Adventuring in Dictionaries : New Studies in the History of Lexicography [1 ed.] 9781443826266, 9781443825764

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Adventuring in Dictionaries

Adventuring in Dictionaries: New Studies in the History of Lexicography

Edited by

John Considine

Adventuring in Dictionaries: New Studies in the History of Lexicography, Edited by John Considine This book first published 2010 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2010 by John Considine and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-2576-X, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-2576-4

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction ................................................................................................ ix The History of Lexicography John Considine Chapter One................................................................................................. 1 “For the Better Understanding of the Order of This Dictionarie, Peruse the Preface to the Reader”: Topics in the Outside Matter of French and English Dictionaries (1580–1673) Heberto Fernandez and Monique C. Cormier Chapter Two .............................................................................................. 14 Cawdrey’s Table Alphabeticall (1604) Reconsidered: Its Driving Force for Early English Lexicography Kusujiro Miyoshi Chapter Three ............................................................................................ 23 Henry Cockeram: The Social World of a Seventeenth-Century Lexicographer John Considine Chapter Four .............................................................................................. 45 L’apport de Nicot et Ménage au Tresor de Recherches et Antiquitez gauloises et françoises de Pierre Borel Antonella Amatuzzi Chapter Five .............................................................................................. 58 Collocations and the Philosophical Language of John Wilkins in William Lloyd’s Lexicography of Possibilities (“An Alphabetical Dictionary”, 1668) Fredric S F Dolezal Chapter Six ................................................................................................ 82 Dictionaries as Behavior Guides in Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century England Linda C. Mitchell

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Chapter Seven............................................................................................ 94 Words by Women, Words on Women in Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary of the English Language Giovanni Iamartino Chapter Eight........................................................................................... 126 Converting “this uncertain science into an art”: Innovation and Tradition in George Motherby’s A New Medical Dictionary, or, General repository of physic, 1775 Rod McConchie Chapter Nine............................................................................................ 149 Dessins et desseins: le rôle fondateur des ornements de l’Encyclopédie dans la tradition des dictionnaires français ornés. Thora Van Male Chapter Ten ............................................................................................. 164 The Growth of the English Etymological Dictionary Anatoly Liberman Chapter Eleven ........................................................................................ 187 Can you Adam and Eve it? Dictionaries of Rhyming Slang Julie Coleman Chapter Twelve ....................................................................................... 197 The Lost and Found in Richardson’s A new dictionary of the English language (1836–1837/1855): An Insight into the State of the Vocabulary Laura Pinnavaia Chapter Thirteen ...................................................................................... 212 “Not altogether treated as I should treat it now”: James Murray’s Early Editorial Decisions for the New English Dictionary Peter Gilliver Chapter Fourteen ..................................................................................... 238 Joost Halbertsma, Latin, and the Lexicon Frisicum Anne Dykstra

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Chapter Fifteen ........................................................................................ 256 Le parti pris de “la besogne des mots”: le « Dictionnaire critique » de Georges Bataille Laura Santone Chapter Sixteen ....................................................................................... 269 Edmund Peck and the Making of the Eskimo–English Dictionary: Myths of the Missionary Lexicographer Sylvia Brown Chapter Seventeen ................................................................................... 290 Legacies of the Early Modern English Dictionary Michael Adams Abbreviations .......................................................................................... 309 Bibliography ............................................................................................ 310 Contributors............................................................................................. 361 Index........................................................................................................ 366

INTRODUCTION THE HISTORY OF LEXICOGRAPHY JOHN CONSIDINE

1. “This is what adventuring in dictionaries means” The title of this book is taken from “The world of words” by Hugh MacDiarmid, a section of his long poem In memoriam James Joyce. In it, MacDiarmid has compared both human life and human language to “landscape,” before imagining a heroic journey through an Arctic landscape, in which rare words bristle menacingly: nunataks to the left, holes in the travellers’ kamiks, séracs ahead.1 The extended image climaxes in an exhilarated outburst: This is what adventuring in dictionaries means, All the abysses and altitudes of the mind of man, Every test and trial of the spirit, Among the debris of all past literature And raw material of all the literature to be. (MacDiarmid 1955/1994, 2:823)

Dictionaries meant a great deal to MacDiarmid (see e.g. Brewer 2010, 124). His son remembered how as a child “I eagerly thumbed through the hand-heavy dictionary in an attempt to catch this smoke-hazed figure out” and how this was “a game not to be won; the dictionary and he had established a rare accord of mutual esteem” (Grieve 1972, xii). MacDiarmid himself wrote in later life that “I wrote my early Scots lyrics straight out of the dictionary” (MacDiarmid 1959/1984, 223) and on another occasion that in writing them “I went to where the words were—to Jamieson’s Dictionary” (idem 1970/1984, 247). And in the first instalment of his 1

A nunatak is a rocky peak projecting through the ice; kamiks are a kind of boot; a sérac is a pillar of ice on a glacier. MacDiarmid took all three words from a novel by John Buchan, A prince of the captivity (Buchan 1933, 85 [nunatak and sérac]; 99 [kamik]), but that is another story.

