by Roberta Facchinetti

This book delves into three scholars who contributed to the advancement of English lexicographic and grammar writing tradition between the 16th and the 19th century. Specifically, Peter LEVINS authored Manipulus Vocabulurom (1570), the first hardword rhyming dictionary; Anthony HUISH’s Priscianus Nascens (1660) and Priscianus Ephebus (1668) were aimed at English schoolboys learning to translate from English into Latin and vice versa; finally, Percival LEIGH’s Comic English Grammar (1840) laid bare a cross section of English socio-linguistic idiosyncrasies that could hardly be unveiled in a ‘serious’, scholarly way. From language teaching to translation, from lexicology to lexicography, from theoretical studies to socio-linguistic parody, the three scholars examined complement each other in terms of genres exploited, content analysed and methodology enacted; most of all, they testify to the fact that viewing language – particularly lexico-grammar – from different perspectives is a winning way to understand the past (and present) of language itself.