Tesoro de la lengva castellana, o española. Compvesto por el licenciado don Sebastian de Cobarruuias Orozco. Madrid : Por L. Sanchez, impressor del rey n.s, 1611. Fol. 504v. Classmark: O*.9.17(C)

This image shows the entry on “ingenio” included in Sebastián de Covarrubias’ Tesoro de la lengua castellana, o española (1611), the first monolingual dictionary in Spanish. Published in between the first and second parts of Don Quijote, the Tesoro offers a fascinating record of the currency and usage of many ingenuity-related expressions at the time of Cervantes’ writing.

After establishing the etymological links with the Latin ingenium and the notion of inborn nature, Covarrubias firstly defines ingenio as a natural force of the understanding with a wide range of applications, from intellectual endeavours to inventions and trickeries. This sense of ingenuity as a mental faculty was predominant at the time and is connected with the kind of accounts that physicians like Huarte de San Juan and other natural philosophers were producing. Secondly, having drawn an etymological connection with the word “ingeniero” (engineer), Covarrubias defines ingenio as any machine that has been skilfully invented, like the famous “artificio de Juanelo” -the water-lifting device designed by the Italian engineer Juanelo Turriano- or the “ingenio del açucar” -the sugarcane-processing machine used in the New World. Finally, according to Covarrubias ingenio stands for any product of our understanding that enables us to accomplish tasks which would be difficult to undertake by force. The entry also includes a definition of ingenioso, which is said to refer to whoever is endowed with a subtle and sharp ingenio.

Early modern dictionaries such as Covarrubias’ Tesoro constitute a wonderfully rich resource for the study of the language of ingenuity used in this period. Interestingly, at least three of the authors in charge of translating Don Quijote into other European vernaculars – Cesar Oudin, Lorenzo Franciosini and John Stevens- were also involved in the production of lexicographic materials.