[11] The first essay towards a history of the Portuguese language, and an introduction to Portuguese orthography, were published in Lisbon at the time when Portugal was a Spanish province.--Duarte Nunez de Liaõ, the author of both works, was a statesman and magistrate. (_Desembargador da Camara da Supplicaçaõ._) The former is entitled _Origem da Lingoa Portugueza_, _Lisb._ 1606, in 8vo. It is dedicated to Philip III. king of Spain, who is, however, on this occasion merely addressed as _Dom Phelipe II. de Portugal_. In the preface the author states his other, but older work, (_Orthographia da Lingoa Portugueza_, Lisb. 1576, in 8vo.) to be the first of the kind. The Portuguese have, however, for two centuries laboured with as little success as the Germans, to introduce uniformity of orthography into their language. The convertible M and AÕ appear to have been so early selected to denote the French nasal tone which occurs in numerous final syllables, that Nunez de Liaõ found it necessary to acquiesce in the custom, according to which the same word might be very differently written, as _naçaõ_ or _naçam_, _naõ_ or _nam_, pronounced nearly as _nassaong_ and _naong_, with the French sound of _on_, _bon_. But it surely could not have been very difficult to dispossess the totally unnecessary and barbarous H in _hum_ and _huma_ (from the latin _unus_ and _una_) of the place it had assumed, as it is now banished from elegant Portuguese orthography. Trifles of this kind present more materials for reflection than a first view gives reason to expect. When the orthography of a country continues to be an object of reform, that nation is deficient in a certain degree of refinement, the attainment of which has either been missed, or the right pursuit of which is but just commenced. Indeed what necessity is there for the French, Italians, Spaniards and Portuguese, writing the same sound, occurring in the same word, in four different ways, as for example, _bataille_, _battaglia_, _batalla_, _batalha_? [12] Nothing could be more improper than to follow Du Cange, (Glossar. praef. § 34, sq.) in dividing the _vulgare idioma_ of the present inhabitants of the Pyrenean Peninsula into the _Castellanum_, _Limosinum_, and _Vasconicum_. [13] A particular account of the Limosin poetry, even in its last period, which is late enough to come into the division of time called the latter ages, does not belong to the history of modern poetry. It ought to be treated as the last part of the chivalrous poetry of the middle ages.--See the notices in Velasquez and Dieze, p. 45, and the still more instructive sketch of the history of Limosin poetry, in Eichhorn’s _Gesch. der Cult. u. Litt._ vol. i. p. 123.