The word school comes from a Greek term that originally meant leisure
School traces back to the Greek schole, which first meant free time and the activity you filled it with, before shifting to mean a group gathered for lectures. Only people with leisure could afford to study. Compulsory attendance for ordinary children is a far newer idea, spreading in parts of Europe during the 18th century.
Organised schools existed in ancient Greece, Rome, India and China. The Byzantine Empire ran a primary system reportedly beginning in 425 AD, and its large bureaucracy needed literate staff; even soldiers usually had basic schooling. That system lasted until the empire fell in 1453. In Western Europe, cathedral schools trained clergy and officials, and several English ones still operate: Canterbury's King's School from 597, Rochester's from 604, St Peter's in York from 627 and Thetford Grammar from 631.
Because medieval and early modern schools existed chiefly to teach Latin, the label grammar school stuck. In the United States it now loosely means an elementary school, whereas in Britain it means a secondary school that selects by ability. British usage has another trap: the most exclusive fee-paying schools are called public schools, while in North America a public school is one funded by the state.
The Islamic world built dedicated institutions early. Learning first happened inside mosques, but by the 9th century freestanding madrassas appeared, such as al-Qarawiyyin, founded in 859. Ottoman külliye complexes, notably in Bursa and Edirne, bundled a mosque, madrassa, hospital and public kitchen, drawing wider groups of students with free meals, medical care and sometimes lodging. In 18th-century India, British records describe schools attached to nearly every temple, mosque or village, teaching subjects from arithmetic to astronomy and medicine.
Denmark-Norway made attendance compulsory between 1739 and 1741 to raise literacy among ordinary people. Many early American public schools were single rooms where one teacher handled seven grades of boys and girls together. From the 1920s these were merged into larger buildings, with children increasingly transported by horse-drawn kid hacks and later school buses.
Source: School
