Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1998. Vol. 2. Eger Journal of English Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 26)

Studies - Lajos Szőke: Anglica vetera in the Archdiocesian Library of Eger

LAJOS SZŐKE ANGLICA VETERA IN THE ARCHDIOCESAN LIBRARY OF EGER Abstract: The Archdiocesan Library of Eger is the second public library in Hungary. It was founded by Count Eszterházy in the XVIIIth century with the aim to establish a university with four faculties. This is the reason why almost all sciences are represented in the collection of the Library. Although Eszterházy did not succeed in carrying out his plan, the collection of books went on even in the following centuries. In the XVII-XVIIIth century English stock of the Library, understandably, theology and philosophy take a prominent place with special interest in contemporary protestantism. The collection of books in English on natural sciences and astronomy can be explained by the observatory equipped with precious instruments and books from Greenwich. The Library has also a great variety of course books, grammar books and dictionaries of the English language offering a good opportunity to students of English to study language teaching methodology in the XVII-XVIIIth century. The study is followed by a biblography of English books divided into major scientific groups. Count Eszterházy and his collection Several studies - shorter and longer - have already dealt with the history of the over 200 year old Archdiocesan Library of Eger but none of them have discussed the English part of the Eszterházy-collection. The author of the most competent study about the Library, L. Antalóczy has rightly pointed out that the research of the French, German, Latin and English books in the second public library of Hungary would bring useful data and precious information into the cultural history of XVIIIth century Central-Europe (Antalóczy 1993. 32-33). As the majority of the books are in Latin, German and French, shorter studies could concern only minor languages and cultures represented in the Library. Understandably, most of the attention has been paid to the Slavonic books, as many believers of the Eger diocese were Slavs (Pallagi-Zbiskó 1962, 1963, 1964, 1966; Földvári-Ojtozy 1992 ). In spite of this it still needs a full bibliography. I. Bitskey in a short but excellent study examined the influence of the Italian spirituality on the Hungarian cleric137