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Oxford English Dictionary
“The aim of this dictionary is to present in
alphabetical series the words that have formed the English
vocabulary from the time of the earliest records down to the present
day, with all the relevant facts concerning their form,
sense-history, pronunciation, and etymology.”
Preface,
Oxford English Dictionary
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Brief History
Creation of the OED began in 1857.
James Murray was one of the driving forces
behind the completion of the OED, a project which depended on
hundreds of volunteer readers throughout the English-speaking world.
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Fun
Fact: A book by Simon Winchester called, “The Professor
and the Madman, A Tale of Murder, Insanity and the Making of the
Oxford English Dictionary,” brings to light the story of one of
the OED’s most prolific contributors. William Minor, an American
Civil War veteran and resident of the Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic
Asylum contributed over 10,000 words to the OED over a two decade
span. The book covers the history of Minor’s life and his work on
the OED, and the relationship which developed between James Murray
and William Minor. |
The first edition was
published serially in twelve volumes and was completed 71
years later in 1928. The dictionary was
out-of-date by the time it was finished and was reissued with a
supplement in 1933.
Four volume supplement to
OED published between 1972 and 1986.
2nd edition of the OED
appeared in 1989.
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UNLOCKING THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE
Author:
Burchfield, Robert (1923- )
Publisher: Hill and Wang (New York, 1991). 202 pp.
Type of
work: essays on linguistics
A
collection of essays celebrating the dynamic features of
English grammar and vocabulary and illustrating how
dictionaries become controversial records of linguistic
change. |
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Features
- Authoritative source on the evolution of
the English language—beginning in 1150
- Provides history, meaning, and
pronunciation of words
- Provides examples of words used in
context, from the first recorded occurrence to the present
day
- Depth of coverage (12 volumes plus
supplements)
- Defines half a million words and
phrases
- Contains 2.5 million illustrative
quotations
- Lists variant word spellings from
different periods of a word’s history
- Includes international words
incorporated into the English language
Words To Understand
Lexicography—the vocabulary of a particular
language; the writing or compiling of dictionaries
Etymology—The study of historical linguistic
change especially as applied to individual words; an account of the
history of a particular word
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Using the Oxford English Dictionary
Each definition in the OED contains
- The Identification
- The Etymology
- The Signification
(Meaning)
- The Illustrative Quotations
The Identification—
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Typical spelling of word
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Words believed to be obsolete
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The pronunciation
§
Part of speech, and specific uses of a word (i.e. in
music… in botany…)
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Status of a word—obsolete, archaic, colloquial,
dialectal, rare…
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Earliest form and appearance of word
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Note: earliest sense of a word appears first
Etymology—form history of a word (usually in
brackets [ ] )
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Derivation
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Teutonic (Germanic) history
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Latin, or other romance language adaptation
Signification—historical significance of word
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Historical explanations of word meanings and changes
to those meanings (in outline format beginning with numbers, then
letters)
Illustrative Quotations
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Illustrate the forms and uses of words showing the
earliest uses (first appearance of a word)
To
effectively read a word definition in the OED you must make use of
“The Key to the Pronunciation” and the “List of Abbreviations,
Signs, Etc.” at the beginning of each volume.
For more information see “General
Explanations” in Volume A, or visit
http://www.oed.com
Some of the material on this
page came from:
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