Espejo general de la gramatica en dialogos para saber la natural y perfecta pronunciacion de la lengua castellana ... = Miroir general de la grammaire en dialogues pour sçavoir la naturelle & parfaite pronontiation de la langue espagnolle ... / por Ambrosio de Salazar.

Espejo general de la gramatica en dialogos para saber la natural y perfecta pronunciacion de la lengua castellana ... = Miroir general de la grammaire en dialogues pour sçavoir la naturelle & parfaite pronontiation de la langue espagnolle ... / por Ambrosio de Salazar.

A Rouen : Chez Louys Loudet, ruë aux Juifs, pres le palais, MDCXXVII [1627]

[22], 506, [8] p. ; 17 cm

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France -- Rouen, -- publication place.

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From dealer's description: "Espejo general de la gramatica en dialogos para saber la natural y perfecta pronunciacion de la lengua castellana…Miroir general de la grammaire en dialogues pour sçavoir la naturelle & parfaite pronontiation de la langue espagnolle... by Ambrosio de Salazar Rouen: Louis Loudet, 1627 [22], 506, [8] p. (lacking entire S sheet) | 8vo | ã8 B-2K8 2L4 | 167 x 107 mm A popular Castilian grammar that features the sixteenth-century Afro-Spanish poet and professor Juan Latino. Fifth edition, and one of two issues that year. Published exclusively in Rouen; preceded by editions in 1614 (two issues), 1615, 1622 (three issues), and 1623 (two issues); and followed by editions in 1628, 1634, and 1636 (three issues). One of at least three bilingual works the author produced for the French student looking to learn Spanish (see also his Clavellinas de recreacion and Secretos de la gramática). ¶ This grammar, set entirely in parallel columns of Spanish and French, principally takes the form of seven instructive dialogues spread over seven days. The dialogues range from simple question and answer to more sustained conversations, their subject matter covering language and grammar, of course, but also history and literature. Includes glossaries, select verb conjugations, and a number of insightful common phrases. It is the most applauded work of Ambrosio de Salazar, informed by the peripatetic method of grammatical pedagogy (“Grammar was taught by walking and conversing, similar to the pedagogy of Socrates” [Royal Spanish Academy] ), a system adopted by many scholars of that time. This method walks a student through stories and situations that are central to the national identity of Spain. Therefore, one of the dialogues presents one of the most notable figures of Golden Age Spain: Juan Latino, 16th-century professor of African descent, who appears in the seventh dialogue (p. 467-472). After several statements about manos, the author moves on to manera, the opening in skirts worn by Spanish women. “On this word manera,” he continues, “I shall tell the story of Juan Latino of Granada." He dedicates the following five pages to Latino’s story, told in parallel Spanish and French. De Salazar speaks of his purchase at the age of twelve; his facility for languages and all manner of learning, as well as music; and how he came to meet his future wife. “Thus he found entrée with the foremost ladies of the city, because his smooth voice helped him a great deal.” In any case, the story continues, a royal counselor hired Latino to teach his daughter to play the clavichord. Latino wooed the daughter, which began with him sticking his hand inside the manera of her skirt, and eventually slept with her. When their dark-skinned baby was born, the father died from anger, the mother accepted that Latino must marry her and inherit the estate, and the son was sent to school, where he proved as capable a student as his father. “I saw him,” de Salazar adds here, “and four of his very beautiful daughters, although mulatas, smart and dressed like ladies.” The story closes with an anecdote about several men who came to see Latino at his home. Upon seeing a Black man crossing the patio, but not knowing him to be the esteemed professor himself, the visitors asked him if his master was at home. Yes, the man responded. Well, they said, go and tell him that we wish to speak with him. Latino went into the next room, sat down, and asked his visitors to enter. Thus he asked his visitors, now clearly embarrassed, to tell him what they wanted. ¶ This is "a spicy, elaborate version of the scholar's life," Henry Louis Gates and Maria Wolff note, "full of juicy incidents and verbal games which lead us to wonder if Salazar did not do some embellishing...As we see in these passages, Salazar was quite interested in Latino's marriage, and the interracial, interclass aspects of it sparked the author's imagination. Juan Latino takes on features