A Brill Calendar: April 24

"De Vries & te Winkel"

Few books codify spelling of the language in which they were written.

The ‘Woordenboek der Nederlandsche Taal’ (WNT, ‘Dictionary of the language of the Netherlands’) is such a book. It started publication in 1864; and was completed just before the 21st century, some five generations later. Already a century before, in 1764, a published academic reflection stated that the Republic of the Seven United Provinces would benefit greatly from an alphabetically structured book describing all words of the language spoken in the European Delta. The extant jungle of spelling – proliferating in a culture with high literacy levels compared to other European regions and with a strong decentralized tradition - made this dream almost a ‘fata morgana’.

When Lambert Allard te Winkel (Arnhem, September 13 1809 – Leyden, April 24 1868) died, this work (calling for a Sisyphus-like mind-set) had hardly started; although preliminaries had been made. Together with his associate, Matthijs de Vries (Haarlem, November 9 1820 – Leyden, Augustus 9 1892) te Winkel had already produced a work entitled ‘Grondbeginselen der Nederlandsche spelling’ (Basic Principles of Dutch Spelling’), accepted by national Government in 1863 – and in Belgium one year later – as official standard, universally valid. That status would be maintained until 1946.

In Dutch learning & education, ‘De Vries & te Winkel’ became proverbial; comparable to ‘Rolls & Royce’ as a byword for English motor-cars. Te Winkel was a self-made man; de Vries had been teaching language and literature as Leyden Professor since 1853. His learned affiliation made Leyden into the workshop where (with as much care as circumspection) a superb survey of all stages in the historical development of the Dutch language was developed, as well as of its present state; the great dictionaries of English and German nations serving as shining examples.

The dream, at last fulfilled and even digitally accessible, originated before the advent of useful writing machines; the notion of a comprehensive historical archive of the language dawned in a scholarly culture with Gutenberg’s ‘Black Art’ as the only wand for lexicographical wizardry; and steel pens for rather new-fangled writing tools.