ABC BOOK: Početnica za osnovne škole [A Primer for Elementary Schools].

Description A rare Croatian primer with basics of the ABC and short texts and poems, accompanied with decorative colour illustrations, was published on the eve of WWII with a royal arms on the cover. The book was written by a Dalmatia-born author of pedagogical books for children Ilija Dizdar (1877 —1929). The book, which was published in other versions from the 1920s on, was made an official ABC book for primary schools by the main office for schools of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia nine years after Dizdar’s death, on March 8, 1938. This is a rare version from the same year with a royal coat of arms on the cover. Because these ABC books were often disposed of after the use and especially during the German occupation in WWII as well as under the later Tito’s government, all the versions are rare. In the international institutions we could only find two issues of the book from 1929 (National and University Library of Ljubljana and National and University Library of Zagreb) and one issue from 1934 (Princeton University Library). We could not find any other institutional examples of our issue from 1938.  The book is in a near mint, unread condition.  References: Ivo PERIĆ, Dizdar, Ilja. Hrvatski biografski leksikon, 1993.