of a picaresque hero, a well-spoken rogue, and also of a jester or buffoon, his blackness providing him only with an added dimension, an added topic of wit, in this respect." As aforementioned, this edition was produced for French learners of Castilian, which allows us to think about how wide-reaching Juan Latino’s image was during this period. Further, at the time of its publication, Salazar resided in France, supported by royal courtiers and under the sponsorship of members of the royal family, such as Maria de Medici. The Royal Spanish Academy states on the multinational impact of such grammars: “Of the Spanish language for foreigners, specifically for Frenchmen, within the general context of the golden centuries, a period in which a large number of Spanish grammars were published in a large part of Europe, which contributed to a great expansion of Spanish.” Through narratives emphasizing the regal to the folkloric, Salazar had an interest in shaping international understandings of not only the Castilian language but Spain. Due to the popularity of Salazar’s grammars, Juan Latino’s narrative would have been known by members of European nobility outside of Spain itself. A remarkable digression, and certainly among the earliest (relatively) positive representations of a Black man in western pedagogical literature. PROVENANCE: Scattered penciled underlinings and markings that perhaps show its use as a pedagogical tool: avenue supplied in the margin alongside the printed text's alameda and promenade (p. 56), and several words in both Spanish and French penciled in the lower margin of p. 504. ¶ Dated ownership inscription on title page of Pierre de Cardonnel (Ex. Bibl. Petr. de Cardonnel 1645). French poet and printer Cardonnel (1614-1667), native of Caen but no less an Englishman, is remarked upon in scholarship as an early reader of Thomas Hobbes and early translator of Dryden. He had grand ambitions for Hebrew and Arabic printing, certainly unusual for a provincial town, and even hired one of Robert Estienne's former apprentices. These interests brought him a bit too close to biblical scholarship. As a Protestant, this irked France's Catholic authorities, who launched a formal inquiry into his printing activities. Samuel Bochart's Phaleg was especially problematic. De Cardonnel did eventually see it through publication, but he never printed another book. His book collection, auctioned in London in 1681, demonstrated that he "was a serious collector of books, more interested in scholarly rarities than in the novelties of contemporary publishing." He possessed a complete Aldine Aristotle, for example, and a Caxton Cato. This is a particularly early acquisition for de Cardonnel. Malcolm found several ownership inscriptions dated 1645, but only one earlier, for 1641. CONDITION: Early parchment. Woodcut portrait of Louis XIII on title leaf verso; leaf ã8 is blank. ¶ Lacking the entire S sheet (16 pages, a lapse noted by our reader in pencil); upper margin frayed throughout, with occasional marginal loss, plus a tear in the final leaf affecting a little text; text block a little warped, more so near the end. Rather crudely recased at some point, with new endpapers added, and inelegantly repaired with patches of parchment; parchment soiled. REFERENCES: USTC 5010175 ¶ Henry Louis Gates and Maria Wolff, “An Overview of Sources on the Life and Work of Juan Latino, the ‘Ethiopian Humanist,’” Research in African Literatures 29.4 (Winter 1998), p. 14–51; Nick Jones, "Cosmetic Ontologies, Cosmetic Subversions: Articulating Black Beauty and Humanity in Luis de Góngora’s 'En la fiesta del Santísimo Sacramento'," Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies 15.1 (2015), p. 26-54; Santiago Martinez Hernandez, “Ambrosio De Salazar,” Inicio, https://dbe.rah.es/biografias/6107/ambrosio-de-salazar; Pedro Ruiz Pérez, "Ambrosio de Salazar: trayectoria y modelos de una construcción autorial," Bulletin Hispanique 121-2.2 (2019), p. 569-592; Noel Malcolm, "Pierre de Cardonnel (1614-1667), Merchant, Printer, Poet, and Reader of Hobbes," Aspects of Hobbes (OUP, 2002), p. 260 ("As the author of the first known French translations of works by Dryden and Waller, de Cardonnel must deserve at least a small place in Anglo-French literary history"), 310-311 (cited above, on his book collection; "Books from de Cardonnel's library survive in various modern collections: they are easily identifiable, as it was his habit to write an ownership inscription, in his neat, rounded script, at the bottom of the title page," typically dated, as here), 312-313 (his earliest acquisitions)."

Ordered from Patrick Olson Rare Books, D9669, 2023-07-13, email quote.

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