Joanes Leizarraga (1506–1601) was a 16th-century

Basque Basque may refer to: * Basques, an ethnic group of Spain and France * Basque language, their language Places * Basque Country (greater region), the homeland of the Basque people with parts in both Spain and France * Basque Country (autonomous co ...

priest. He is most famous for being the first to attempt the

standardisation Standardization or standardisation is the process of implementing and developing technical standards based on the consensus of different parties that include firms, users, interest groups, standards organizations and governments. Standardization ...

of the Basque language and for the translation of religious works into Basque, in particular the first Basque translation of the

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Chris ...

. French spellings of his name are often encountered in older works, for example ''Ioannes Leiçarraga'' and ''Jean de Liçarrague'' and various other spellings of his surname such as ''Leissarrague'' or ''Leiçarraga''. or in Spanish Juan de Lizárraga.

Life

Early years

Leizarraga was born in the

Northern Basque Country The French Basque Country, or Northern Basque Country ( eu, Iparralde (), french: Pays basque, es, País Vasco francés) is a region lying on the west of the French department of the Pyrénées-Atlantiques. Since 1 January 2017, it constitu ...

in the province of

Labourd Labourd ( eu, Lapurdi; la, Lapurdum; Gascon: ''Labord'') is a former French province and part of the present-day Pyrénées Atlantiques ''département''. It is one of the traditional Basque provinces, and identified as one of the territorial c ...

in a village called

Briscous Briscous (; eu, BeskoitzeBeskoitze
Lower Navarrese dialect of Basque. His family's farmhouse bore the family's name, Leizarraga, and stood in Briscous until it was destroyed in 1944. Very little is known about Leizarraga's early years beyond these few facts.

Priesthood

Leizarraga was baptized a

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

. Although it is not known where, he was trained as a priest and converted to

Protestantism Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

in 1560. By 1563, his name is mentioned in the records of the Protestant Synod of

Béarn The Béarn (; ; oc, Bearn or ''Biarn''; eu, Bearno or ''Biarno''; or ''Bearnia'') is one of the traditional provinces of France, located in the Pyrenees mountains and in the plain at their feet, in southwest France. Along with the three B ...

. In his dedication of the New Testament to

Jeanne d'Albret Jeanne d'Albret ( Basque: ''Joana Albretekoa''; Occitan: ''Joana de Labrit''; 16 November 1528 – 9 June 1572), also known as Jeanne III, was Queen of Navarre from 1555 to 1572. Jeanne was the daughter of Henry II of Navarre and Margar ...

he mentions having spent time in prison but again, it is not known which prison he was in, what the charge was or how long he was imprisoned for. He was instituted as rector of the church in

Bastide Bastides are fortified new towns built in medieval Languedoc, Gascony, Aquitaine, England and Wales during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, although some authorities count Mont-de-Marsan and Montauban, which was founded in 1144, as ...

Lower Navarre Lower Navarre ( eu, Nafarroa Beherea/Baxenabarre; Gascon/Bearnese: ''Navarra Baisha''; french: Basse-Navarre ; es, Baja Navarra) is a traditional region of the present-day French ''département'' of Pyrénées-Atlantiques. It corresponds to the ...

in 1567 by Jeanne d'Albret. By the time Leizarraga came to Bastide, the majority of inhabitants were not speaking Basque but Gascon, since it had come to be populated by a Gascon colony. Nonetheless, Leizarraga was even in his time renowned as a great scholar of the Basque language, the very reason he would later be entrusted with the translation of the New Testament. It is also known that various Basque shepherds in the area sent their children to him so that he would teach them Basque. He was married but it is not known when or to whom. In March 1563 Leizarraga was instructed by

, the Queen of

Navarre Navarre (; es, Navarra ; eu, Nafarroa ), officially the Chartered Community of Navarre ( es, Comunidad Foral de Navarra, links=no ; eu, Nafarroako Foru Komunitatea, links=no ), is a foral autonomous community and province in northern Spain, ...

at the Synod of Béarn to produce a Basque translation of the New Testament. Having negotiated the tricky issue of translating into a language which by then had no great written tradition, common standard or spelling system, he persevered with some help from four old Catholic colleagues: Piarres Landetxeberri from Espès-Undurein, Sanz de Tartas from Charritte-de-Bas (both in

Soule Soule (Basque: Zuberoa; Zuberoan/ Soule Basque: Xiberoa or Xiberua; Occitan: ''Sola'') is a former viscounty and French province and part of the present-day Pyrénées-Atlantiques ''département''. It is divided into two cantons of the arron ...

