Category: Rare Books

First Book Printed in English by William Caxton

This year celebrates the 550th anniversary of the first book printed in the English language, Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye (1473-1474). This monumental achievement was accomplished by William Caxton, an English merchant living in Bruges. The story of the first printed book in English is one of international collaborations, personal networking, and the support of a renowned noblewoman, without whom the work would not have been completed.

Color etching of a man with a green hat and white beard. His image is shown in a circular frame.
1816 etching of Caxton. Retrieved September 11, 2023 from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:William_caxton.jpg

We know much about Caxton due to in-depth research by modern scholars in the last four decades. The Wardens’ Account Books record that he apprenticed with Robert Large in 1438. Apprenticeships began at age fourteen, so we can be confident that Caxton was born in the first half of the 1420s. Large’s will of 1441 left Caxton twenty marks and it is likely this sum of money helped him make the voyage to Bruges to begin his life in business.

Caxton was a successful businessman, who was politically savvy and engaged with his fellow English merchants, serving as governor of Merchant Adventures. Most importantly, he built connections with royalty. In 1468, he was invited to attend the wedding of King Edward the IV’s sister, Margaret of York. Caxton had been involved behind the scenes in the marriage negotiations with the groom-to-be, Duke Charles the Bold. His status fell for a time when Edward went into exile. This downtime (1471-1472) provided him with an opportunity to travel and he made a fateful trip to Cologne, one of the earliest centers in the development of mechanical printing. His successor, Wynkyn de Worde, later confirmed that Caxton was bitten in Cologne by the printing bug.

Soon after his visit to Cologne, Caxton chose to translate The Recueil de Histories de Troye, written by Raoul Lefrevre for Philip the Good. The book focuses mainly on the exploits of Hercules, and it provided the dukes of Burgundy with a lineage with the heroes of Greece, through Hercules, it was claimed, who had married a Burgundian woman!

Printing was a new technology, and entrepreneurs who followed this career path often went bankrupt. Expertise in the process was needed. Paper and ink were very expensive. Like any business, printers had to cover their costs and make a living on whatever income was derived thereafter. Printing in English was a risk as most works at that time used Latin, not the vernacular of the place it was produced. English was quickly becoming an accepted language in both formal spoken venues, like Parliament (1362), and in written works like the English Bible (ca. 1380s). Thus, the shrewd businessman Caxton was strategic in choosing this work to translate into English.

In the preface of Recueil, Caxton explained that he found the translation to be more difficult than he expected. Caxton found help in the translation from none other than Margaret of York. Although there is no evidence that she provided financial support, she was a vital patron in both the translation and eventual distribution of the book. She was a bibliophile and her personal library included many religious and historical texts produced in the scribal tradition on vellum.

Painting of a woman with light skin and a black headdress. She looks off to her right and wears a dark dress with an elaborate neckline. On her left ear, she wears a dangly gold earring.
1458 portrait of Margaret of York. Retrieved September 11, 2023 from https://collections.louvre.fr/ark:/53355/cl010061606 – https://collections.louvre.fr/CGU

The use of Medieval English was also a challenge as it had a variety of regional dialects. People from northern England could barely understand those from the south. In a later work, Eneydos (his translation of Virgil’s Aeneid), Caxton admitted that “common English spoken in one shire varies from that of another” and that “the language we use today is very different from that which was spoken when I was born.” Thus, he decided on the London dialect, where wealth and literacy abounded, and which contained a mixture of Latin and French. His choice had an enormous, long-lasting influence because it set a standard for a broader community-shared spelling, grammar and syntax in spoken and written English.

It is not known how many copies of the Recuiel were printed. Sometime in 1473-1474, printing of the work was completed in Bruges. Only eighteen copies are known to survive today. He eventually moved his press to Westminster in 1476 near the gate to the Almonry (near the west end of the Abbey), where he printed his most famous work: Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales. He died ca. 1491 and was buried in the churchyard of St. Margaret’s Westminster. His press was inherited by his partner, an equally remarkable printer and businessman, Wynkyn de Worde.

