"Throughout antiquity, education was oral. Times were changing, however, as the old order passed away, as imperial authority in the West collapsed, and as Europe fragmented into successor kingdoms. Strained economies meant less public education, and fewer aristocrats with the resources to hire private teachers. “Following the collapse of the taxation system that had formerly paid for the Roman civil administration, and the consequent loss or radical downsizing of the bureaucratic cadres, there was no longer any call for the services of the grammarians and rhetoricians who had drilled Roman schoolboys in the skills that made them eligible for a civil career”. A student might not have a local teacher available to answer questions and explain difficult texts. Cassiodorus took up the call to be the “Antiquarius Domini,” the “Book-Producer of the Lord”, creating the self-study guides for the coming generations of do-it-yourself scholars."

https://aetherczar.substack.com/p/ii-1726-monasticism-and-education