The "Manuale," of unknown authorship, first appeared in 1481. For the next several centuries it had a "succès de fou." Edition after edition was brought out. Professor Seybolt's excellent translation into fluent, colloquial English makes it accessible to the American public, and sooner or later it will find its way into a great many college libraries. The book deals with university life.
In form it is a series of dialogues, touching the registration and initiation of new students; the "special treatment" (of which this is the first notice) accorded to freshmen (who were then called 'beani') by the old students; undergraduate views of exercises and lectures ('cuts' were popular then, too, and stringent regulations had to be passed by the university); methods and courses of study, with the requirements for the degree of "Atrium Baccalaureus;" poetry and law; students' recreations; table talk; quarrels among students; examinations; university regulations; girls; "how the student ought to reply when questioned concerning the customs of the university"; matters of good form; etc., etc. In short, no college annual ever gave so complete a survey of student life and thought. Even though these were students of the Middle Ages, human nature has not altered greatly, except that freshmen now have less indignity to endure, an easier gauntlet to run, before being admitted to "the privileges of the university". The original is not in the best Ciceronian Latin, and in this translation one or two mistakes of interpretation have been cleared up. The content of the book far outweighs its form. There is no denying that, in spite of the fact that the book raises about as many questions as it set ties, original documents have a value apart from their indubitable interest, and this translation, with its appendix and bibliography, is not only very readable but is a valuable contribution to the study of the Middle Ages and the history of education.
—The Sewanee Review, Volume 30 [1922]