Thomas Jefferson Papers
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George Ticknor to Thomas Jefferson, 25 November 1815

From George Ticknor

Göttingen Nov. 25. 1815.

Dear Sir,

Besides the letter, which I had the honour of sending you by our commissioner Mr. Clay from London, I wrote you a long one from this place Oct. 14 giving you the reasons which induce me to spend the winter here and some slight notices of German literature—and Oct. 30. on hearing of the emigration of your friend Mons. Dupont de Nemours to the U.S. I enclosed to you the letter of introduction your kindness furnished me to him. To day I have received your favour of July 4. inclosing your catalogue of books. If I had been in France I should have received it a month earlier but even that would have been too late to send out your books this fall and I rejoice by this comparison of dates to find that, though you will not receive them till the spring, you will receive them as early as it would have been possible even under the plan I originally contemplated. Whenever they go, may they have a more fortunate fate than an hundred pounds worth of choice and curious classicks, which I shipped to my father from Holland, and which I have too much reason to believe were lost in some of those tremendous storms which in August and September seem to have covered the Atlantick with wrecks.

In the mean time, as I have had access to the great library here, and seen there all the editions of the classicks extant, I can, wherever you have left a choice open to my decision, first consult you with all the knowledge I could get at Paris, & mention to you, perhaps, some editions that will be more to your taste, as you have expressed it in your letter, even in some cases, where you have left me no alternative.—

1. Herodotus. 3. 8vo. Oxon. there is a german edit. of this in the same form & size, which will be cheaper & quite as good.

2. Thucydides. You express some doubts of the Bip. in 6. 8vo. Perhaps you were not aware that it is a reimpression of Duker’s with emendations & decidedly the ed. opt.

3. Diog. Laertius. The edit. of Meibomius in two small thin quartos is one of the best edited Greek classicks extant.—

4. Plutarchi Vitæ. There is a curious & beautiful edition of the lives published in 8vo. at Paris by Coray1 the modern Greek from Scios (Χιος). He has published, also, a specimen of an edit. of Homer, a Hierocles, & two or three other small Greek works with Greek Prefaces, & notes written with great purity & taste & a selection of scholia, which I think would please you very much.

5. I know of no decent edit. of Dion Cassius but that by the famous Reimarus in 2. fol. which is one of the best edited Greek classicks extant.

6. Tacitus. The edition of Oberlinus in 4. 8vo. is the optime.

7. Homeri Op. I know of no edition of Homer (except Didymus 1689) cum scholiis. If, however, you add to this Heyne’s Iliad in 8. 8vo. you will have a complete corpus of everything relating to the criticism of Homer. The running commentary of Heyne is beautiful—and his excursi admirable. His scholia, too, are more curious & ample than those of any other edit. His Iliad, his Pindar2 3. 8vo., his Tibullus 1. 8vo, and his Virgil 6. 8vo are unrivalled as editions of the classicks.

8. The best Theocritus is by Valkenaer 1. 8vo. with very few notes.

9. Juvenal by Ruperti 2. 8vo. gives a better explanation of this difficult author than was ever before given &, indeed, as good as is to be expected. Gifford, in London, spoke of it to me with unmeasured praise, & I am satisfied that I never understood it till I read it with this admirable commentary.

10. The optime of Hesiod is now by Loesner, 1. 8vo with scholia & Le clerc’s notes.

11. Aeschylus 3. 8vo. German edit. by Schultz is the best.

12. Reiske’s Orators in 12. 8vo, now that the apparatus criticus and scholia &c are complete is very much sought. It cost me in Holland 80 florins = $.32.—

I mention these items to you merely as bibliographical hints. In many instances you undoubtedly have personal & peculiar reasons for preferring the elder editions to the optimes, for an old edition or copy in which we have been accustomed to read is like an old friend, who is not to be put aside for a younger one, even though he should be of more promise.—If, therefore, I receive no further direction from you, I shall fulfil your orders as expressed in your list, immediately on my arrival at Paris, which will be as soon as the roads are comfortable in the spring.—

A letter addressed to our legation in France—to Francis Williams Esq. Paris—or to my father Boston will reach & govern me.—

I am, with much respect,
Your obedient servant,

Geo: Ticknor.—

I had forgotten to mention that your’s of Aug. 16 was received Oct. 13. with Mr. Vaughan’s enclosure. My father mentioned that he had received a very kind & polite letter from you for which I pray you to accept my thanks as you have doubtless before received his.—

