Teaching children how to study in 18th-century Rome. No U.S. copies.
[Books] / [Education] / Ottavio Imberti. Metodo di studiare le Scienze con pietà, e profitto proposto alla gioventù. Rome: Francesco Gonzaga, 1716. 12mo [14.2 x 8.0 cm], [14] ff., 330 pp., [1] f. errata, with woodcut initials and tailpiece. Bound in contemporary vellum, title in manuscript on spine, blue sprinkled edges. Minor staining and edge wear, mend to lower pastedown. Minor stain on title, pale water staining at lower margin of a few leaves, short marginal mend to errata leaf, the occasional minor spotting. Well preserved.
Rare (no U.S. copies) first and only edition of this early 18th-century Roman handbook instructing young students how best to go about their studies (“studiare le scienze”). Ottavio Imberti, Rector of the Seminario Pamphilj at Sant’Agnese in Agone on Piazza Navona, dedicated his work to Benedetto Pamphilj (1653-1730), Librarian of the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana and archivist of the Archivio Segreto Vaticano. The volume was intended for the use of seminarians and students of the collegi and includes copious theoretical and practical advice about what to read, what not to read, and how to approach reading.
Imberti first discusses pious and practical motives for learning and debunks excuses for eschewing hard study. He notes the differences between aspiring churchmen, young nobles, and disadvantaged children (“giovani poveri”). He also recommends a course of study to children who will learn only the rudiments of reading and writing or even who will never learn to read at all (‘study’ the crucifix, the world, God’s creations, pp. 43-4).
Imberti then discusses the dangers of the study and suggests good habits: proper days and times of day for study, places to study and not study, how to keep your books and papers in order, how to organize papers of different sorts by tying them up with different colored ribbons (p. 89), etc. Among the memory exercises he discusses is the suggestion to read from the same edition and same copy of a book to reinforce the “locations” of passages (p. 94). Students should not eat or drink immoderately, should study the text in full and not in digests or compendia, should write copiously (“scrivere molto,” p. 120), and should speak publicly about their studies, etc.
He familiarizes students with how to find the most accurate books (“stampe più correte,” p. 135), warns against new and beautiful books (p. 138), discusses banned books (p. 138), profane books (140), and useless books (p. 141, e.g., Ramon Llull, romances, etc.), and suggests that there should not be too many books in the house.
Imberti moves on to how to read (p. 143), broadly speaking, and discusses types of books (dictionaries, etymological dictionaries, compendia, compellations, indices, biblical concordances, chronological tables, catalogues of books, etc.). He remarks on how to index a book.
He writes about the study of belles lettres or humanities, the study of Latin (with reading lists), Greek and Hebrew (with reading lists), modern languages, letter writing, translation, textual criticism and manuscript studies, orthography, history, and specialist books for one’s profession (law, medicine, surgery, pharmacy, etc.). The natural sciences are discussed, as are philosophy, logic, astronomy, fortification, arithmetic, mathematics, sacred history, ecclesiastical history, canon and civil law, liturgy and scripture.
Imberti advises on the creation of commonplace books or florilegia (p. 288, e.g., do not write too large or too small, but use enlarged initial letters), and creating compositions from notes. He closes with advice about writing and publishing a book of one’s own, observing that upon publication of a new book an author should assiduously attend to public opinion, rethink one’s own positions, and make cuts, additions, and corrections in anticipation of a new edition (pp. 326-7; note that a second edition of Metodo di studiare le Scienze con pietà, e profitto proposto alla gioventù never appeared.)
*Collated against the Biblioteca nazionale centrale (Roma) copy.
OCLC and KVK locate no U.S. copies of this work.