In 1928, when the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) was finally completed after a little over seventy years, British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin began his toast with the remark that if he were lost on a deserted island, he would choose the OED for company because, “Our history, our novels, our
How long did it take to produce the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary?
The first edition of the OED, titled A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles, took 70 years to complete. In 1857, the Philological Society of London embarked on a quest to develop “a complete re-examination of the language from Anglo-Saxon times onward”.
How long did the first dictionary take to make?
Several book publishers got together and commissioned Johnson to compile a dictionary similar to the one created by the French Academy. In France, that effort took 40 scholars 40 years to complete.
When was the 1st Oxford dictionary published?
1884
Oxford English Dictionary
| Seven of the twenty volumes of the printed second edition of The Oxford English Dictionary (1989) | |
|---|---|
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press |
| Published | 1884–1928 (first edition) 1989 (second edition) Third edition in preparation |
How long did it take Dr Johnson to produce the first dictionary?
First published in 1755, this dictionary took Johnson and his small team of helpers nine years to compile, and was unsurpassed as a reference work for over a century until the publication of the Oxford English Dictionary in 1884.
How long did it take to produce and publish the complete Oxford English Dictionary from the time it was originally proposed?
It took 70 years to complete, but the Oxford English Dictionary was arguably history’s first massively-crowdsourced collation of English knowledge.
How long did it take to complete the English dictionary?
In 1928, when the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) was finally completed after a little over seventy years, British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin began his toast with the remark that if he were lost on a deserted island, he would choose the OED for company because, “Our history, our novels, our
How long did it take to build the Oxford dictionary?
Compiling the Oxford English Dictionary was a massive crowdsourced project that took more than 70 people working for over 70 years to complete.
Who wrote the 1st Oxford dictionary?
The project proceeded slowly after the Society’s first grand statement of purpose. Eventually, in 1879, the Society made an agreement with the Oxford University Press and James A. H. Murray to begin work on a New English Dictionary (as the Oxford English Dictionary was then known).
What is the 1st word in the dictionary?
Examples of aardvark
The discernment of this collection of attributes allows us to recognize the animal as an aardvark. It has got past aardvark, which is the first word in the dictionary.
Who published the 1st dictionary?
Robert Cawdrey’s
Robert Cawdrey’s Table Alphabeticall, published in 1604, was the first single-language English dictionary ever published. It lists approximately 3000 words, defining each one with a simple and brief description.
How many words were in the first Oxford English Dictionary?
400,000 words
It was 352 pages long, cost 12/6 and sold 4,000 copies. Eventually, the dictionary ran to ten volumes, and contained over 400,000 words and phrases.
Who edited the first Oxford English Dictionary?
The principal editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, James Murray was born the son of a tailor in Denholm, Scotland. At fourteen he began an intense regimen of self-education, showing intelligence and determination that later would see him through twenty-eight trying years of work on the Dictionary.
What is the first word in the Oxford dictionary?
Aardvark
“Aardvark” is commonly the first word listed in English dictionaries, because it begins with two A’s. This unique spelling is due to its direct adoption from Afrikaans, a Dutch-influenced language spoken in South Africa and the surrounding countries.
Who spent 10 years writing a dictionary?
In 1746 Johnson was approached by a group of publishers, including the celebrated William Strahan, about compiling a dictionary of the English language. This enormous, hugely ambitious work would take Johnson almost a decade to complete, and would be one of his most important legacies.
What is the longest word in the dictionary?
pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis
In that case, what’s the longest word in the English language dictionary? It’s pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis.
When was the first Oxford English Dictionary completed?
‘This year, whatever else it may be, is the Year of the Dictionary. ‘ So wrote Charles Onions in the Times of 19 April 1928, in an article celebrating the completion of the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary.
How was the first English dictionary produced?
The first book generally regarded as the first English dictionary was written as Robert Cawdrey, a schoolmaster and former Church of England clergyman, in 1604 Cawdrey made use of wordlists published earlier in educational texts, such as Richard Mulcaster’s Elementary (1582) and Edmund Coote’s English Schoole-maister (
How much does the complete Oxford English Dictionary cost?
The Oxford English Dictionary is available by subscription to institutions and individuals. We are pleased to offer annual individual OED subscriptions for $100 in the US or £100 for the Rest of the World. For this annual rate, you’ll have full unrestricted access to the OED Online – including quarterly updates.
How many 5 letter words are in the Oxford dictionary?
The Free Dictionary lists more than 158,000 words with five letters. The the Official Scrabble Dictionary (which allows some pretty obscure five-letter words), puts the number at about 9,000.
How long would it take to say every word in the dictionary?
In the Oxford English Dictionary, there are 171,476 words, putting it at 867,380 letters. I say it takes around half a second to say a 5 letter word. That puts the total at around 85,738 seconds, or 1,428 minutes. TL;DR: It would take a little less then 24 hours.