Art of Grammar of the Most Used Language on the Coast of Brazil

Art of Grammar of the Most Used Language on the Coast of Brazil is a book written in 1555 by Jesuit priest Joseph of Anchieta and first published in Portugal in the year 1595.

It is the first grammar of a Brazilian indigenous language—in this case, Old Tupi—and the second one of an American indigenous language, following the grammar of Quechua by Domingo de Santo Tomás, published in 1560. In 1874, the work was translated into German by linguist Julius Platzmann under the title Grammatik der brasilianischen Sprache, mit Zugrundelegung des Anchieta. It is the only known translation of this book by Anchieta.

Antecedents
Although the Art of Joseph of Anchieta is considered the first grammar of Old Tupi, information regarding the grammar of the language was first published in 1578 by the French Calvinist Jean de Léry, who visited Rio de Janeiro in the mid-1550s and added grammatical explanations as appendix to his travel narrative during the time of Villegaignon's France Antarctique.

Author
Joseph of Anchieta was born in La Laguna, Tenerife, in 1534. He studied in Coimbra from 1548 to 1551, where he entered the Society of Jesus, and arrived in Brazil, specifically in Salvador, in July 1553. There, Anchieta took linguistic notes from, the first Jesuit to learn Old Tupi. He traveled in November of the same year to São Vicente, where he arrived in December. In January 1554, Anchieta went inland with Manuel da Nóbrega and together they founded a college in Piratininga, where he served as a Latin teacher for eleven years. Although he may have initiated the learning of the Old Tupi language in Salvador, Bahia, he truly mastered it in Piratininga, inhabited by the Tupi Indians, in whose dialect he probably wrote the first version of his grammar, still in the 1550s. The grammar was only published in 1595 and, therefore, may have been revised several times after he began living with the Tupinambás—in Bahia, Rio de Janeiro, and Espírito Santo.

History
The Art of Joseph of Anchieta was written in Piratininga or São Vicente, between the years 1553 (when he arrived in that region) and 1555 (when Manuel da Nóbrega took it to Bahia). Anchieta probably was unaware, at the time, of the dialectal variants of Old Tupi. The first version of his work must have ignored them; with his travels and changes of residence over 43 years in Brazil, he was able to account for these variants in his grammar, probably reworking it more than once. It is also possible that Anchieta received contributions from third parties, as it was used daily in the Tupi courses taught by the Jesuits to the missionaries.

In 1592, authorization was requested to publish the book, along with a Christian doctrine, but, likely due to financial constraints, only Anchieta's grammar was printed. This occurred in 1595 in the city of Coimbra.

Content
The following are the 16 chapters of the Art of Anchieta:


 * Chapter I – Das letras.
 * Chapter II – Da Orthographia ou pronunciação.
 * Chapter III – De accentu.
 * Chapter IIII – Dos Nomes.
 * Chapter V – Dos pronomes.
 * Chapter VI – Arte da dos Verbos.
 * Chapter VII – Annotações, na Conjugação.
 * Chapter VIII – Da Construição dos verbos activos.
 * Chapter IX – Dalgüas maneiras de verbos em que esta amphibologia se tira.
 * Chapter X – Das Proeposições.
 * Chapter XI – De sum, es, fui.
 * Chapter XII – Dos verbos neutros feitos activos.
 * Chapter XIII – Dos activos feitos neutros.
 * Chapter XIIII – Da Composição dos verbos.
 * Chapter XV – Da Repetição dos verbos.
 * Chapter XVI – De algüs verbos irregulares de Aê

Reception
Anchieta's grammar was for several decades the only existing compendium for the teaching of Old Tupi, but its didactic qualities were not recognized at the time. In Luís Figueira's Art of circa 1628, Manuel Cardoso attributes to Anchieta the merit of the first grammar, but to Figueira the clarity in teaching. Cardoso argues that Anchieta's Art is detailed and inaccessible, stating it to be "diminutive and confusing, as we all have experienced", and expressing gratitude for Figueira's alternative. Luís Figueira himself does not mention Anchieta in the prologue of his grammar.