G. T.

RC (DLC); addressed: “To His Excellency, Thomas Jefferson Esquire, late President of the United States Monticello, Albermarle county, Virginia”; stamped “SHIP”; with notation: “Received & forwarded Rotterdam 5 Decr 1815 by y mo H Servants Collings & Maingy”; franked; postmarked Boston, 28 Jan.; endorsed by TJ as received 7 Feb. 1816 and so recorded in SJL; with two marginal notes by TJ described below; and with Ticknor’s numbered list annotated in pencil, probably by TJ in preparation for his 8 Feb. 1816 reply, with plus-signs next to nos. 1–4, 6–7, and 9–11, and minus-signs next to nos. 5, 8, and 12.

Ticknor’s letter to TJ of oct. 30. is not recorded in SJL and has not been found. Adamantios Coray’s edition of Plutarch’s lives was Πλουταρχου Βιοι Παραλληλοι, 6 vols. (Paris, 1809–14; TJ’s copy in MoSW).

TJ’s marginal notes described below reference a book review of William Martin Leake’s Researches in Greece (London, 1814), in which the scholarship of Adamantios coray is mentioned several times, and a list of new publications that included an edition of pindar, Christian Gottlob Heyne’s Pindari Carmina (Edinburgh Review 47 [1814]: 266; 48 [1815]: 353–69; either TJ’s pagination is erroneous or he used a different edition).

1To the left of this word TJ keyed a note with an asterisk: “see Edinb. Rev. 1815. Feb. pa. 350.”

2To the left of this word TJ keyed a note with a dagger: “see Edin. Rev. Nov. 1814. Monthly catalogue pa. 266.”

