KURENAI : Kyoto University Researc

The Japanese studies of Andreas MOller ( 1630-1694)
account of how the syllabary actually works and finally even the lack of a unified Romanization
in his sources, Muller indeed fared rather well.
To sum up, Muller was working with the following set of sources:
• Durefs Thresor de l'histoire des langves de cest vnivers (1613 or 1619)
• the Meakensian manuscript, a copy of some Nanatsu iroha, at least in part with
Romanizations added
• a Chinese character dictionary of the Zihiii group, most likely Ylnyim zihiii
• Collado's Ars and Dictionarivm
Apart from a few minor mistakes, this set above is sufficient to explain all the materials
and the knowledge pertaining to Japanese found in "SJ". Corroborating evidence suggesting
that the latter two, i.e. YZ and Collado's works, were indeed available to Muller will be
given in the following two sections.
2. Other references to Japanese in the works of Muller
In the following we will survey in chronological order passages from various of Muller's
works containing references to either the Japanese language or script. Some of these will
provide us not only with further indicators that Collado's works were available to him, but
even with explicit proof.
2.1. Excerpta Manuscripti cujusdam Turcici (Colin 1665)
Probably the earliest reference to Japanese in Muller's work is found in note 50 (unpaginated)
to his Excerpta Manuscripti cujusdam Turcici (Excerpts from a certain Turkish
manuscript), where we read:
Prrepositio AB in sermone Turcica postremum locum occupat. Sic omnes
Particulre, quas secundum Linguarum nostrarum genium PRJE.POSITIONES
vocamus; Turcice rectius POSTPOSITIONES. Sed & Japones, Georgiani,
Ungari Finnonesq hujus generis particulas suis nominibus postponunt. V. vel.
Grammaticas Didac. ColladoJapon. Fr . . Mar. Magg. Georg. Alb. Moln. Ungar.
& Andr. Burcei Sveciam. Imprimis Japonica Lingua non pauca comrnunia habet
cum Turcica, qure in aliis LL. usu non veniunt.
(The preposition 'from' takes the last position in the Turkish language. In
this way all particles, which we call "prepositions" according to the nature of
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