), Joanes Etxeberri from

Saint-Jean-de-Luz Saint-Jean-de-Luz (; eu, Donibane Lohitzune,Donibane Lohitzune
Ostabat Ostabat-Asme (; ), Hostavalem in the Middle Ages, is a commune in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department, in south-western France. It was the meeting point of 4 European ways to Santiago de Compostela, 3 of them joining together there, namely ...

. Finally, in 1571, the printer

Pierre Haultin Pierre Haultin (c. 1510 – 1587) was a French printer, publisher, punchcutter and typefounder. He was the nephew of the famous Parisian women printer Charlotte Guillard. As a punchcutter, he may have been trained by Claude Garamont, who w ...

based in

La Rochelle La Rochelle (, , ; Poitevin-Saintongeais: ''La Rochéle''; oc, La Rochèla ) is a city on the west coast of France and a seaport on the Bay of Biscay, a part of the Atlantic Ocean. It is the capital of the Charente-Maritime department. Wi ...

printed three works by Leizarraga, amongst them is translation of the New Testament. It is indicative of the respect he commanded that in 1582 he was visited by Jacques Auguste de Thou, the man who would later negotiate the

Edict of Nantes The Edict of Nantes () was signed in April 1598 by King Henry IV and granted the Calvinist Protestants of France, also known as Huguenots, substantial rights in the nation, which was in essence completely Catholic. In the edict, Henry aimed pr ...

on religious tolerance. In his writings, Thou mentions Leizarraga and the copy of the Basque translation of the New Testament he had been given as a gift during his visit. This copy today is in the

National Library of France National may refer to: Common uses * Nation or country ** Nationality – a ''national'' is a person who is subject to a nation, regardless of whether the person has full rights as a citizen Places in the United States * National, Maryland, c ...

. It is also Thou who mentions the exceptionally harmonious relationship between Protestants and Catholics in Bastide where according to him both faiths were worshipped in the church, something that was rare in 16th century France which is known for its

religious wars A religious war or a war of religion, sometimes also known as a holy war ( la, sanctum bellum), is a war which is primarily caused or justified by differences in religion. In the modern period, there are frequent debates over the extent to wh ...

. By 1594 Leizarraga was no longer attending the Synod of Béarn, the record stating ''Monsieur de Lissarrague, ministre de Labastide de Clarence, excusé pour sa vieillesse et pour son indisposition'' "Mr Liazarraga, minister of Bastida, makes his excuse due to old age and being indisposed''. He died in Bastide in 1601 at the age of 95.

Leizarraga's work

Leizarraga published three books, all in 1571: *''Iesus Christ Gure Iaunaren Testamentu Berria'' (The New Testament of Jesus Christ our Lord) *''Kalendrera'' (a calendar of religious holiday) *''ABC edo Christinoen instructionea'' (ABC or the Christian's Instruction) The most famous of these undoubtedly is the ''Testamentu Berria'' which even today is known as "Leizarraga's New Testament". Apart from the New Testament's main text, his translation also includes the following addenda: *''Testamentu Berrian diraden icen propri Hebraico eta Greco batzuén declarationeo'' ("Listing of some of the Hebrew and Greek proper names contained in the New Testament"), 3 pages *''Testamentu Berrico hitz eta mincatzeco manera difficil bakoitz batzu bere declarationéquin'' ("Listing with explanations of a number of difficult words and expressions of the New Testament"), 13 pages *''Çuberoaco herrian usançatan eztiraden hitz bakoitz batzu hango ançora itzuliac'' ("Some words not used in Zuberoa with their local equivalents"), 2 pages *''Testamentu Berrico materien erideteco taulá'' ("A table for finding topics of the New Testament"), 48 pages *a long section on how to conduct ecclesiastical ceremonies: **''Othoitza ecclesiasticoen forma'' ("The way of ecclesiastical prayer"), 15 pages **''Baptismoaren administratzeco form'' ("The way of administering baptism"), 6 pages **''Cenaren celebratzeco forma'' ("The way of celebrating mass"), 5 pages **''Ezconcaren celebratzeco forma'' ("The way of celebrating a wedding"), 5 pages **''Erien visitatzeaz'' ("On visiting the ill"), 2 pages **''Catechismea, cein erran nahi baita, Iesus Christen doctrinán haourrén iracasteco formá...'' ("The

