Willem Canter

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Willem Canter in an engraving around 1700.

Willem Canter (also Wilhelm Canter ; * 1542 in Leeuwarden or Utrecht , † 1575 in Leuven ) was a Dutch philologist who achieved outstanding importance as one of the first Graecists in his country. His considerations on the philosophy of editions were of decisive influence until the 19th century.

Willem Canter came from a respected Frisian family who enabled him to live a prosperous life that he was to live as a private scholar without economic constraints . From Macropedius he was early in the classical languages taught and showed a high mastery. At the age of 12 he began his studies at the University of Leuven in 1554 , in 1560 he moved to the University of Paris , where he met Jean Dorat and Joseph Justus Scaliger . Travels took him to Germany and especially to Italy, where he met various scholars and sometimes made friends. Because of the Huguenot Wars and the associated unrest in Paris, he traveled to Italy in 1562, where he lived until 1563. After returning home, he settled in his home in the Netherlands, where he died of consumption at the age of 33 .

Canter's excellent knowledge of ancient Greek differed from most of the Dutch philologists of his time, most of whom were more oriented towards Latin studies . He was thus in the tradition of his French teachers. He used his language skills to translate various Greek works into Latin and thus make them accessible to a larger number of Dutch researchers. With Scaliger he edited editions of Lycophron from Chalkis and Athenaeus that were critical of the text ; Some of them only appeared posthumously: 1571 Euripides , 1579 Sophocles and 1580 Aeschylus . These editions were used for a long time and became the starting point for the later editions of these authors' works. He also dealt scientifically with the works, researched about metrics and determined the correspondence of the choral songs. In Latin Studies, Canter did research on Properz and Cicero in particular . As with his editions of Greek authors, he dealt with text-critical and philological issues in the notae and also took notes from older authors. He added an appendix to his translation of Greek speakers such as Aelius Aristides , Gorgias von Leontinoi , Andokides and Lysias into Latin. In this Ratio emendandi he presented his view of the edition philosophy. It was to be Canter's most important work. The font appeared for the first time in Basel in 1566 and was subsequently published as an independent font until the 19th century. It was used by Wilhelm Dindorf , Johan Nicolai Madvig and Eduard Fraenkel , for example . In his font, Canter defines criteria for describing handwriting and systematically defines the common mistakes in handwriting.

literature

personal data
SURNAME Canter, Willem
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Canter, Wilhelm; Canterus, Gulielmus (Latinized)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Dutch classical philologist
DATE OF BIRTH 1542
PLACE OF BIRTH Leeuwarden or Utrecht
DATE OF DEATH 1575
Place of death Lions