Ad usum Delphini

The Delphin Classics or Ad usum Delphini was a series of annotated editions of the Latin classics, intended to be comprehensive, which was originally created in the 17th century.

The first volumes were created in the 1670s for Louis, le Grand Dauphin, heir of Louis XIV (Delphin is the adjective derived from Dauphin), and were written entirely in Latin. Thirty-nine scholars contributed to the series, which was edited by Pierre Huet with assistance from several co-editors, including Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet and Anne Dacier. The main features included the main Latin texts; a paraphrase in the margins or below in simpler Latin prose (an ordo verborum); extended notes on specific words and lines, mainly about history, myth, geography, or natural sciences; and indices. One useful pedagogical feature of this series is that it keeps students reading and working in the target language (Latin). .

The original volumes each had an engraving of Arion and the Dolphin, accompanied by the inscription in usum serenissimi Delphini (for the use of the most serene Dauphin). The collection includes 64 volumes published from 1670 to 1698.

The Ad Usum Delphini series were reprinted for centuries, and served in classrooms across Europe and the Americas. Beginning in 1819 a series of Latin classics was published in England under the name Delphin Classics by Abraham John Valpy. This series was edited by George Dyer (poet), who produced 143 volumes.

The expression Ad usum Delphini was sometimes used on other texts which had been expurgated because they contained passages considered inappropriate for the youth, and has been used pejoratively to indicate any work expurgated for the sake of younger audiences, and not just this series of Latin texts and commentaries.

Publishing history

(Taken from Volpilhac-Auger p. 214. )

Author	Editor	Date and place of publication, Number of volumes
Salluste	Daniel Crispin	Paris, 1674
Cornelius Nepos	Nicolas Courtin	Paris, 1675
Phèdre	Pierre Danet	Paris, 1675
Térence	Nicolas le Camus	Paris, 1675
Velleius Paterculus	Robert Riguez, S. J.	Paris, 1675
Panegyria Veteres	Jacques de la Beaune, S. J.	Paris, 1676
Justin	Pierre Joseph Cantel, S. J.	Paris, 1676
Claudien	Guillaume Pyrrhon (ou Pyron)	Paris, 1677
Jules César	Jean Goduin, professeur à Paris	Paris, 1678
Quinte Curce	Michel le Tellier, S. J.	Paris, 1678
Manilius	Michel La Faye (ou Dufay) ; Pierre Daniel Huet, Remarques sur Manilius ,et Julius Caesar Scaliger, Notes	Paris, 1679
Plaute	Jacques de l'Ouvre	Paris, 1679, 2 vol.
Tite-Live	Jean Douiat	Paris, 1679,6 vol.
Valère Maxime	Pierre Joseph Cantel, S. J.	Paris, 1679
Boèce	Pierre Cally, professeur à Caen	Paris, 1680
Dictys de Crète et Dares de Phrygie	Anne Dacier, fille de Tanneguy Lefebvre	Paris, 1680
Lucrèce	Michel La Faye (ou Dufav)	Paris, 1680
Martial	Vincent Colesson, professeur de droit	Paris, 1680
Aulu-Gelle	Jacques Proust, S. J.	Paris, 1681
Aurelius Victor	Anne Dacier, fille de Tanneguy Lefebvre	Paris, 1681
Sextus Pompeius, Festus, et M. Vernus Flaccus	André Dacier	Paris, 1681
Cicéron, Livres qui concernent l'art oratoire	Jacques Proust, S. J.	Paris, 1682,2 vol.
Tacite	Julien Pichon	Paris, 1682,4 vol.
Virgile	Charles de la Rue, S. J.	Paris, 1682
Eutrope	Anne Dacier, fille de Tanneguy Lefebvre	Paris, 1683
Cicéron, Discours	Charles de Mérouville, S. J.	Paris, 1684, 3 vol.
Juvénal et Perse	Louis Desprez	Paris, 1684
Suétone	Augustin Babelon	Paris, 1684
Catulle, Tibulle et Properce	Philippe Dubois	Paris, 1685,2 vol.
Cicéron, Épîtres adfamiliares	Philibert Quartier	Paris, 1685
Pline l'ancien, Histoire naturelle	Jean Hardouin, S. J.	Paris, 1685,5 vol.
Stace	Claude Berault	Paris, 1685, 2 vol.
Prudence	Etienne Chamillard, S. J.	Paris, 1687
Apulée	Jules Fleury, chanoine de Chartres	Paris, 1688, 2 vol.
Cicéron, Ouvrages philosophiques	François L'Honoré, S. J.	Paris, 1689
Ovide	Daniel Crispin	Lyon, 1689,4 vol.
Horace	Louis Desprez	Paris, 1691,2 vol.
Pline l'ancien, Histoire naturelle	Jean Hardouin, S. J.	Paris, 1723, 3 vol. in fol. (nouv. édition)
Ausone	Jules Fleury ; Jean-Baptiste Souchay	Paris, 1730

Reception and influence

The Ad usum Delphini collection was referred to by E.T.A. Hoffmann in Lebensansichten des Katers Murr (1819).

„Sie sind, unterbrach ihn der Prinz, ein spaßhafter Mann.“ — Ganz und gar nicht, fuhr Kreisler fort, ich liebe zwar den Spaß, aber nur den schlechten, und der ist nun wieder nicht spaßhaft. Gegenwärtig wollt' ich gern nach Neapel gehen, und beim Molo einige gute Fischer- und Banditenlieder aufschreiben ad usum delphini.

The Ad usum Delphini collection was referred to by Edward Bulwer-Lytton in Devereux, Book IV (1829):

let me turn to Milord Bolingbroke, and ask him whether England can produce a scholar equal to Peter Huet, who in twenty years wrote notes to sixty-two volumes of Classics, for the sake of a prince who never read a line in one of them?" "We have some scholars," answered Bolingbroke; "but we certainly have no Huet. It is strange enough, but learning seems to me like a circle: it grows weaker the more it spreads. We now see many people capable of reading commentaries, but very few indeed capable of writing them."

by Honoré de Balzac III: Ève et David, later Les souffrances de l'inventeur, (1843).

History is of two kinds--there is the official history taught in schools, a lying compilation ad usum delphini; and there is the secret history which deals with the real causes of events--a scandalous chronicle.

There is a reference to the Delphin Classics in Part I, Chapter 5 of Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure (1895),, where young Jude, trying to educate himself by reading while delivering bread from a horse and cart,

"plunge[s] into the simpler passages from Caesar, Virgil, or Horace [. . .] The only copies he had been able to lay hands on were old Delphin editions, because they were superseded, and therefore cheap. But, bad for idle school-boys, it did so happen that they were passably good for him."

External Links

• PDFs of Ad Usum editions
• Encyclopaedia Britannica on Delphin Classics