Few of Caxton’s works survive as a whole. More often leaves can be found in libraries. These sell at   incredibly high cost (when available for sale) at more than $9,000/leaf. Special Collections (SCUA) is fortunate to have two original leaves from Caxton’s works:

Duff, E. Gordon (Edward Gordon). 1905. William Caxton. Chicago: The Caxton Club.

Higden, Ranulf. 1482. Leaf From the First Edition of the Polychronicon in English. Westminster: William Caxton.

We also have William Morris’ Kelmscott Press editions of Caxton’s works that are considered some of the most beautifully crafted books ever made:

Lefèvre, Raoul. 1892. The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye. Hammersmith: Kelmscott Press; London: Sold by Bernard Quaritch.

Jacobus, de Voragine. 1892. The Golden Legend. Hammersmith London, England: Kelmscott Press. London : Sold by Bernard Quaritch.

On April 30th, 1882, a stained-glass window was erected at St. Margaret’s where Caxton is buried. Following Caxton’s motto “Fiat Lux”, Lord Alfred Tennyson wrote:

Thy prayer was “Light, more Light” – while Time shall last!

Thou sawest a glory growing on the night,

But not the shadows which that light should cast,

Till shadows vanish in the Light of Light.

 

References

Blades, William. 1877. The Biography and Typography of William Caxton, England’s First Printer. London: Trubner & Co.

Crotch, W.J.B. 1928. The Prologues and Epilogues of William Caxton. London: Oxford University Press.

Deacon, Richard. 1976. A Biography of William Caxton: The First English Editor, Printer, Merchant and Translator. London: F. Muller.

Hellinga, Lotte. 2020. William Caxton and Early Printing in England. London: British Library.

Kuskin, William, ed. 2006. Caxton’s Trace: Studies in the History of English Printing. Notre Dame University Press.

Painter, George Duncan. 1977. William Caxton: A Biography. NY: Putnam.

Zeldenrust, Lydia. 2023. “Tales of Troy, Hercules, and a Printer called Caxton.” BBC History Magazine, 24:3, 26-31.

— David de Lorenzo, Giustina Director

New Acquisition: Confessionale, 1462

A new acquisition to the special collections is Antoninus Florentius, Confessionale and other texts, written in 1462. This manuscript has works in both Latin and Italian, is from Northern Italy, and is written on paper. It is written in brown ink and has evidence of four hands, with hand 1 being the primary scribe of the text. It is a single column text of 25 lines, with rubrication; there are some catchwords found at the bottom center of some of the pages.

Opening Page of the manuscript

A confessionale was a text used to assist the confessor in his tasks. Antoninus Florentius (1389-1459) was a Dominican friar and archbishop of Florence. He had a reputation for his theological knowledge and assisted as a papal theologian at the Council of Florence. He wrote many works including a guide for confessors which was highly regarded. Antoninus was canonized on May 31, 1523.

This particular confessionale is notable for including an extract on women’s dress codes, and a model of confession in the vernacular. The watermarks and vernacular indicate that the book was copied and decorated in Italy. The manuscript also contains two colophons which give the year of completion as 1462. This date was misread as 1402 as the “6” is quite abraded; 1402 is an impossible date as this work was not composed until c. 1437.

The manuscript contains the following sections:

  1. 1-23v: Antoninus Florentinus, Confessionale, “Liber primus: De instruction confessoris” (Book 1: On the instruction of the confessor)
  2. 23v-95v: Antoninus Florentinus, Confessionale, “Liber secundus: Interrogatorium” (Book 2: Interrogation)
  3. 96r-101r: Commentaries on deadly sins and the five senses
  4. 101v-102v: Excerpts of canonical and patristic texts
  5. 103r-104v: Excerpt from Antoninus Florentinus, De ornatu et habitu mulierum (On the ornamentation and dress of women)
  6. 105r-108r: Anonymous, Compendium de doctrina Christiana (Compendium of Christian doctrine)
  7. 108v-109v: A model for confession in Italian The first page of the manuscript shows much wear, and the book contains some water damage, ink stains, and later corrections to the text.

