An Ainu-English-Japanese Dictionary and Grammar.

By the Rev. John Batchelor, Church Missionary Society, Hakodate. Tokyo : Printed for the Hokkaido Cho by Y. Kumata, 1889. Large octavo (240 x 165 mm), quarter black morocco over blind-blocked black cloth (expertly recased with new spine replicating the original), upper board with gilt lettering and device, spine in compartments with gilt lettering and decoration; marbled edges and endpapers; additional title-page in Japanese characters; main title in English, with old wet stamp of the Hansische Universität, Hamburg; pp. [2] (Preface in Japanese), 1-80 (Introduction, which serves as a grammar), 1-287 (Dictionary, printed in two columns), [1] (blank), [1] (Addenda], [1 blank], [1] (colophon in Japanese characters), [1] (blank); a very fine example.

Scarce first edition of John Batchelor’s important trilingual dictionary, which includes a grammar of the Ainu language. A revised and enlarged edition was published in 1905 (Tokyo/London, Methodist Publishing House).

Englishman Rev. John Batchelor (1855-1944), of the Church Missionary Society, arrived in Hokkaido in 1877 and lived among the indigenous Ainu communities for more than sixty years. He was the first to develop a writing system for the Ainu language.

Cordier, BJ, 618

No sale record for the first edition traced in the Rare Book Hub database.