The first public schools in Croatia were founded in Zadar (1282), Dubrovnik (1333) and Zagreb (1362). The first Gymnasium was founded by Paulists in Lepoglava near Zagreb in 1503.

---

Croatian students studied at many European Universities, starting from the Early Middle Ages. For example, Herman Dalmatin (1110-1154) was our first student who attended lectures of the famous Thierry de Chartres in Paris in the thirties of the 12th century. Born according to his own words in the heart of Istria, he wrote about 20 original books and translations, thus contributing a great deal to natural philosophy and exact sciences in Europe. He travelled a lot, and besides Latin and Greek mastered perfectly Arabic.
On the left you can see an old drawing of Herman with an astrolabe in his hand, shown with Euclid (from Chronica Maiora written by Matthew of Paris in the 13th century). See a monograph by Zarko Dadic – Herman of Dalmatia, Skolska knjiga, Zagreb, 212 pp (parallel English and Croatian text).

He translated many important books from Arabian into Latin, like Euclid’s Elements, Al-Khwarizmi‘s Tables (continuing the work of Adelard of Bath on both classics), Sahl ibn Bishr’s (Arabian scientist of the Jewish origin, 9th century) Sextus astronomicae liber, Abu-Ma’ashar’s Introduction to Astronomy, acquainting thus the West with Aristotel’s thoughts, and in particular the oldest Latin redaction of Ptolomey‘s Planisphere (published in Toulouse 1143; in Islamic literature known as `Almagest’). Herman wrote an astrological – cosmological treatise De essentiis (Béziers, 1143). With his English friend Robert from Ketton he worked on the translation of Kur’an. Herman’s translations from Arabic represent an unavoidable ingredient of the so-called `Toledo corpus’ of texts on Islam. Its main objective was to resist Islam not by force as the Crusaders did, but by understanding and love. As we know, the Arabic culture was a bridge across which the spiritual heritage of the Ancient Greeks came to the West.

The Croats were also present at the Court of the Andalusian califs in Cordoba (Spain). The body guard for califs was composed of islamized Croats. Among them the most famous were Wadha el-Ameri and Zahair Alameri (11th century). The Croatian kingdom maintained relations with the Califat, so that in 953 the Croatian legation visited Cordoba.

The oldest known map where the name of Croatia appears is El’Idrisi‘s map of the Mediterranean sea from 1154. The name of Croatia is written as Garuasia. This map was a supplement of El’Idrisi’s book “The Joy of Those Who Long to Travel around the World”.