There are red under-linings and marginal notes, indicating that this was a much-used manuscript. The pagination is corrected after f. 19; it appears that the original numbering skipped a page as there is no evidence of missing leaves. A later reader went in and corrected the numbers to reflect the correct pagination. The manuscript is that it is bound in vellum manuscript waste of a choir book. This waste also dates from the 15th century. The manuscript also has a 17th century label on the spine.

Cover of manuscript from reused choirbook.

— Patricia McCall, Special Projects Archivist/Doctoral Candidate, UO History of Art and Architecture

The Irish Arts and Crafts Movement: The Dun Emer Press

Special Collections has recently acquired a set of the first eleven titles published by Dun Emer Press, a printing house established in Ireland in 1902 by Evelyn Gleeson, Elizabeth Yeats, and William Butler Yeats.

While living in London, Elizabeth Yeats had been part of the circle of William Morris, and had been inspired by his printing work. In 1902, Elizabeth Yeats joined Gleeson in establishing a studio in Dundrum, a town outside of Dublin. They named the studio Dun Emer after Emer, the daughter of Forgall Monach and Cú Chulainn), a woman noted for her artistic skill and beauty. The studio specialized in printing and other crafts. In keeping with the tenets of the Arts and Crafts Movement in England, these women also provided training and work for other young women in the fields of bookbinding, printing, weaving and embroidery.

The focus of the press was publishing work by Irish authors; it produced limited editions of books selected or written by W. B. Yeats, the press’s literary editor. Dun Emer used an Albion Press, with Caslon typeface in a fourteen-point size. Elizabeth focused on using white spaces and wide margins to ensure the focus of readers would be on the text itself. The text is predominately black, with red being used for titles, some notes, and colophons. The paper was handmade of linen rags at Saggart Mills in Dublin. The books were small, with page sizes of around 21 cm by 14.5 cm and bound in blue or brown paper boards with linen backs. These features give the books a soft, intimate feel and invite readings into the world of the text.

Elizabeth Yeats (left) at work in the Press, 1904

After publishing eleven books, the various aspects of the press separated in 1908. Elizabeth Yeats and her sister, Lily, who had worked at Dun Emer Press, established Cuala Press in Dublin, while Gleeson retained the other aspects of the studio under the name Dun Emer.

Dun Emer Press Founders

Evelyn Gleeson, ca. 1904

Evelyn Gleeson (1855-1944) was an English embroidery, carpet, and tapestry designer. She attended school in England, where she learned to be a teacher and studied portraiture. She studied under Alexander Millar, a member of the Arts and Crafts movement. Gleeson was interested in Irish affairs and women’s rights, becoming members of the Gaelic League, the Irish Literary Society, and the suffrage movement. Gleeson moved to Ireland for health, where she established the Dun Emer Press with Elizabeth Yeats. Gleeson took charge of the weaving and tapestry areas of the studio as well as managing the overall finances. Beginning in 1904, tensions between Gleeson and the Yeats sisters began to rise, eventually leading to the split of the company between the two parties. In 1910, Gleeson became a founding member of the Guild of Irish Art Workers. Her work continued to earn notoriety until her death in 1944.

Lily and Elizabeth (Lolly) Yeats, 1900

Elizabeth “Lolly” Yeats (1868-1940) was an Anglo-Irish educator and publisher and sister to the poet W.B. Yeats. In 1874 Elizabeth joined her family in London, where she stayed until 1881. In 1883 she enrolled in the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art. The Yeats family moved back to London in 1886, where Elizabeth wrote fiction. While in London this second time, Elizabeth trained and worked as an art teacher, was a member of William Morris’ circle, and studied printing with the Women’s Printing Society in London. In 1900, the family returned to Dublin where she formed the Dun Emer Press with Evelyn Gleeson. Elizabeth ran the printing aspect of the press. Tensions grew between Elizabeth and Gleeson, eventually leading her and her sister to separate from Dun Emer and establish Cuala Press in 1908. Elizabeth worked at Cuala Press until 1940.

