ABSTRACT
Lay literacy was widespread in most cities, particularly among the wealthier burgesses. In the late medieval cities as in the rural areas, educational levels were at least as high among women as among men. The urban bureaucracies generated massive written records. The Latin education of the earlier period changed to a mainly vernacular culture in the late Middle Ages. The language used in municipal chanceries shows the advance of the vernacular language everywhere. Many French urban charters exist first in a Latin version, then in French, perhaps with a third in the regional dialect. The story of humanism in Italy and its expansion to the north is more a feature of the next period than of the Middle Ages, and an aspect of broader cultural currents than specifically of urban society. The coarse entertainments that were such a prominent part of the social environment in the late medieval city show that emotions were raw and close to the surface.
