hornbook

plural hornbooks

1. historicalA single page containing the alphabet, covered with a sheet of transparent horn, formerly used for teaching children to read.

   Yes, yes, he teaches boyes the Horne-Booke: […]

   c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i], page 136

   5 more examples

   HO′RNBOOK. n.ʃ. [horn and book] The firſt book of children, covered vvith horn to keep it unſoiled.

   [1755 April 15, Samuel Johnson, “HO′RNBOOK”, in A Dictionary of the English Language: […], volume I (A–K), London: […] J[ohn] and P[aul] Knapton; […], →OCLC, column 1

   By way of the hornbook Shakespeare would have learned to read, […]

   1913, Katharine Lee Bates, Lilla Weed, Shakespeare: Selective Bibliography and Biographical Notes, page 41

   Infants learned their letters from a hornbook, a square of wood shaped like a table-tennis bat on which were pasted the alphabet, syllables and the Lord's Prayer […]

   1999, Nigel Wheale, Writing and Society: Literacy, Print, and Politics in Britain, 1590-1660, page 43

   The hornbook is the first piece of instructional material specifically mentioned in American records.

   2002, Nila Banton Smith, American Reading Instruction, page 14

   Not only is it difficult to extract just the right doozy of an adjective out of the hornbook, but the maneuver can be performed at most twice in the course of an article or chapter.

   2008, Ben Yagoda, When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It, Crown, →ISBN, page 30

   Synonyms: battledore

2. lawA legal textbook that provides a basic overview of a particular area of law.