Syriac Grammar
MICHAELIS, Johann David.
Grammatica syriaca. [(Colophon:) Göttingen, Friedrich Andreas Rosenbusch for] Halle, the Orphanage, 1784.
4to, pp. viii, 99, 101–103 (a single folding letterpress sheet tipped in), 104–299, [1, blank], 1 engraved plate (of variant historical letterforms); text in Latin and Syriac with some Hebrew and Greek, woodcut device to title; a few small minor stains; a very good copy bound in contemporary half German calf with paste paper sides, white calf lettering-piece, edges red; binding somewhat rubbed with loss of paste paper, joints cracking at head; early inscription of Bonaventura Vuillaume to flyleaf, small printed book label of the Jesuit College of Poitiers to inside front cover, Jesuit ink stamp ‘Dom. S. Aloys. Jerseiens. S. J.’ to verso of title (with show-through to title).
First edition of a notable Syriac grammar by one of the most learned oriental scholars of the German Enlightenment, Johann David Michaelis.
Michaelis (1717–1791), professor of theology and oriental languages at Göttingen, had studied in Halle and was keenly interested in the Protestant missions to India. He was from a family of scholars of oriental languages; his father, Christian Benedict, had also written a grammar of Syriac printed in Halle in 1741. Syriac was not just the language of some early Christian communities, it was also used by Malabar Christians and other Asian churches, and the study of Syriac served to inform and enlighten the reading of the Hebrew Bible in Europe.
The Orphanage of Halle an der Saale was a Pietist society founded in around 1700 for educational and scientific purposes; its substantial premises included a bookstore and a college for the teaching of numerous oriental languages, from Armenian to Ethiopic. The Jesuits were similarly engaged in the teaching of languages for missionary purposes; this copy belonged to two Jesuit colleges.
VD18 14568993.