L’Escole Paroissiale, Ov La Maniere De Bien Instrvire Les Enfans Dans Les Petites Escoles.
Paris, P. Targa 1654.
8vo (174 x 108 mm.). [xxiv], 335p. Woodcut mathematical diagram of a counting game.
Contemporary vellum over flexible paper boards (soiled, small lacunae).
First Edition of “ONE OF THE MOST INFLUENTIAL EDUCATIONAL MANUALS OF THE ANCIEN RÉGIME” (Gordon). THIS BOOK WAS THE BASIS FOR GIRLS AND BOYS PRIMARY EDUCATION FOR OVER A CENTURY IN FRANCE AND FRENCH CANADA.
In three parts, The Parish School addresses every aspect of a lower school’s organization and operation. The first part outlines the necessary qualities of a teacher and details a school building’s optimal architecture, including the number and placement of windows. It specifies the requisite furniture, supplies, books for students and instructors as well as admission policies, daily lunch and parental communication. The second part treats religious formation (especially catechesis and prayer), and the third secular curriculum, order of subjects taught and duration of classes.
Batencour discusses teaching the alphabet, reading instruction in both Latin and French, writing, how to hold and sharpen a pen, spelling, grammar, arithmetic and currency conversion. He emphasizes the importance of introducing new concepts at an appropriate pace. Bright students were to be cultivated and badly behaved ones subject to punishments, i.a., fasting and public humiliation. He based his methods on those practiced at the parish school of Saint-Nicolas du Chardonnet in Paris where he taught.
The Parish School remains a witness to the daily lives of early modern children, offering a wealth of detail on how they spent their time — and the types of trouble they caused. Both North American copies are in Québec, imported in the 17th and early 18th centuries for use by teachers. In good condition (lower blank marginal worming in the first third of the book affecting the text (but not legibility) on six leaves, minor dampstaining).
¶Combes & Fortin, En Charente-Maritime: notre école au bon vieux temps 6; Gordon, Catholicism as Musical Discourse: The Reconversion of Women Through Seventeenth-Century French Sacred Songs 116; Poutet, “L’auteur de L’Escole paroissiale et quelques usages de son temps (1654)” in Bulletin de la Société des Bibliophiles de Guyenne 77 (1963) 27-50; Lavoie, “L’Arithmétique dans les petites écoles du Bas-Canada au début du XIXe siècle” in Éducation et francophonie 25 (1997) 5-25.
Price: $13,500.00