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manifesto “A theory of Scots letters”, published in February 1923, he remarked brilliantly that “We have been enormously struck by the resemblance—the moral resemblance—between Jamieson’s Etymological Dictionary of the Scottish language and James Joyce’s Ulysses” (idem 1923/1984, 129). The dictionary, he continued, was charged with the comic linguistic force released in the novel: a Scots Ulysses would realize the potential already stored in Jamieson. He was not, then, using the word “adventuring” in a banal or patronizing sense. His argument was much more serious: that a dictionary is an Odyssean text, and that committed engagement with dictionaries is therefore the exploration of a vast range of human experience. Adventuring in dictionaries is arduous. In the end, it entails confronting everything that has been written (MacDiarmid’s vision was evidently of a comprehensive historical dictionary) and, more alarmingly, it also entails confronting the power of words to generate future texts—and these may, like Ulysses, be “prodigious, uncontrollable, and utterly at variance with conventional morality” (MacDiarmid 1923/1984, 129). An adventure is a journey into unfamiliar territory, like the Arctic landscape sketched in MacDiarmid’s poem. It is a journey which has a narrative quality, and in which, as in Ulysses and the Odyssey and all narratives, there are surprising turns. There is a famous story about the visitor to the Scriptorium in which MacDiarmid’s countryman James Murray was at work upon the Oxford English Dictionary.2 She was displeased and incredulous to find a word which she did not know on a recent page of the dictionary, and was not mollified by Murray’s pointing out that he worked all the time on words which he had never seen before (K. Murray 1977, 299–300). Murray, who perhaps understood lexicography as deeply as any human being ever has understood it, knew that dictionaries are full of— even constituted by—surprising turns. The story of the displeased visitor has another important feature. Although it is a story about lexicography, it is not quite a story about the making of dictionaries: the conversation between Murray and his visitor was in fact an interruption to his lexicographical work, one of the many interruptions which at one level he seems to have welcomed. The point of the story, then, is that it is not so much about a dictionary as about people reacting to a dictionary, and in particular that it is one of the many good stories in which Murray is the protagonist. Every adventure has a protagonist, a person doing the 2

“Countryman” in the sense that MacDiarmid and Murray came respectively from Langholm and Hawick, twenty-three miles apart by road. Both towns are in Scotland, near the English border, a fact which helped to shape both men’s thought: see MacDiarmid 1970/1984, 246, and K. Murray 1977, 12–13.

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adventuring: the phrase “adventuring in dictionaries” is one in which people are necessarily present.

2. Overview MacDiarmid’s phrase is meant to suggest the perspective of this book as a whole. The contributions to Adventuring in dictionaries are united by the argument, explicit or implicit, that the history of lexicography is not the history of a series of texts, reproducing each other and registering vocabulary in inhuman silence. It is, rather, a history of human activity: the activity of makers of dictionaries (including lexicographers, other contributors, and publishers), and that of users of dictionaries (including lexicographers again, and the other readers who tend greatly to outnumber them, and the considerable class of people who own dictionaries but do not read them).3 To be sure, there are times when the human element of the history of lexicography may temporarily be put to one side, as may be the case in some stages of a bibliographical or textual study, but such studies are purely ancillary to the telling of a human story. There is, for instance, an invaluable bibliography of editions of the polyglot dictionary of Ambrogio Calepino (Labarre 1975), but this work is invaluable precisely as a means to the end of understanding more about the people who had copies of Calepino in their hands. From it, one can move on, for instance, to unpack the story of the Portuguese Jesuits in sixteenth-century Japan who adapted an edition of the dictionary for the use of their pupils. Which pagan Latin authors had these young Japanese converts heard of? How far did the Latin they learned from Calepino go beyond what was needed to understand the liturgy? The recent work of Emi Kishimoto (2006, 2010) suggests answers to these human questions. It is, likewise, human questions with which the contributions to this volume engage. In the first chapter, Heberto Fernandez and Monique Cormier discuss the “outside matter” of the first bilingual French and English dictionaries, the pages in which lexicographers and publishers addressed their readers most explicitly. Their story begins with a teacher, Claudius Holyband (alias de Sainliens), and with the pedagogically-oriented prefaces in which he commented on the relationships of his dictionaries with his other books for learners of French, and commented on elements of his work such as his defining style. Holyband not only had readers to address, but also the patron to whom his Dictionarie French and English of 1593 was dedicated—and although the mechanics of dictionary patronage are not the 3

On dictionaries and the history of reading, see Adams 2010.

