Dear Dad, Send Money: Letters from Students in the Middle Ages

The more things change, the more they remain the same. One of the first things that students learn when they go off to college is that it’s expensive to live on your own, out from under your parents’ roof. It was the same way back when college was invented. This letter is from the 1220s:

B. to his venerable master A., greeting This is to inform you that I am studying at Oxford with the greatest diligence, but the matter of money stands greatly in the way of my promotion, as it is now two months since I spent the last of what you sent me. The city is expensive and makes many demands; I have to rent lodgings, buy necessaries, and provide for many other things which I cannot now specify. Wherefore I respectfully beg your paternity that by the promptings of divine pity you may assist me, so that I may be able to complete what I have well begun. For you must know that without Ceres and Bacchus Apollo grows cold.

Ceres, the goddess of agriculture and grains, is a nod to food, and of course, Bacchus is the god of wine. Adding his name might not have been the best idea. You can see more examples of medieval letters home from school at Medievalist.