七艺：语法、逻辑、修辞、算术、几何、音乐及天文

三学或三艺（拉丁文：trivium，意为“三条道路”） 是欧洲中世纪大学首先要教授的三门学科：语法、逻辑和修辞，构成中世纪博雅教育的基础，为进一步学习四艺做准备。

四术或四艺（拉丁文：quadrivium，意为四条道路）指中世纪欧洲大学继三艺之后所教的四门学科，以完成博雅教育。四艺包括算术、几何、音乐及天文。在学习四艺之前，要学习三艺，包括语法、逻辑和修辞；而在学习四艺之后，可以进一步学习哲学和神学。

Inclassical antiquity, the "liberal arts" denoted those subjects of study that were considered essential for a free person (Latin:liber, "free")[5]to master in order to acquire those qualities that distinguished a free person fromslaves[citation needed]- the latter of whom formed the greater number of the population in the classical world. Contrary to popular belief, freeborn girls were as likely to receive formal education as boys, especially during the Roman Empire—unlike the lack of education, or purely manual/technical skills, proper to aslave.[6]The "liberal arts" or "liberal pursuits" (Latinliberalia studia) were already so called in formal education during the Roman Empire; for example,Seneca the Youngerdiscusses liberal arts in education from a critical Stoic point of view in Moral Epistle 88.[7]The subjects that would become the standard "Liberal Arts" in Roman and Medieval times already comprised the basic curriculum in theenkuklios paideiaor "education in a circle" of late Classical and Hellenistic Greece.

In the 5th century AD,Martianus Capelladefined the seven Liberal Arts as:grammar,dialectic,rhetoric,arithmetic,geometry,music, andastronomy. In themedieval Western university, the seven liberal arts were divided in two parts:[8][9]

theTrivium

grammar

logic

rhetoric

theQuadrivium

arithmetic

geometry

music

astronomy, often calledastrology; both modern senses were covered