Arcadius Avellanus' "Tusculum/Palaestra"?

Latin Learning Latin
1

I recently read A.A’s outstanding translation of “Treasure Island” (“Insula Thesauraria”) and I personally consider him a genius. I also found out that he developed a technique to help the student achieve complete fluency in Latin. Whereas I am happy with “Lvo”, I’d like to find out more about this man and his ideas. Can anyone help me? Do you own a copy of the book (“Palaestra”) or can you at least tell me more about the method itself? Thank you.

2

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arcadius_Avellanus
Modus discendi eius viri ignoro. // I don’t know about his method.

3

Nonne tibi vis ‘modum’? Quod scio, modus substantivum secundae est declinationis.

4

Palaestra
http://ia600406.us.archive.org/26/items/novasermonislat00mogygoog/
Interesting // curâ est.

Also // Etiam
Mysterium Arcae Boulé (The Mystery of the Boule Cabinet)
http://www.archive.org/details/mysteriumarcbou00mogygoog

Also // Etiam
Insula Thesauraria
http://la.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fasciculus:Insula_Thesauraria.djvu

Also // Etiam
Pericla Navarchi Magonis
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pericla_Navarchi_Magonis.djvu

Also // Etiam
Fabulae Divales
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fabulae_Divales.djvu

5

I wrote the Latin version of this article (of which the English is someone’s translation), so if you have any feedback, let me know. http://la.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arcadius_Avellanus

6

Great, thesaure. I didn’t know of him before. He’s really interesting.
Bene factum est, thesaure. Ignotus mihi anteà hoc homo. Valdè attractivus.

7

Hoc modò animadverti. Rectè dicis, Matthaee.

8

What a very liney method… :O.

9

Having looked quickly at it, I think the Palaestra method is very intuitive. He starts with a point and a line indeed, and coincidentally that how I begin my (unfinished) Mundus program, though less well,—well, right after showing what you might take out of a schoolbag. But this is to tie Latin in nicely with other things being taught in a school curriculum.

Opus innui et rationem Palaestrae libri prorsùs intuitivam habeo. Puncto lineâque incipit liber,—quo et meum programma ineditum Mundus nomine casu modo minùs perito incipit, illis rebus quas capsa discipuli continet monstratis. Quae ratio scito modo aliis disciplinis in ludis integrat.

10

For a PDF of Fabulae Divales, if you have a US IP address, go to:
http://books.google.com/books?id=JfI_TJo2Z_YC
or, failing that:
http://www.lulu.com/product/file-download/fabulae-divales/6044763

11

Salvete!

I stumbled upon the work of Arcadius Avellanus (real name Árkád Mogyoróssy, see the la.Wikipedia article). I thought it might be useful to put together all information about freely available versions (and those not yet online):

  • His course:
  • Nova Sermonis Latini Palaestra: the first part of the course (PDF, 2.3 MB, 81 pages)
    • Arena Palaestrarum: the second part of the course (PDF, 2.9 MB, 177 pages)
    • Medulla, a classical reader (unfortunately unavailable)
  • His translations:
  • Insula Thesauraria: Robert L. Stevenson’s Treasure Island (DJVU, 3.1 MB, file size unknown, 456 pages)
  • Other works:
  • Colloquiorum Scholasticorum Liber Secundus: an edition of the dialogues written by Corderius as adapted by Arcadius Avellanus (HTML).
    • Fabulae Tusculanae: unfortunately unavailable. Its sub-title: ad suppeditandam praeceptoribus studiosisque materiam latinum sermonem vivae vocis adminiculo docendi et discendi (1913, 16 pages according to the Library of Congress’ Catalogue of copyright entries).

Please add to this list if you know of additional works or where to find the ones still lacking online versions.

Valete,

Carolus Raeticus