bible)
