euskalarien nazioarteko jardunaldiak IKER - 1 - Euskaltzaindia

ENRIQUE KNÖRR
Disimúleme Vd. con su acostumbrada bondad esta molestia y mande con
igual franqueza quanto guste a este su obligado servidor y amigo que su mano
besa.
Valentín Verastegui
END NOTE
Those bascologists interested in our lexicography and the Basque studies
in the 18th century will perhaps be pleased to learn of documents I present
here. They all concern the project of a Basque dictionary by the Real
Sociedad Bascongada de Amigos del País. This project is closely linked with
the name of José María de Aizpitarte, born at Elgoibar and who lived in
Vitoria, where he was the steward of the Marqués de Montehermoso. He
died in 1809 and the MS. of his dictionary is in the Loiola library.
The documents belong to the Archivo Prrstamero of the Diputación of
Alava. All of them come from the Real Sociedad Bascongada, of course,
whose Secretary in Alava was Diego Lorenzo Prestamero Sodupe (1.733-
1789).
The document N.° 1 is a letter from Campomanes to Peñaflorida (the
President of the Bascongada), dated July 19, 1773. It was already known that
the idea of the Basque dictionary was suggested to this learned Society by
Pedro Rodríguez, Conde de Campomanes (1723-1803), a prominent personality
of the political and cultural world in Madrid. Now we have the full
evidence to prove that.
In this letter, Campomanes, himself a Member of the Bascongada, gives
some indications about the dictionary, whose main purpose would be to help
in shedding some light on the linguistic situation in Spain before the Romans
arrived. It is interesting to note that most of the proposals of Campomanes
are reflected, even literally copied, in the Instrucción para la formación de un
Diccionario de la Lengua Bascongada. The text of the letter is not the original,
as can be seen at the end, where some words are missing.
We include the Instrucción itself (N.°. 2 and 3), in two columns, on the
left the MS. and on the right the printed booklet. This booklet was published
in the Extractos de las Juntas Generaks, i.e., the proceedings of the annual
meetings of the Society, Vitoria 1781. It is now evident that Aizpitarte took
part in writing the definitive text.
In document N.° 10 we find a mention of the dictionaries of Sobrino
(Dictionnaire français et espagnol, Brussels 1705) and Boyer (French and
English Dictionary, London 1709).
The document N.° 12 contains two copies with very few differences.
Here we see that from August 1785 to July 1786 Aizpitarte presented 3,600
(or 3,900) record cards covering the whole alphabet.
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