About six months ago a book came into my hands thus inscribed: Reynardus Vulpes, a poem translated from the Teutonic language before the year 1280 by a certain Baldwin. From the only surviving example which was printed around the year 1473 by Nic. Ketelaer and Ger. de Leempt in the public library of Dauntry, M. F. A. G. Campbell, librarian of the royal library of which the Count of The Hague is the librarian, The Hague, published by Martin Nijhoff. 1839. When I examined the Flemish version of Reynard, such as exists here in the Coburg codex, I found it to be corrupted by many errors, either by booksellers or printers, but so much so that I could persuade myself that, in most places where I had some trouble with some errors, especially if the Flemish copy were constantly being compared, I could easily find a remedy. And so I proposed to myself to take the risk of correcting this poem. Which attempt I hoped would succeed all the more, because that book, printed in the fifteenth century by Campbell, appeared at first sight to be as accurately described in print as possible. But when I had made such progress in criticizing Baldwin's poem that I had the text cleansed of the most obvious and foulest defects, there remained some passages about which I was very much in doubt. - [Editor]

Language: Latin