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582 APPENDIX II In the year 1484 Deventer was again visited by the plague. Hegius writes to Agricola" on 17 Dec. (1484) that in the summer twenty of his pupils had died of the disease and many had been driven away, but that the school had now recovered its numbers. This is clearly the visitation which induced Erasmus’ father to recall the two boys to Gouda; his mother, howeyer, probably fell a victim, as Kimmel suggests, to the outbreak of 1483, since it seems that the boys did not leave Deventer immediately after her death. On the question of the date of his departure from Deventer Erasmus himself throws some light in an answer“ sent to a correspondent who claimed to have been his contemporary in the school: ‘Cum ego Dauentria discederem, nondum fluuius qui vrbem praeterfluit ponte iunctus erat.’ To illustrate this Revius* quotes a manuscript to show that the bridge was begun on 1 Aug. 1482 and opened to traffic on 16 March 1483; and thus there is an obvious contradiction to the date given above. But the care with which the town of Deventer has cherished its archives enables the difficulty to be disposed of. The accounts of the bridge contractor are still to be seen preserved in their original form on seventeen folio pages; and they run from 15 June 1482 to 1487. It is clear, therefore, that the bridge must have been opened to traffic before it was actually completed; and with work upon it still going on in 1484 Erasmus’ description of it as unfinished is quite justified. In the summer of 1484 Erasmus must have been nearly eighteen, if he was really born in 1466, an age at which he might well describe himself as ‘iam satis maturus Academiae,’ since it was customary then for boys to enter universities between the ages of thirteen and sixteen“, It is remarkable too that if he had been nine years in the school, he should not have progressed beyond the third class‘, even allowing for the early inaptitude for learning to which he refers. An explanation may perhaps be found in the suggestion that the residence as a chorister at Utrecht came in the middle of, instead of preceding, his school time at Deventer. Nine is an early age for a boys singing-days to be done; and such an interruption might well have prevented him from reaching the top of the school. Soon after Erasmus’ return home his father died, and for a short time the two boys were engaged in a struggle with their guardians, who in perhaps genuine zeal urged them to enter a monastery“. A compromise was effected, and instead of being sent as Erasmus wished to a university, they were allowed to continue their studies at Hertogenbosch in another school conducted by the 38 Hegii Dialogi, ed. Ja. Faber, Deventer, R. Paffraet, 31 Dec. 1503, fo. Ot v°. The date 1484 is arrived at from comparison with Agricola’s letters, especially Agric.® 16 ; see EHR. Apr. 1906. D Où Gi P. 321: # Lond. v. 32, LB. 405, written on 17 April 1519. # Daventria illustrata, p. 128. These dates have been incorrectly quoted as 1481 and 2 by Dr. Richter, whom Mr. Nichols follows. 4 Rashdall, Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages, ii. 604. In the Insiitutio Christiani Matrimonii (LB. v. 715 F) Erasmus states that a boy could obtain his Master’s degree and become a schoolmaster by sixteen. FT, Zons SIVIT 4 A novice might enter an Augustinian house at fourteen ; for other requirements of the Order see Ep. 296. 33 0.
