"L'interprect ou traduction du françois, espagnol & basque" (~1620): II. Elkarrizketak

Abstract

The edition of Voltoire's L'Interprect (Lyon, c. 1620) was begun with the short grammar and French-Basque vocabulary published in this journal's last year's issue. It is now completed with these 14 dialogues for various purposes in Spanish, French and Basque. The text was created from oral Basque without accurate knowledge of the language; its translation was not quite precise and the Basque version was written using inappropriate orthographic conventions (that corresponding to contemporary French). These factors contributed to the corrupt state in which the text has reached us, which accounts for the need of the explanatory notes provided in this edition, despite which there is still a remnant of unclear issues. An index of attested words is included, both because of the text's lexicographic value and because of their usefulness for the study of its ensuing tradition.