William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) was an Irish poet, dramatist, and prose writer. As a child he would vacation with his grandparents in the Irish countryside, which would color his later work. His family would move between London and various Irish towns, giving W. B. Yeats the change to connect with many burgeoning members of the literary world. In the 1880, he attended the Metropolitan School of Art in Dublin, with his first volume of verse being published in 1887, after his family had moved back to England. While in England, W.B. Yeats joined the Irish Nationalist cause. He founded the Irish Theatre with Lady Gregory and was its chief playwright until John Synge joined. His plays focused on Irish legends and had themes of mysticism and spiritualism. After his sister Elizabeth and Gleeson formed the Dun Emer Press, W. B. Yeats served as its literary editor, a position which caused friction between everyone involved. This friction between W. B. Yeats and his sisters continued into the founding of Cuala Press. Yeats continued to write poetry and in 1922 he was appointed to the Irish Senate where he served for six years. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923. He died in 1939.

Dum Emer Titles at SCUA

In the Seven Woods: Being Poems Chiefly of the Irish Heroic Age By William Butler Yeats.

Published on “the sixteenth day of July in the year of the big wind 1903”, this is the first work published by the press and is the only work to have a brown linen cover. There were 325 copies printed. This copy has nine quires and several uncut pages. The work includes a mix of red and black text; this ratio changes in the other books published by Dun Emer Press.


The Nuts of Knowledge by A.E.

Published on the “tenth day of October, in the year nineteen hundred & three,” there were 200 copies of this book printed. The book in SCUA is bound in blue and has five quires. The work includes an emblem, the An Claidheamh Soluis, (the Sword of Light), which became known as AE’s emblem. AE was the pseudonym of George William Russell (1867-1935), an Irish writer, editor, critic, poet, painter, and Irish nationalist. In 1894, he published his first work of poems Homeward: Songs by the Way, which established him within the Irish Literary Revival. He became friends with James Joyce, William Butler Yeats, and other notable literary figures. Russell spent many years working for the Irish Agricultural Organisation Society. He acted as the IAOS journal editor until 1930. In 1932 he moved to England. After a final tour in the United States, he passed away from cancer in 1935.

The Love Songs of Connacht Being the Fourth Chapter of the Songs of Connacht, Collected and Translated by Douglas Hyde L.L.D.

There were 300 copies of this book published “on the sixteenth day of April in the year1904.” Bound in blue, it is the longest of the Dun Emer Press works, containing seventeen quires. This book’s pages are unevenly cut. The introductory note congratulates Dr. Hyde’s translations as being closer to the true meaning, as they are not in the formal eighteenth century style of past translators.

Douglas Ross Hyde (1860-1949) was an Irish academic, linguist, politician, diplomat, and first president of Ireland. He was a leading figure of the Gaelic revival and was the first president of the Gaelic League. As a child, Hyde became interested in Gaelic and languages. He graduated from Trinity College in 1884, where he became fluent in French, Latin, German, Greek, and Hebrew. His passion for Gaelic led him to found the Gaelic League in 1893 in an effort to preserve the language and Irish culture. He was a Professer of Irish at the Unviersity College in Dublin until 1938, when he retired; this retirement was short lived as later that year he was elected the first President of Ireland. He remained president until 1945, when he opted to not run for a second term.

Stories of Red Hanrahan By William Butler Yeats

Five hundred copies of this work were published “on Lady Day in August, in the year 1904.” It is bound in blue and contains eight quires. This work also included an illustration by Robert Gregory; it appears to be a landscape that includes several buildings and the symbols for each suit of playing cards. 

Twenty One Poems Written by Lionel Johnson: Selected by William Butler Yeats

“Finished on All Hallow’s Eve, in the year 1904,” 220 copies of this book were printed. This particular book is bound in blue and has five quires. Only the final colophon is in red, with the rest of the text appearing in black.

