Arte de la lengua Zebuana

[Encina, Francisco]

S.a. [c.1801-04]. [Sampaloc, Franciscan Convent, or Manila?]. 4to, (190 x 134 mm). 616, [15]. Modern red morocco, ruled in blind, spine lettered in gilt, gilt edges, gently rubbed. Printed on rice paper; some browning, a few closed tears (without loss except for one or two letters on 30*2), repaired tears in four leaves (B1, D1, Q1 and 334, without loss), excellent copy.

First edition, very rare, of the art of the Austronesian language spoken in the Philippines largely in Central Visayas, western parts of Eastern Visayas, and most parts of Mindanao, thought to have been surreptitiously printed at Manila in about 1804. This extensive work is the first study of the language of the island of Cebu, one of the largest of the Bisayan islands of the central Philippines.

 

This work was in all likelihood printed clandestinely for a small group of missionaries or locality, without a title-page (as all the known copies) and probably in limited numbers, after a manuscript by Francisco Encina (1715–1760), an Augustinian who had served in the parishes of Argao and Opon in Cebu. Towards the end is a chapter (‘De la poesia Zebuana’) which discusses the prosody and figures of Cebuano verse forms. Palau and Retana differ on the date of publication, the former giving 1804 and the latter 1801. A manuscript note on the flyleaf of the Harvard copy indicates that the type used for this work is the same as that used for Martínez de Zuñiga’s Historia de las Islas Philipinas (Sampaloc, 1803).

 

According to Worldcat we locate four U.S. library copies (Yale, Harvard, New Mexico, and the John Carter Brown), there is one more at LoC.

 

Medina, Manila 396 bis; Palau 79565; Retana 4133; Streit VI 1309; Blake, Philippine Languages, 139.

S.a. [c.1801-04]

$18,000.00