Quadrivium
Quadrivium,the higher division of the Seven Liberal Arts, comprising the sciences, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music (as distinct from the methodological subjects of the Trivium , grammar, rhetoric, and logic). Although the Liberal Arts in groupings of this kind were a staple of Greek and Roman education, the Quadrivium as such originates with Martianus Capella (early 5th cent.), followed by Boethius and his pupil Cassiodorus whose 6th-cent. On the Arts and Disciplines of the Liberal Letters was the definitive text for the Middle Ages. The Quadrivium had great importance for the writers of Chartres in the 11th–12th cents; it was neglected by the metaphysical synthesists of the 13th cent., and became associated thereafter with Oxford rather than with the Schools of continental Europe, which were less interested in the material sciences. (See Bacon, R. ) See G. Leff , Medieval Thought: St Augustine to Ockham ( 1958 ),...
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