Octolingual

In 1539 Estienne reversed his Dictionarium, a direct descendant of his own Latin Thesaurus, into the Dictionnaire that was the ancestor of Nicot’s French Thresor. He did this because when popular demand required a reprinting of the octolingual Calepin, Estienne found this work unacceptable and a willing revisor unavailable.

Makkai is the author of Cantio Nocturna Peregrini Aviumque [Nightsong of the Wanderer and the Birds], an octolingual book of poetry honoring Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s 250 anniversary in 1999.

Also due for mention is Berlaymont’s octolingual dictionary, among them also Dutch, the Colloquia et dictionariolum octo linguarum; Latinae, Gallicae, Belgicae, Teutonicae, Hispanicae, Italicae, Anglicae et Portugallicae.

Contains an eight-language dictionary, fols. O8ᵛ - T3ʳ. The preface is dated 1585. NUC (NC 0554212) lists an octolingual edition of Venetiis 164-? (copy in Boulder UCL).

Two years later, in 1639, an octolingual edition was issued by ‘Michael Sparke junior’ under the title New Dialogues or Colloquies, and, A little Dictionary of eight Languages. Latine, French, Low-Dutch [i.e. Flemish], High-Dutch [i.e. German], Spanish, Italian, English, Portugall.

From 1565 onward Junius’ works were published with Christopher Plantin: his religious poem on the Passion (Anastaurosis), his edition of Nonius Marcellus and his Emblemata et Aenigmata (all in 1565), his frequently reprinted and adapted octolingual dictionary Nomenclator (1567), his editions of Eunapius and Martial (both 1568), and his edition of Hesychius (1572).

Beza, as he was called, wrote the Latin poem to Queen Elizabeth, and George Bishop and Ralph Newbery printed it and the seven translations in a most careful arrangement on the page. […] But the poetics of translation and printing of this page are also all about the landlocked “wars of letters,” the literary competition in which England had long been engaged, and the struggle to elevate the place of English letters in the world. That struggle finds a historico-political catalyst or stimulus here in the Armada moment and finds expression in the printing and translations on this remarkable octolingual page.

The Doktor was in the highest dudgeon. He kept shouting "pigs, louts, goatherds" in several languages; then he exhausted his octolingual vocabulary on words like Communists, deviationists, Reactionaries, and Imperialist dogs.