Classics in Vivarium

The survival of classical books in the Early Middle Ages is aquestion never-entirely-answered that still tackles our attention.The distinctiveness of the classical works was fading at the timeof the late antiquity, while Christianity was taking over theprimacy and the throne over the society and the civilization.Vivarium was a unique foundation in terms of launching a program ofChristian education, enhanced with secular studies. Cassiodorusprovided his monks with an opulent library. This library inVivarium was enriched by both Christian and classical works and wasliterally the only library enhanced with the classical authors atthe time; other monastic schools of this kind rejected classicalwriters as well as classical education altogether. In the historyof scholarship it was presumed that Cassiodorus was responsible forthe transmission of the books to the posterity and that his rolewas crucial in this preservation. Still, Cassiodorus? aim was of adifferent kind. Having not been able to foresee the imminentdevastation as well as the sharp edges between the two eras the waywe see them today, he could not predict tendencies in neglectingclassics.