The Western Bank Library of the University of Sheffield in England has the largest collection of Comenius manuscripts outside of the Czech Republic, including much of his correspondence with individuals such as Samuel Hartlib. The State Archives in Poznań, Poland, also houses many manuscripts authored by Comenius. The National Museum in Prague has the largest collection of Comenius’s manuscripts, including many found in Leszno in the 19th century. Unfortunately, some of his unpublished manuscripts were lost in a fire in Leszno in 1654. Research on Comenius is hampered by the international scope of his work, which means that the original manuscripts are found in several locations. Instead, this article focuses on modern editions, especially collections, of his writings. It is not possible in this article to provide a complete bibliography of Comenius’s publications, much less all of the translations. The creation of the Czech Republic and the admission of the country to the European Union in the 1990s facilitated research on Comenius for scholars outside of central Europe. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) declared 1992 as the year of Comenius in honor of the quadricentennial of his birth. Much of the research on Comenius has been published in Czech, but literature in German and English is also considerable. Until the middle of the 20th century, Comenius was known primarily as a pedagogue, but the rediscovery of his pansophic writings, most notably De rerum humanarum emendatione consultatio catholica, launched a new appreciation for Comenius as a philosopher, social reformer, and peace activist. Comenius’s writings may have had as much impact in the 20th century as they did in his lifetime as his works were translated into several languages. Comenius was one of the first pedagogical theorists to apply Francis Bacon’s epistemology.
Scholars in many countries have proclaimed him the “father of modern education” because of his humanistic methods and advocacy of universal education. Comenius sought refuge in Amsterdam in 1656, where patrons published his collected pedagogical works under the title Opera didactica omnia. Tragically, many of his unpublished manuscripts were lost in the resulting fire. He returned to Leszno, Poland, in 1654, but, two years later, the city was destroyed during the First Northern War. In 1650, he was invited to set up a pansophic “school of play” in Transylvania, where he wrote his groundbreaking textbook Orbis pictus. Comenius accepted an offer from the Swedish Crown to produce new educational materials. The outbreak of war between Charles I and Parliament prevented those plans from maturing. After his early pedagogical works were published in Latin and English translation in the 1630s, he was invited to establish a school system for England.
Comenius began his career in Moravia as a pastor and teacher in a small Protestant church known as the Unity of the Brethren, but he was forced into exile in Poland because of religious persecution. Few modern scholars have mastered the scope and complexity of Comenius’s intellectual endeavors, and the literature on him and his work is daunting. During his lifetime, Comenius published more than 150 works in Czech, Latin, and German on such diverse topics as linguistics, pacifism, social justice, human development, cartography, and spirituality. He advocated a holistic approach to knowledge and ethics called Pansophy (universal wisdom), which was rooted in the conviction that people should work with nature rather than against it. Jan Amos Comenius (John Amos Comenius Johannes Amos Comenius Jana Amose Komenskeho Jan Amos Komenský ) gained international fame for his innovative teaching methods and proposals for comprehensive educational reform.
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