Lionel Pigot Johnson (1867-1902) was an English poet, essayist, and critic who claimed Irish descent. Johnson graduated from New College, Oxford in 1890. As a poet, Johnson wrote about Celtic and Catholic themes.

Some Essays and Passages by John Eglinton; Selected by William Butler Yeats

Published “on the sixteenth day of April, in the year 1905,” 200 copies of this work were printed. This book has a blue linen cover and includes eight quires, which are lettered throughout the work. There are two colophons in red, one after the table of contents and one at the end of the work. Similar to the other works, this one gives the exact date of publication: “finished on the sixteenth day of April, in the year 1905.” The titles found throughout the work are in red, while the body of the text is in black. There are no notes within the text or book plates, though the general wear of the exterior of the book and edges of the pages indicates that the book was read.

John Eglinton (1868-1961) was the pen-name of author William Kirkpatrick Magee. He was active in the Irish Literary Revival, though he was in favor of more universal subjects rather than Irish materials and traditions. He was the head of the National Library of Ireland from 1904-1921; after retiring he moved to Wales and then England. He continued to write about Irish Literature until his death in 1961.

Sixteen Poems by William Allingham Selected by William Butler Yeats

Published “on the fifteenth day of September, in the year 1905,” this book was bound in blue and contains six quires and had a run of 200 copies. In this copy there are several uncut pages.

William Allingham (1824-1889) was an Irish poet, diarist, and editor. He went to the Royal Belfast Academical Institution until the age of 14, after which he held a job at a custom-house; he held similar jobs until 1870, though he was also publishing his poetry during this time. In 1870 he moved to London and became the sub-editor of Fraser’s Magazine; he became its main editor in 1874 and held that position until 1879. He continued to write poems until his death in 1889. 

A Book of Saints and Wonders Put Down Here By Lady Gregory According to the Old Writings and the Memory of the People in Ireland.

Published “on the Eve of Lady Day in Harvest, in the year 1906,” 200 copies of this book were made. It is bound in blue and has fourteen quires, some of which have uncut pages. The work includes a printed note, presumably from Lady Gregory, which indicates that Lady Gregory made her own translations. The book also includes an pressmark made by Robert Gregory of a bell next to a waterfall, below which sits a fish.

Lady Gregory (1852-1932) was an Irish dramatist, foklorist, and theatre manager. Gregory was educated at home, where she was introduced to the history and legends of Ireland. In 1880, she married Sir William Henry Gregory, a man who had many literary and artistic interests. Two years later, her first work was published in her own name. She founded the Irish Literary Theatrein 1899  and the Abby Theatre in 1904, both with William Butler Yeats and Edward Martyne. She wrote short works for both theaters and is also known for her retellings of Irish mythology. 

By Still Waters: Lyrical Poems Old and New by A.E.

“Finished on All Soul’s Eve, in the year 1906,” this book, which had a run of 200 copies, has a blue linen cover and includes five quires, which are lettered throughout the work. This work includes AE’s emblem. This graphic, the acknowledgements, the first poem, and the final colophon are in red, while the rest of the text is black. 

Twenty-One Poems by Katharine Tynan: Selected by W. B. Yeats 

This book, published “on the twentieth day of March 1907,” and bound in blue, is one of two hundred printed copies. It is made of five quires and includes the pressmark designed by Elinor Monsell; it depicts Emer leaning against a tree. The colophon also includes the names of Esther Ryan and Beatrice Cassidy, the first two women trained by Elizabeth Yeats.

Device of the Dun Emer Press, designed by Elinor Monsell

Elinor Monsell (1879-1954) was an Irish illustrator, engraver, and portrait painter. In 1896, Monsell moved to London to study at the Slade School of Art in London. She was active from 1899-1929 and is best known for her woodcuts and illustrations of her husband’s children’s books. In 1907, W. B. Yeats commissioned her to create the pressmark found in this book.

