Beschreibung:

[RUSSIA] – LUDOLFUS, Henricus Wilhelmus (1655-1712). Grammatica russica. Oxford: 1696. First edition of the first printed grammar of Russian , as opposed to Church Slavic, the work of a German diplomat active in England and Denmark. It includes a trilingual ‘phrase book’ section in Russian, Latin and German. ‘Though Russian has long been a widespread and fully-fledged literary language, in 1696 it existed almost solely as a spoken idiom and to only a very limited extent served as a medium of writing. In that year Grammatica Russica , the earliest written analysis of the Russian language, was published. This grammar is in itself a remarkable testament to the movement of people and ideas across borders. The work is dedicated … to Boris Alexeyevich Golitsyn (1654-1714), a scion of a very prominent noble house in Russia and one of Czar Peter the Great’s closest associates in his westernization project ... Ludolf evidently got to know Golitsyn quite well during his time in Russia from 1692 to 1694. Early in the book there is a short passage about the differences between Slavonic and Russian (pp. 4-5). Ludolf’s work ... was the first to specifically address Russian, which point he makes at length in the preface. The linguistic status quo in Russia at the time was clearly diglossia, the state in which prestige and non-prestige varieties of what is considered the same language are used in complementary distribution ... In 17th century Russia Church Slavic was the high form and Russian the low' (K. Roth, Learning Russian Via Latin' in Graeco-Latina Brunensia 18, 2013, 1, 1-2). Wing L-3463. Small quarto (205 x 133mm). Cyrillic, roman, gothic and italic types. Engraved title vignette and one engraved calligraphic plate by W. Burg (some light browning). Contemporary drab wrappers (spine skilfully repaired). Provenance : ?A. Cherry (contemporary inscription to title).