BENCIRECHI, Abbé. Leçons hebdomadaires de la langue italienne à l’usage des Dames. Suivies de deux Vocabulaires ; d’un Recueil des Synonimes Français de l’Abbé Girard, appliqués à cette Langue ; d’un Discours sur les Lettres Familières, & d’un Précis des Règles de la Poésies Italienne. Dédiées aux Dames Françaises par M. l’Abbé Bencirechi, Toscan, de l’Académie des Apatistes de Florence, de celle des Arcades de Rome, & Professeur de L. Itale. Nouvelle édition avec Additions faites par l’Auteur.

Abbot Bencirechi, from Tuscany, was a member of the Academy of the Apatistas in Florence, and also of the no less famous Arcades of Rome. He liked to say that he was “known and protected by several people of distinguished rank” because his textbooks were addressed above all to quality ladies, as can be seen in his Dedications. For eight years he lived in Vienna, Austria, where he taught the Italian language to the Ladies of the Court, and to other “persons of distinction” in that city. Arrived in Paris around 1771, he was also a professor of Italian there for many years.

Abbot Bencirechi therefore seems to have a rather worldly experience of teaching. Les Leçons hebdomadaires de la langue italienne à l’usage des Dames, published in 1772, are dedicated to French Ladies, just like the 1778 edition, just slightly different from the previous one. The author deplores that, unlike so many European countries where women do not disdain to speak Italian, the French female audience still shuns a language endowed with so many attractions.

The concern not to tire his pupils is found in the very structure of his book. For fear of boring the Ladies with a too difficult nomenclature, he will give it imperceptibly, where necessary. He begins with a few explanations on Italian pronunciation, for two weeks, followed by the nine parts of the speech or the prayer presented in turn, throughout the following weeks: the article, the noun, the pronoun, the verb, the participle, adverb, preposition, conjunction and interjection.
Always in order not to tire the Ladies too much, and to avoid them having to obtain a dictionary, he writes, after each lesson, two small French-Italian and Italian-French vocabularies. Thus all the words necessary for each version will be explained gradually and at the appropriate time. The choice of words also, taken in their preoccupations and their daily life, will please the Ladies by mixing useful and pleasant knowledge.
With such a method, the presence of a Master will not be necessary, at most once a week, for the correction of the weekly translation, and to acquire good pronunciation and the habit of speaking the language.

For Bencirechi, the three treatises which follow les Leçons seem essential and will be presented entirely in Italian because he assume quite advanced now the Ladies’ knowledge of the language.

1 – When talking about knowing how to choose the right terms, Abbot Bencirechi therefore offers his students Recueil des Synonymes français de l’abbé Girard, applied to Italian.

2 – The art of letter writing, like the one of conversation, is often practiced brilliantly, and naturally, by women who will be able to read the Discours sur les lettres familières with profit. Many Ladies’ Grammars in France offer Advice for Letters, or Sample Letters, for every occasion in life.

3 – Le Précis des Règles de la versification italienn will allow them to appreciate poetry.” (Madeleine Reuillon-Blanquet).

Elisabeth-Philippe-Marie-Hélène de France, eighth and last child of Louis, dauphin, son of Louis XV, and Marie-Josèphe de Saxe, and sister of Louis XVI, called Madame Elisabeth, was born in Versailles on May 3, 1764 and most often lived far from the court, in her small house in Montreuil, occupied only with charitable works; From 1789, this virtuous princess came to share the dangers of Louis XVI, refused to emigrate and was locked up in the Temple with the royal family. Accused of maintaining relations with her emigrant brothers, she was condemned to death by the revolutionary tribunal on May 10, 1794 and guillotined the same day on the Place de la Révolution.

“Her library, which contained works of piety, history and science, was transferred to the National Library; the volumes are generally simply connected, in marbled or granite-like calf. » (Olivier-Hermal).

The copy is not only wearing her coat of arms but also her rare ex-libris drawn by Dezauche present in his some favorite books.