Skip to main content

A most short instruction teaching or reason etc., of the knowledge of the art of grammer..., by William Lily.

Archive Item: BC MS Lg q 1

Details

Type of record: Archive

Title: A most short instruction teaching or reason etc., of the knowledge of the art of grammer..., by William Lily.

Level: Item

Classmark: BC MS Lg q 1

Creator(s): Lily, William()

Date(s): c.1560-1600

Language: English

Size and medium: 31 ff., folio manuscript.

Persistent link: https://explore.library.leeds.ac.uk/special-collections-explore/7994

Description

Also known as:Brevissima Institutio - English

Contains an apparently unpublished English translation of William Lily's 'Brevissima Institutio', which forms the second part of his 'A short introduction of grammar', the standard Elizabethan grammar. The present version comprises only the first two of the work's four sections, namely, those on 'Orthographie' and 'Etymologie'. Its language is an interesting example of academic Elizabethan English.


Written in a fluent and rapid late sixteenth-century Secretary hand with several revisions, suggesting that it may be autograph. Stitched, unbound, and partly defective.

Biography or history

William Lily (1468?-1522), an Oxford graduate and grammarian, taught in London, latterly as high-master at St Paul's School. For fuller details of his life and writings see the Dictionary of National Biography. The translator and the writer of this manuscript are both unknown.

Access and usage

Access

Access to this material is unrestricted.

Collection hierarchy

Visitor Basket

Ref No. Item Ref Title