Catechism A catechism (; from grc, κατηχέω, "to teach orally") is a summary or exposition of doctrine and serves as a learning introduction to the Sacraments traditionally used in catechesis, or Christian religious teaching of children and adul ...

, meaning the way of teaching the doctrine of Jesus Christ to children..."), a 62-page section in a question and answer format *a short treatise on the life of a Christian The ''Kalendrera'' is short, 15 page calendar with monthly listings of religious events and holidays, the ''ABC'' a short collection of common prayers and instructions on how to conduct daily worship.

Critical appraisal

The main criticism that has been made of his work is that he often used Romance loanwords where native terms exist. For example, he translates "fisher of men" as ''giza pescadorea'' rather than ''giza arrantzalea''. At the same time, he uses grammatical forms which were most likely archaic even in his period. The other main criticism was that, as an over-regional standard, he based it too much on his native Lapurdian dialect and the two other Northern dialects with very little regard to the Southern dialects. However, it must be remembered that he was the first to tackle standardization and that there was no previous work he could build upon and that with his limited resources he had to carry out most of the work himself. Overall, the quality of his translations and the thoroughness of his effort at standardizing Basque were and are recognized today, and have in no small way contributed to the formation of Standard Basque.

Leizarraga as a source

Leizarraga's texts provide a wealth of data on the Basque of his time. *His work includes one of the few documented tripersonal verb forms where the direct object is not in the third person: ''gommendatzen cerauzquiotet'' "I recommend you to them", which is a type of Basque verb formation no longer in use. Trask, L. ''The History of Basque'' Routledge: 1997 *He is one of the first known authors to have used the term ''heuscal herria'' ( Euskal Herria in modern spelling, meaning "Basque Country"). As an example, the following is a comparison between Leizarraga's version and the modern version of the Lord's prayer (in Leizarraga's orthography):

Standardisation of Basque

Leizarraga's work represents the first documented effort to bring together the various

Basque dialects Basque dialects are linguistic varieties of the Basque language which differ in pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar from each other and from Standard Basque. Between six and nine Basque dialects have been historically distinguished: * Biscay ...

in a single standard. His form of Basque was largely based on the Northern dialects Lapurdian, Zuberoan and Lower Navarrese which at the time were considered the prestigious varieties of Basque. He discusses the issue of dialectal divergence in the foreword and says: In the 20th century, Federico Krutwig proposed to the Basque Academy Leizarraga's language as the basis for Modern Standard Basque, but his ideas did not get enough support.

References

* Azurmendi, Joxe: "Die Bedeutung der Sprache in Renaissance und Reformation und die Entstehung der baskischen Literatur im religiösen und politischen Konfliktgebiet zwischen Spanien und Frankreich" In: Wolfgang W. Moelleken (Herausgeber), Peter J. Weber (Herausgeber): ''Neue Forschungsarbeiten zur Kontaktlinguistik'', Bonn: Dümmler, 1997. *Etxegoien, J. ''Orhipean, Gure Herria ezagutzen'' Xamar: 1996 *Linschmann, Th. & Schuchardt, H. ''I. Leiçarragas Baskische Bücher von 1571'' Kaiserliche Akademie der Wissenschaften: 1900 *

External links

Online edition of Leizarraga's New Testament
in modernized spelling. {{DEFAULTSORT:Leizarraga, Joanes 1506 births 1601 deaths People from Labourd Converts to Protestantism from Roman Catholicism Huguenots French-Basque people Linguists Basque culture Basque-language scholars Translators to Basque Basque-language writers Translators of the Bible into Basque