Janua lingvarum: Changes and Development of a Textbook

• Authors: Steiner Martin
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

Isaac Habrecht’s publication of the Hybernian Janua differs only slightly from the original text published in Salamanca. Comenius’s transformation of Habrecht’s text is on the other hand radical, both in the composition of the chosen vocabulary, and especially in concept and composition. It is a completely new text which uses its model only as an inspiration. Comenius himself is the author of another great transformation. He reorganised its 100 chapters and 1,000 sentences according to a reconsidered structure of the material discussed. In doing so he largely expanded the text, so the second version is over twice the original extension. Even stylistically, it is more complicated; simple sentences no longer predominate, being replaced by complex sentences in longer paragraphs. We also know several adaptations of Comenius’s Janua by other authors. Their common feature is again an increase in the vocabulary, for the most part in conflict with Comenius’s original requirements for the simplicity and accessibility of a text book intended for beginners. In his system of textbooks, Comenius later included Janua as the second level, preceding it with the Vestibulum.

Keywords

EN

Jan Amos Comenius; Janua linguarum; pedagogy; textbook

Discipline

• PHILOLOGY_&_LINGUISTICS: PHILOLOGY & LINGUISTICS

• Publisher: Institute of Philosophy, Czech Academy of Sciences
• Journal: Acta Comeniana (International review of Comenius studies and early modern intellectual history)
• Year: 2007
• Volume: 20-21
• Pages: 177-182

Contributors

author

Steiner Martin

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