Croatian History

Croatian Encyclopaedists Now we have come to a very rich history of the Croatian Encyclopaedia. Its origins go back to the first half of the 15th century. The earliest known lexicographic work is a handwritten book “Liber de simplicibus” (The book about medicinal herbs), prepared in Zadar and Venice between 1415 and 1453. Written by an Italian physician and Zadar protophysicist Nicolo Roccabonelli, it contains very nice drawings of various plants together with their Croatian, Latin, Greek, Arabic and in…

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Ilija Crijevic, poet, orator and lexicographer from Dubrovnik (1463 – 1520), wrote his Lexicon in 1480, a Latin encyclopaedic dictionary. This very nice handwritten book of large format, 33 x 23 cm, has 429 pages.

We know of a small Italian – Croatian dictionary Opera nuova che insegna a parlare la lingua schiavonica alli grandi, alli picoli et alle donne, containing about 300 words, written in 1527 by Pietro Lupis Valentiano in Ancona, Italy.

Pavao Skalic, photo from Zagreb Pavao Skalic, a humanist-polyhistorian (Paulus Scalichius, born in Zagreb, 1534-1575), was the first to have used the notion of ENCYCLOPAEDIA in its modern meaning, in his book Encyclopediae seu orbis disciplinarum… (Basel, 1559). He also wrote a musical tractate “Dialogus en Lyra” (Köln, 1570). He used to write his name as Pavao Skalic de Lika, thus indicating the origin of his family.

An extremely interesting biography has Bartol Gyurgieuits (Bartol Jurjevic or Gjurgjevic, born in the region of Turopolje near Zagreb, known for nice wooden churches, 1506 – 1566?), a participant of the tragic battle on the Mohac field in 1526, where he was captured by the Turks and lived as a slave in many parts of the Turkish Empire. As a captive he was a teacher of Greek in Damascus (see [Marianna D. Birnbaum, p. 252]). After 13 years of slavery…

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Another Turkish captive was Juraj Hus (Hosti), contemporary of the above mentioned Bartol Gyurgieuvits. After the defeat of Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent in the battle with the army led by famous Croatian statesman Nikola Jurisic in 1533 (the aim of Suleyman was to occupy Vienna), and after his retreat through Croatian lands, Juraj Hus was taken to slavery from his village (Rasinje) to Constantinople. Since he did not want to renounce his Catholic faith, he managed somehow to be educated…

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Faust Vrancic (or Faust Verantius, 1551-1617) from Sibenik was the author of a five language dictionary “Dictionarium quinque nobilissimarum Europeae linguarum: Latinae, Italicae, Germanicae, Dalmaticae et Hungaricae” (Venice, 1595), with more than 5000 words (i.e. altogether 25000 words), where Dalmaticae means Croatian language. Indeed, in his dictionary the words Dalmata, Dalmatia, Dalmaticae are translated as Croat, Croatian land, Croatian respectively. It is known that Vrancic was fluent in at least seven languages. See p. 13 of his Dictionarium: Faust Vrancic…

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In 1605 a Czech Benedictine Petr Loderecker published the book Dictionarium septem diversarum linguarum: videlicet Latine, Italice, Dalmatice (Croatian), Bohemice, Polonice, Germanice & Ungarice… in Prague (around 5000 words for each language). This dictionary represents an extension of Vrancic’s 1595 Dictionary of the five most noble European languages: Latin, German, Italian, Croatian and Hungarian, in which Czech and Polish languages have been added. In Loderecker’s book we can find the following descriptions: Dalmatian = Croat, Dalmatia = Croatia, Dalmatian =…

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A significant Croat, born on the island of Hvar, very little known even among the Croats, was Ivan Franje Bjundovic (Giovanni Francesco Biondi, 1573-1645). After having met Sir Henry Watton, English ambassador in Venice, with whom he shared the same interests as a lawyer and literature fan, he journeyed to England and carried confidential messages to King James I. Obviously, he was considered a competent scholar and diplomat, since James himself entrusted him with important diplomatic missions. Bjundovic wrote a…

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Bartol Kasic (1575-1650), a Croatian Jesuit, was the author of the first Croatian Grammar “Institutiones lingue illyricae”, printed in Rome 1604. About the same time he prepared the Croatian – Italian dictionary, which remained unpublished until 1990. In the period of 1631-1636 he translated the whole Bible into spoken Croatian, but unfortunately the book remained only in handwriting. In his “Ritual Rimski” (“Rituale Romanum”, Rome, 1640) he cites very old Croatian names for months that are in use even today…

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