HULSIUS, Levinus.

by Levinus Hulsius

£2,750 · Offered by Sokol Books

.This copy belonged to the young Johannetta Elisabeth (1593-1654) von Nassau-Dillenburg, aged ten in 1603, the date of the ex-libris. That her father s arms were stamped on the upper board suggests it was a gift for her French lessons. Her ex-libris casts her as fräulein zu Nassau Catzenelnbogen . Her father from whom the later House of Orange-Nassau, including William III of England, descends was Johann VI, Graf (Count) of Nassau-Dillenburg (and Katzenelnbogen-Diez), and brother of William the Silent, first Prince of Orange. . .A very good, unsophisticated copy of the scarce second edition of this French-German dictionary, with a four-verse prefatory poem by Pierre de Ronsard. .Born in Belgium, the polymath Levinus Hulsius (1546-1606) settled in Nuremberg in the late 1580s, became a notary, one of the earliest traders in mathematical-astronomical instruments, and, from 1596, a writer and publisher of scientific books, dictionaries and geographical works such as a Latin and German edition of Sir Walter Raleigh s Description of Guiana . The scant copies that survive, especially of the early editions, suggest Hulsius s dictionary was extremely popular, and copies were quickly worn out by use. Whilst the 1596 edition of this French-German dictionary was in quarto, with a German preface, this second was a pocket version, with a French preface. The French material is based on Mellema s French-Dutch dictionary (1592); Hulsius s became, in turn, the main source for subsequent tr

• Binding: Hardcover

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