Index Entries

  • Aeschyli Tragoediae Quae Supersunt ac Deperditarum Fragmenta (Aeschylus; ed. C. G. Schütz) search
  • Aeschylus; Aeschyli Tragoediae Quae Supersunt ac Deperditarum Fragmenta (ed. C. G. Schütz) search
  • books; classical search
  • Cassius Dio; Roman History (ed. H. S. Reimarus) search
  • classics; G. Ticknor on editions of search
  • Clay, Henry; forwards letter to TJ search
  • Collings & Maingy (Rotterdam firm); forwards letter to TJ search
  • Coray, Adamantios; edition of Hierocles by search
  • Coray, Adamantios; edition of Homer by search
  • Coray, Adamantios; editsΠλουτάρχου Βίοι Παράλληλοι (Ploutarchou bioi parallēloi) (Plutarch) search
  • Coray, Adamantios; works of search
  • D. Iunii Iuvenalis Aquinatis Satirae XVI (Juvenal; ed. G. A. Ruperti) search
  • De Bello Peloponnesiaco Libri Octo Graece et Latine (Thucydides; eds. J. Wasse and K. A. Duker) search
  • Demosthenes; Oratorum Graecorum, quorum princeps est Demosthenes (ed. J. J. Reiske) search
  • Didymus Chalcenterus; editsὉμήρου Ἰλιὰς καὶ εἰς Αὐτὴν Σχόλια τῶν Παλαιῶν. Homeri Ilias, Et Veterum in Eam Scholia search
  • Diogenes Laertius; Diogenis Laertii De Vitis, Dogmatibus et Apophthegmatibus Clarorum Philosophorum Libri X. Græce et Latine (ed. M. Meibomius) search
  • Diogenis Laertii De Vitis, Dogmatibus et Apophthegmatibus Clarorum Philosophorum Libri X. Græce et Latine (Diogenes Laertius; ed. M. Meibomius) search
  • Duker, Karl Andreas; editsDe Bello Peloponnesiaco Libri Octo Graece et Latine (Thucydides) search
  • Du Pont de Nemours, Pierre Samuel; arrives in U.S. search
  • Du Pont de Nemours, Pierre Samuel; G. Ticknor carries letter for search
  • Edinburgh Review search
  • Germany; scholarship in search
  • Gifford, William; recommends book search
  • Greek language; classical works written in search
  • Herodoti Musae sive Historiarum Libri IX (Herodotus; ed. J. Schweighaeuser) search
  • Herodotus; Herodoti Musae sive Historiarum Libri IX (ed. J. Schweighaeuser) search
  • Herodotus; Oxford edition of search
  • Hesiod (Greek poet); Hesiodi Ascraei Quae Exstant (ed. C. F. Loesner) search
  • Hesiodi Ascraei Quae Exstant (Hesiod; ed. C. F. Loesner) search
  • Heyne, Christian Gottlob; edits Albius Tibullus search
  • Heyne, Christian Gottlob; editsPindari Carmina (Pindar) search
  • Heyne, Christian Gottlob; editsThe Iliad (Homer) search
  • Heyne, Christian Gottlob; edits Virgil search
  • Hierocles (Greek author of witticisms); A. Coray edition of search
  • Homer; A. Coray edition of search
  • Homer; C. G. Heyne edition ofIliad search
  • Homer; Ὁμήρου Ἰλιὰς καὶ εἰς Αὐτὴν Σχόλια τῶν Παλαιῶν. Homeri Ilias, et Veterum in Eam Scholia (ed. Didymus Chalcenterus) search
  • Iliad (Homer); C. G. Heyne’s edition of search
  • Jefferson, Thomas; Books & Library; orders books search
  • Jefferson, Thomas; Business & Financial Affairs; lines of credit in Europe search
  • Juvenal; D. Iunii Iuvenalis Aquinatis Satirae XVI (ed. G. A. Ruperti) search
  • Leake, William Martin; Researches in Greece search
  • Leclerc, Jean (Johannes Clericus); andHesiodi Ascraei Quae Exstant (Hesiod) search
  • libraries; at University of Göttingen search
  • Library of Congress; TJ replaces books sold to search
  • Loesner, Christoph Friedrich; editsHesiodi Ascraei Quae Exstant (Hesiod) search
  • Meibomius, Marcus; editsDiogenis Laertii De Vitis, Dogmatibus et Apophthegmatibus clarorum philosophorum Libri X. Græce et Latine (Diogenes Laertius) search
  • Oberlin, Jeremias Jakob; edition of Tacitus by search
  • Oratorum Graecorum, quorum princeps est Demosthenes (Demosthenes; ed. J. J. Reiske) search
  • Pindar (Greek poet); Pindari Carmina (ed. C. G. Heyne) search
  • Pindari Carmina (Pindar; ed. C. G. Heyne) search
  • Plutarch; Πλουτάρχου Βίοι Παράλληλοι (Ploutarchou bioi parallēloi) (ed. A. Coray) search
  • Reimarus, Hermann Samuel; editsRoman History (Cassius Dio) search
  • Reiske, Johann Jacob; editsOratorum Graecorum, quorum princeps est Demosthenes (Demosthenes) search
  • Researches in Greece (W. M. Leake) search
  • Roman History (Cassius Dio; ed. H. S. Reimarus) search
  • Ruperti, Georg Alexander; editsD. Iunii Iuvenalis Aquinatis Satirae XVI (Juvenal) search
  • schools and colleges; University of Göttingen search
  • Schütz, Christian Gottfried; editsAeschyli Tragoediae Quae Supersunt ac Deperditarum Fragmenta (Aeschylus) search
  • Schweighaeuser, Johannes; editsHerodoti Musae sive Historiarum Libri IX (Herodotus) search
  • Tacitus; J. J. Oberlin edition of search
  • The Netherlands; book prices in search
  • Theocritus; edition of by L. C. Valckenaer search
  • Thucydides; De Bello Peloponnesiaco Libri Octo Graece et Latine (eds. J. Wasse and K. A. Duker) search
  • Tibullus (Roman poet) search
  • Ticknor, Elisha; forwards letters to and from TJ search
  • Ticknor, Elisha; G. Ticknor sends books to search
  • Ticknor, Elisha; mentioned search
  • Ticknor, George; and books for TJ search
  • Ticknor, George; carries TJ’s letters to Europe search
  • Ticknor, George; letters from search
  • Ticknor, George; on education in Europe search
  • Ticknor, George; travels of search
  • Valckenaer, Lodewijk Caspar; edition of Theocritus by search
  • Vaughan, John; and TJ’s lines of credit in Europe search
  • Virgil; C. G. Heyne edition of search
  • Wasse, Joseph; editsDe Bello Peloponnesiaco Libri Octo Graece et Latine (Thucydides) search
  • Williams, Francis; and G. Ticknor’s correspondence search
  • Πλουτάρχου Βίοι Παράλληλοι (Ploutarchou bioi parallēloi) (Plutarch; ed. A. Coray) search
  • Ὁμήρου Ἰλιὰς καὶ εἰς Αὐτὴν Σχόλια τῶν Παλαιῶν. Homeri Ilias, et Veterum in Eam Scholia (Homer; ed. Didymus Chalcenterus) search