Katharin Tynan (1859-1931) was an Irish writer and poet. She was educated at the Dominican St. Catherine’s, a convent school in Drogheda. In 1875, her poetry was first published. In the 1880s she was a major figure in Dublin literary circles and was a friend of W. B. Yeats. Her work explored her Catholic faith, feminism, Irish nationalism, and World War I. 

Discoveries; A Volume of Essays by William Butler Yeats

Published in 1907, this work was the last of Dun Emer Press. There were two hundred copies printed, “on the twelfth day of September.” The colophon in this work also includes the names of Esther Ryan and Beatrice Cassidy. The book also contains the emblem of a charging unicorn designed by Robert Gregory. This work is also bound in blue and contains seven quires.

These eleven books were delightful to read and examine as books and objects. The size made them feel personal, as did the colophons. The print has held up on the paper, with none of the pages having any smudging; the printing was done with great care as there were no words, letters, or lines out of place. While the books have signs of wear and age, they are still readable and in wonderful condition.

— Patricia McCall, Special Projects Archivist/Doctoral Candidate, UO History of Art and Architecture

UO Libraries/OPA Undergraduate Poetry Prize

Deadline – Friday May 27th, 2022 (midnight)

The UO Libraries/Oregon Poetry Association Poetry Prize awards two undergraduate student prizes every other year to high-quality works of poetry in which the library has played a role in their artistic output.

Awards are $500 and deposited in the winning student’s campus account.  Winning poems will be published in the OPA Journal, Verseweavers

Prizes will be awarded for a single poem on any topic or theme.

Criteria

  • A maximum of 5 poems should be submitted, which were produced during the student’s undergraduate years.
  • Currently enrolled University of Oregon undergraduates (and graduating seniors).
  • Poems must be a final version prior to submission.

Application Instructions (attach in your email all items listed below)

  • A Biographical Statement (200-450 words)
  • One poem per page saved as separate PDF files (total maximum 5 poems)
  • Acknowledgments Page

Deadline & Process

  • Due May 27, 2022 (Midnight)
  • Applications are reviewed at the end of the spring term by the Awards Committee (a panel of UO librarians, UO faculty and Oregon Poetry Association members) who will select the winning poems.
  • Awards are $500 and deposited in the winning student’s campus account.
  • Awards will be presented at the Oregon Poetry Association conference, held every other fall term in Eugene, OR (Fall 2022).
  • Awardees will be required to read their winning poem at the OPA meeting.
  • Authors retain the copyright to their work.

Contact

  • Email questions and submissions to: David de Lorenzo, Director of Special Collections, UO Libraries (ddeloren@uoregon.edu). Use subject line: Poetry Prize 2022.

Funded by the University of Oregon Libraries and the Oregon Poetry Association.

New Acquisition: Seminal Work on Deaf Education in 17th Century Spain

Few written works display the formalization of a nascent language as the book by Juan Pablo Bonet: Reduction of the Letters of the Alphabet and Method of Teaching Deaf-Mutes to Speak, 1620. Bonet was the first to publish not only a method of instruction of the Deaf but, more importantly, the use of a fingerspelling system that continues in use today.

Title page displaying images of a tongue unlocked and birds (nature) set free.

The history of deaf education begins in Spain, for the teaching of deaf children is widely seen as having originated there and led to instruction throughout the world. By the 16th century, Spain had become a wealthy nation and its nobility had chosen to retain power through marriage within its ruling class. This consanguineous marriage over time created a genetic disposition for deaf offspring. They were desperate for a cure for their children and looked to the Church, especially local Benedictine monks, for assistance.

In the centuries preceding Bonet’s work, perspectives on deafness were framed by the philosopher Aristotle, whose work was venerated throughout the Middle Ages. He asserted that those born deaf were inevitably mute and likened deaf people to animals, capable of vocal sounds but not of thoughts. Speech flowed from the soul, animals had no soul, and speech was absent in both animals and deaf people. The intellectual implications for deaf persons who were mute were obvious.

