When it is remembered that this work is not only an educational classic
of prime importance, but that it was the first picture-book ever made
for children and was for a century the most popular text-book in Europe,
and yet has been for many years unattainable on account of its rarity,
the wonder is, not that it is reproduced now but that it has not been
reproduced before. But the difficulty has been to find a satisfactory
copy. Many as have been the editions, few copies have been preserved. It
was a book children were fond of and wore out in turning the leaves over
and over to see the pictures. Then as the old copper-plates became
indistinct they were replaced by wood-engravings, of coarse execution,
and often of changed treatment. Von Raumer complains that the edition of
1755 substitutes for the original cut of the Soul, (No. 43, as here
given,) a picture of an eye, and in a table the figures I. I. II. I. I.
II., and adds that it is difficult to recognize in this an expressive
psychological symbol, and to explain it. In an edition I have, published
in Vienna in 1779, this cut is omitted altogether, and indeed there are
but 82 in place of the 157 found in earlier editions, the following, as
numbered in this edition, being omitted:
1, the alphabet, 2, 36, 43, 45, 66, 68, 75, 76, 78-80, 87, 88, 92-122,
124, 126, 128, 130-141.
On the other hand, the Vienna edition contains a curious additional cut.
It gives No. 4, the Heaven, practically as in this edition, but puts
another cut under it in which the earth is revolving about the sun; and
after the statement of Comenius, “_Coelum rotatur, et ambit terram, in
medio stantem_” interpolates: “_prout veteres crediderunt; recentiores
enim defendunt motum terrae circa solem_” [as the ancients used to
think; for later authorities hold that the motion of the earth is about
the sun.]
Two specimen pages from another edition are inserted in Payne’s
Compayré’s History of Education (between pp. 126, 127). The cut is the
representative of No. 103 in this edition, but those who compare them
will see not only how much coarser is the execution of the wood-cut
Prof. Payne has copied, but what liberties have been taken with the
design. The only change in the Latin text, however, is from _Designat
Figuras rerum_ in the original, to _Figuram rerum designat_.
In this edition the cuts are unusually clear copies of the copper-plates
of the first edition of 1658, from which we have also taken the Latin
text. The text for the English translation is from the English edition
of 1727, in which for the first time the English words were so arranged
as to stand opposite their Latin equivalents.
The cuts have been reproduced with great care by the photographic
process. I thought best not to permit them to be retouched, preferring
occasional indistinctness to modern tampering with the originals that
would make them less authentic.
The English text is unchanged from that of the 1727 edition, except in
rare instances where substitutions have been made for single words not
now permissible. The typography suggests rather than imitates the
quaintness of the original, and the paper was carefully selected to
produce so far as practicable the impression of the old hand-presses.
In short my aim has been to put within the reach of teachers at a
moderate price a satisfactory reproduction of this important book; and
if the sale of the _Orbis Pictus_ seems to warrant it, I hope
subsequently to print as a companion volume the _Vestibulum_ and _Janua_
of the same author, of which I have choice copies.