an
important record of his connection with York. This poem, written before
he left England, is, like most of his verse, in dactylic hexameters. To
a certain extent it follows Virgil as a model, and is partly based on
the writings of Bede, partly on his own personal experience. It is not
only valuable for its historical bearings, but for its disclosure of the
manner and matter of instruction in the schools of the time, and the
contents of the great library. As master of the cathedral school, Alcuin
acquired name and fame at home and abroad, and was soon the most
celebrated teacher in Britain. Before 766, in company with Aelbert, he
made his first journey to Germany, and may have visited Rome. Earlier
than 780 he was again abroad, and at Pavia came under the notice of
Charlemagne, who was on his way back from Italy. In 781 Eanbald, the new
Archbishop of York, sent Alcuin to Rome to bring back the Archbishop's
pallium. At Parma he again met Charlemagne, who invited him to take up
his abode at the Frankish court. With the consent of his king and his
archbishop he resigned his position at York, and with a few pupils
departed for the court at Aachen, in 782.

Alcuin's arrival in Germany was the beginning of a new intellectual
epoch among the Franks. Learning was at this time in a deplorable state.
The older monastic and cathedral schools had been broken up, and the
monasteries themselves often unworthily bestowed upon royal favorites.
There had been a palace school for rudimentary instruction, but it was
wholly inefficient and unimportant.

During the years immediately following his arrival, Alcuin zealously
labored at his projects of educational reform. First reorganizing the
palace school, he afterward undertook a reform of the monasteries and
their system of instruction, and the establishment of new schools
throughout the kingdom of Charlemagne. At the court school the great
king himself, as well as Liutgard the queen, became his pupil. Gisela,
Abbess of Chelles, the sister of Charlemagne, came also to him for
instruction, as did the Princes Charles, Pepin, and Louis, and the
Princesses Rotrud and Gisela. On himself and the others, in accordance
with the fashion of the time, Alcuin bestowed fanciful names. He was
Flaccus or Albinus, Charlemagne was David, the queen was Ava, and Pepin
was Julius. The subjects of instruction in this school, the centre of
culture of the kingdom, were first of all, grammar; then arithmetic,