MIÈGE, Guy
The Great French Dictionary. In Two Parts. The First, French and English; the Second, English and French
London, printed by J. Redmayne for Tho. Basset, 1688
1 vol., in-folio, contemporary full leather, raised bands, red title piece, unpaginated; very good copy, small old stickers to spine, joints partially splitting, bookplate
First and only edition of an important seventeenth-century English-French dictionary, the work of the scholar Guy Miège (Lausanne, circa 1644 – circa 1718), born in Switzerland but resident in London. Miège (1644-1718) studied in Lausanne, and became an academic around 1658. After several voyages across Europe he became a teacher of French and Geography in London. He criticised the dictionary of Cardinal Richelieu and the Académie Française for being too nonchalant and with too many irregularities. In 1678 Miège edited a new grammar “Nouvelle grammaire française, ou une nouvelle méthode pour l’étude de la langue française”. The Great French Dictionary resembles this grammar which was published 10 years earlier but with new insights added. He distances himself from the old habit of latin declensions in French grammar and finds that the English language owes French a lot. Despite the above mentioned flaws, a beautifull copy.
