Confabulationes Tironum Litterariorum (Cologne, 1525)

Confabulationes Tironum Litterariorum (Cologne, 1525) Synopsis

The humanist Hermann Schotten, or Hermannus Schottennius Hessus (c. 1503–1546), student, schoolmaster, and university lecturer in Cologne, was the author of a number of works on humanist pedagogy. His Confabulationes tironum litterariorum of 1525, a collection of Latin dialogues designed to help schoolboys master Classical Latin conversation, was written in admiring imitation of the colloquies of Erasmus. But Schotten had his own distinctive style: a natural ear for dialogue, and a sympathetic understanding of the schoolboy world. As a result, he produced one of the liveliest pedagogical works of the century and a vivid and valuable cultural document of life in the early modern metropolis of Cologne. This critical edition of the Confabulationes, the first since the sixteenth century, makes this one-time best-seller available and comprehensible to modern readers. It presents the Latin text, a full English translation, and extensive notes on the language and on Schotten’s many literary and cultural allusions, accompanied by a detailed investigation of the early printing history of the collection. -- .