Observations Fondamentales…Prospectus De L’Ouvrage Intitulé: La Langue Primitive Conservée.
Paris, for L.-F. Barrois l’aîné 1787.
4to (264 x 212 mm.). [vi], 111, [1]p. ANNOTATED THROUGHOUT in an early 19th-century cursive hand.
Contemporary green pastepaper (rubbed, spine label gone), uncut.
With: And:
Notes & Extraits qui ont rapport à la Langue Celtique. [France] c. 1820. [ii], [19], [105 blank]p. Manuscript in the annotator’s hand, partly tabular, ruled in pencil.
Vie de Ruth, en Langue Bretonne. [And:] Extrait. Eléments succints de la Langue des…Bretons. [And:] Breton Grammar. [France] c. 1820. 4to (243 x 185 mm.). Contemporary foliation: [13], [1 blank], [10], 46 loose leaves including a four-sheet folding table (360 x 870 mm.). Manuscript in the same hand, partly tabular, ruled in ink and pencil.
Ad I-III: Only Edition of the prospectus (I) for “a great work…that fortunately never appeared” (Tourneur, tr.), here annotated by an unidentified Breton linguist and lexicographer, who also compiled the two manuscripts (II-III). In excellent condition.
Ad I: Called the first Celtomaniac, Le Brigant (1720-1804) declared Celtic the primordial language of humanity and the key to all other tongues. The prospectus promised that The Primitive Language Preserved would identify Celtic monosyllabic roots in, i.a., Chinese, Sanskrit, Hebrew, Arabic, Greek, Latin, Carib and Tahitian.
IN OVER FORTY-THREE HUNDRED WORDS OF MINUTE EXTENSIVE MARGINALIA, the annotator shows an impressive knowledge of general linguistics, Latin, Hebrew and Arabic, deeming Le Brigant’s arguments “an ocean of errors” (p. 20, tr.).
¶Tourneur, Esquisse d’une histoire des études celtiques 177-85; Tanguy, “Des Celtomanes aux bretonistes” in Histoire littéraire et culturelle de la Bretagne edd. Balcou & Le Gallo II: 296-317.
Ad II: Bound after the printed prospectus, this four-thousand-word manuscript summarizes scholarly opinions on Celtic language and culture, mounts a detailed critique of Le Brigant’s Élémens succints de la langue des…Bretons (1798/9), gives a glossary of breton words, translates two short Breton texts, and starts a Breton grammar based on J.-F. Le Gonidec’s (1807).
Ad III: A draft of the rest of the above grammar (II) with its large folding tabular verb chart, a French biblical translation from Breton and miscellaneous working notes.
Price: $5,000.00