Experienced with both hornbooks and battledores, children graduated on to the modern concept of a small book. Early reading booklets or religious primers contained both the alphabet and increasingly complicated lists of alphabetized syllables along with selected excerpts from the Bible. Z is for Zeal (a kneeling figure with an open prayer book), or alternatively, a ‘Zany Jester’Īkin to John Bunyan’s introductory rhyme, many battledore’s contained the following admonition:Īs we arrive in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, a gradual shift can be witnessed, towards more secular topics for general reading instruction, and away from predominantly religious material. M is for Mitre (a form of religious head wear) The letter-word associations provide insight into eighteenth century religious and socio-cultural priorities, for instance: The battledore was a more complex type of horn book printed on thick paper, folded in three parts, with illustrations for each of the capital letters bordering the four sides. Such texts first appeared in the 1750s and were produced until the middle of the nineteenth century. This was the real birth of the ‘modern’ alphabet book. The wording printed on them varied greatly, but usually featured an alphabet, and, unlike the hornbook, entertainment was provided as well as instruction in the form of illustrations. The term was applied to the wooden or cardboard tablets which developed, again as devices for teaching children to read. Overtime, the ‘Hornbook’ was gradually replaced with another alphabet text, known as the ‘battledore.’ A battledore was a small, racket-like instrument, that was used for playing badminton. Armed with the letters of the alphabet from the hornbook, children encountered other early forms of reading materials. Origins of Fairy Tales from Around the WorldĪs referenced in this verse, it was an expectation of the period that ‘babes’ began as readers with knowledge of the alphabet.
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