The views of the Church held no hope for deaf people either. The apostle Paul had written that “faith cometh by hearing,” and according to Saint Augustine, deafness “hinders faith itself.” These statements were taken to mean that deaf people could not be taught the Word of God, and once again the implications for deaf people were horrendous in a culture dominated by the Church in daily life.

In a society that believed them to be outside the realm of both learning and salvation, deaf people who could not speak held no legal standing. The law had long distinguished between deaf-mutes and those deaf by accident; that is, deaf people who could talk. Only the latter were recognized as persons by law. Deaf-mutes, in contrast, were routinely classified the mentally defective and the insane. In the thirteenth century the Spanish king Alfonso X had denied them the right to bear witness, to make a will, or to inherit a feudal estate.

Spelling on the fingers, like the technique of using sound-letter correspondences to teach reading, was an innovation for the hand alphabet. In 1593, Fray Melchor Yebra’s Refugium infirmorum used alphabetically ordered paragraphs accompanied by woodcuttings of the appropriate hand positions to represent each letter from A to Z. But it was intended solely to comfort the sick and dying, and the author recommended use of the finger alphabet to facilitate communication with those whose illness had rendered them unable to speak.

When a Benedictine tutor was summoned to the Court of the powerful Velasco family, Juan Pablo Bonet of Aragon (c.1573–1633) was residing in the Velasco household where several deaf noble offspring lived. An ambitious man of the world involved in politics and the military, Bonet had begun his career under Spain’s captain general of artillery, doing battle with the Barbary pirates and in Italy and Savoy, then serving as secretary to the captain general of Oran. Bonet was a man of letters, a scholar of classical languages, as well as French and Italian. In 1607 he had been named secretary to Juan de Velasco, the sixth constable of Castile, and some five years later he had accompanied his employer on a mission to Milan, serving him as both secretary and captain of artillery. After the constable’s death in 1613, Bonet had stayed on in the service of his son and successor, Bernardino, who was but four years old at the time. He had no experience teaching or working with deaf children.

Statue dedicated to Bonet in Torres de Berrellén, Aragon.

Reduction de las letras y arte para enseñar a ablar los mudos was dedicated to Philip III, and it contained among its introductory pages a poem by Lope de Vega Carpio praising the author’s “divine inventiveness.”

In the first part of the book, Reduction de las letras, Bonet wrote that children learning to read should not be taught the names of the letters, but instead, the sounds associated with them. He also advocated the same procedure to teach deaf people to speak. This was a phonic method that Bonet implied that he had invented but no doubt had lifted from the Benedictine tutor.

In addition to the discussion about teaching reading, the Reduction de las letras also contained many curious and farfetched observations about the nature of the letters. For instance, the author argued that the form of each letter was itself suggestive of its pronunciation. Thus, the letter A, he maintained, when laid on its side, suggested the wide-open position of the mouth, and the line that crosses it indicated that the mouth was to remain open during its articulation; the letter B, with its two semi-circles joined in the center, suggested the closed position assumed by the lips to produce it; and so on.

The letter “A” from Bonet
The letter “A” as it appears today in American Sign Language

 

In the second part of the book, Arte para enseñar a ablar los mudos, Bonet identified deafness as the “first and most general” cause of muteness. “Since to speak is the same as to imitate what one has heard,” he asserted, “it follows that whoever cannot hear will not be able to speak, even though the instrument of the tongue may be agile, loose, and free to perform the movement used in the pronunciation of words” (p. 109–110). The work contained a method for instructing deaf students, along with an essay on how to formulate an indecipherable code and decipher coded messages, and a treatise on Greek. Also included was an explanation of how to apply the principles of the Arte to teach mutes of other nations, since muteness was, in this writer’s words, “a common illness” (p. 249).

