[Follow-up of the introduction of medical-natural science curricula into education]

A source-oriented research study that began with medieval library catalogs, provided the material needed to establish the organization und structuring of the teaching of natural science in monastic/convent schools. The further development of natural science from here to present-day teaching of biology was then traced. The wealth of material available since the late Middle Ages enabled the individual phases of development of this new teaching subject to be identified and their adoption into the Latin education system determined. This process revealed a series of different establishment phases. From the Middle Ages onwards, the study is based on teacher's and pupils' books known to have been used in the Latin education system, and, from the 18th Century onward, on an additional 7,000 or so school annual reports as well as, from the second part of the 19th Century, teaching curricula.