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MINSHEU, JOHN. The guide into the tongues. With their agreement and consent one with another, as also their etymologies, that is, the reasons and derivations of all or the most part of words, in these eleven languages, viz. 1. English. 2. British or Welsh. 3. Low Dutch.
London, John Browne, 1617. First edition of the first book printed by subscription, large folio, pp. [16], [1]-[544], [188]; full contemporary calf, gilt arms of Charles the I central on the covers, rebacked in sturdy brown morocco gilt; covers rubbed and worn, text occasionally browned and spotted, paper occasionally limp, with a few natural paper flaws; generally a good, sound copy of the preferred first edition (which included two languages, Welsh and Portuguese, dropped from later editions), without the rare subscriber's list, issued separately. A prospectus preceded the publication of the dictionary, and is known by a single copy only (at the Bodleian Library). With Minsheu we have arrived at what has usually been regarded as the true beginning of subscription publication, and the first book prospectus. Minsheu's Guide was published in 1617, with a printed list of subscribers which was eventually to reach a total of 471 persons and institutions. Its issue preceded that of the book, and thus The Guide is the first book published by subscription after the issue of a prospectus (see Feather, English Book Prospectuses: An Illustrated History, Newton & Minneapolis, 1984, pp. 26-27). Minsheu's earlier works on the Spanish language had secured for him a reputation as a lexicographer, if not an income; this great lexicon stands alone as a guide to Elizabethan English, still useful today. Appended to the work, as issued, is Minsheu's A Most Copious Spanish Dictionarie with Latine and English, London, 1617. STC 17944; Alston II, 103; Lowndes II, p. 1569-70 "a very important work, and has furnished great assistance to subsequent lexicographers"; Graesse IV, p. 533; Ebert 14099.
Offered for US$ 2000.00 by: Rulon-Miller Books ABAA/ILAB - Book number: 30840