Bonet’s identification of deafness as the most common cause of muteness constituted an advance in existing opinions. His view of muteness was negative, for he contended that it impeded “the manifestation of the rational soul” — a belief that speech came from the soul and was the sole source of reason. Consequently, mutes “lose their standing as men before others, being left so unfit for communication that it seems they serve as no more than piteous monsters of nature, which imitate our form” (p. 26). It is doubtful that Benedictines, living in a monastery where verbal communication was limited and sign language was used regularly to communicate, would have shared such uninformed views about muteness.

As a matter of morality, Bonet rejected the harsh and futile methods deaf people were subjected to in his day, procedures such as “taking the mutes to the countryside, and in valleys where the voice has greater sonority, to make them give loud shouts, and with such violence that they came to bleed from the mouth, putting them also in buckets where the voice reverberated loudly, and they could hear it amplified.” Dismissing such tactics as “very violent and not at all appropriate” (p. 111), he advocated instead a different approach to the teaching of speech, one in which the sense of sight would compensate for the lack of hearing. He reasoned that knowledge of articulation could be acquired visually, and in that way the deaf person might be taught to speak.

Bonet’s approach was highly methodical, with the complexity of the material increasing gradually. After the student learned to pronounce individual sounds –first the vowels, then the consonants– he progressed to syllables, then simple words referring to concrete objects present in the room. Next, he learned to read aloud from a printed text; comprehension was not deemed important at this point but would come later. The tenses were reduced to three: past, present, and future. The parts of speech were also reduced to three: noun, verb, and conjunction. Concrete nouns were taught by directly associating the word with the referent; abstract nouns were taught by “demonstrative actions,” which Bonet declined to describe, “leaving this to the teachers’ good judgment and discretion” (p. 146). Action verbs (e.g., run, walk, laugh) were likewise to be acted out. The “passions of the soul,” however, like love, hate, jealousy, contrition, anger, cruelty, and so on, were not to be taught by demonstration. Instead, the teacher was to wait until the pupil found himself in the throes of one of these emotions, then supply its name. These passions might be provoked in the learner for pedagogical purposes, but in so doing, Bonet cautioned, care should be taken not to lead him to sin.

After publishing his book in 1620, Juan Pablo Bonet showed no more interest in deaf education. He dedicated the remainder of his life to politics and died in Madrid in 1633. Thanks to Bonet’s book, this one-handed alphabet would eventually spread to Paris, the cradle of unfettered sign language development, and throughout continental Europe and the Americas, where its use among deaf people continues to this day.

Juan Pablo Bonet. Reduction de las letras y arte para enseñar a ablar los mudos. Madrid: Francisco Abarca de Angulo. 1620.
4to, vellum [26], 308, [6] p., [8] engravings by Diego de Astor, [1] leave engraving folded.

The renown Spanish paper conservator, Pablo Anton, is cited as having washed the engravings and repaired torn pages. When rebound, lower margin and folded engraving had some text loss. Modern binding on limp vellum with author and title handwritten on spine.

Provenance: Unidentified collector in Madrid purchased this copy from the bookseller, Enrique Montero. No ex libris or owner signatures. UO Special Collections purchase from Elena Gallego Rare Books, Madrid, July 2021.

Francisco Abarca de Angelo established a print house in Madrid in 1619. At that time, Madrid had fourteen printing houses in operation. According to an extent contract with the author Fray Antonio de Remesal, Abarca acquired his “Vatican” capital fonts in June 1619. These fonts are used throughout the Bonet. His printing house ceased operation in 1630. The engraver, Diego de Astor (1588-1636), lived in Toledo. He engraved in copper and cut dies. In 1609, he was appointed engraver to the Mint of Segovia.

Modern binding on loose pigskin with cloth ties.

References

Cruikshank, D.W. Italian Type in Spain and the Spanish Empire in the Seventeenth Century. (in) Book Production and Letters in the Western European Renaissance. London: Modern Humanities Research Association, 1986.

Plann, Susan. A Silent Minority: Deaf Education in Spain, 1550-1835. Berkeley:  University of California Press, c1997 1997. http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft338nb1x6/

~ David de Lorenzo