Page:A short history of nursing - Lavinia L Dock (1920).djvu/99

Rh ing for relief as criminals. The care and protection of children especially lagged under civic guardians up to the eighteenth century, and the fate of destitute orphans in European countries often made the ancient pagan custom of exposing superfluous infants to death seem kind in comparison.

It is considered that the term "Dark Age" must not be applied after the eleventh century, for revivals of intellect and spirit gave a fresh impetus to human progress from that time, and the twelfth century is often spoken of as the period of a true renaissance antedating the Renaissance of the fifteenth century. Groups of students and masters who formed themselves into guilds were the beginnings of universities, and from the tenth century the city of Salerno had been famous for the physicians whose labours culminated in a medical school located there. The origin of this school has been sometimes attributed to Saracenic influence, and, again, to the survivals of Greek culture in Sicily. It probably owed something to both, and also to the Jews, for Jewish physicians did much to build up Salerno. It is believed that secular influences controlled it, even in so far that it gave no teaching in theology. It is certain that it became an important centre of medical learning.