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concern of this chapter, the reference here to Holyband’s dealings with his patron is a reminder that among the people who engage with dictionaries are those who subsidize their publication, whether through a love of learning, a sense of noblesse oblige, or a belief that a given dictionary will promote a given agenda.4 The chapter continues with discussion of the outside matter of Cotgrave’s great dictionary, of Robert Sherwood’s English–French second part of the same, and of James Howell’s subsequent editions, in all of which a wider audience than Holyband’s language-learners is being addressed. The discussion of Howell’s adaptation of Etienne Pasquier’s Recherches de la France (1560) in one of his prefaces opens up the important theme of the international contexts of lexicographical work, and that of the relationship between dictionaries and other philological work. The dictionary-making process comes briefly to the fore in Howell’s preface to his second edition of Cotgrave–Sherwood (1660), as he claims that the printer asked “knowing persons” to write supplementary material in special interleaved copies of the 1650 edition, just as Edward Phillips had in 1658 claimed that his new dictionary was enriched by the contributions of specialist consultants. (The story of the making of another dictionary from an interleaved copy of a predecessor is told in Chapter Sixteen.) Fernandez and Cormier conclude by looking forward to the bilingual lexicography of Miège and Boyer, in which the influence of the Dictionnaire de l’académie française of 1694 becomes important (for the outside matter of these later bilingual dictionaries, see e.g. Cormier and Fernandez 2006). The second chapter, by Kusujiro Miyoshi, addresses a question in the history of the monolingual English dictionaries of the seventeenth century: how much did Robert Cawdrey’s successors really owe to his Table alphabeticall of 1604? Miyoshi concludes that Cawdrey’s first successor, John Bullokar, reproduced about three fifths of the Table in his English expositor of 1616, and that his second successor, Henry Cockeram, took over a high proportion of this Cawdrey-derived material in his English dictionarie of 1623, so that long after Cawdrey’s work had ceased to be republished under Cawdrey’s name, it was circulating under Bullokar’s and Cockeram’s. Editions of the English expositor continued to appear until the eighteenth century—and indeed, dictionaries circulate long after their publication—so that a significant proportion of the entries in Cawdrey’s 4

In fact, Holyband’s dedicatee, the eleventh Lord Zouche (for whom see Knafla 2004) was an intelligent man, who had just spent six years travelling in continental Europe and might therefore have been expected to be a patron, at least on a modest scale, of language learning. For a modern perspective on dictionary patronage, see Liberman 2010, xxii–xxiii.

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vade-mecum for the Jacobean reader of sermons and Scripture was still in the hands of the users of cheap dictionaries a century or more after its first publication. My own contribution to the book takes up a modus operandi from Fernandez and Cormier’s and a person from Miyoshi’s, reconstructing the life of Henry Cockeramʊabout which practically nothing was known to previous historiansʊfrom the outside matter of his dictionary. This includes not only Cockeram’s claim to gentle birth and his dedication of the dictionary to a relative, but also a set of liminary verses which help to locate Cockeram in a social context and perhaps in a specific pedagogical controversy in the provincial city in which he lived when the dictionary appeared. The clues provided by investigating Cockeram’s dedicatee show his career in the domestic service of a nobleman in Ireland after the writing of his dictionary: we should not project the image of the Murrayesque full-time professional lexicographer back into the early modern period. The fourth chapter, by Antonella Amatuzzi, examines another seventeenth-century text, Pierre Borel’s Tresor de recherches et antiquitez gauloises et françoises of 1655. This learned antiquarian work might be seen as half-way between a dictionary and an encyclopedia (as might, for instance, some of the dictionaries discussed by Linda Mitchell in Chapter Six). Among the four hundred primary and secondary sources on which it draws are the general French dictionary of Jean Nicot and the etymological dictionary of Gilles Ménage. These two sources are, as Amatuzzi shows, by no means pervasively present in Borel’s work: perhaps one entry in thirty (two hundred or so in a total of 6300), cites one or the other. But they are important as models; and the flexible use which Borel makes of them, abbreviating or supplementing as his material requires, exemplifies the interplay between his semi-encyclopedic work and that of earlier writers in a more purely lexicographical tradition. That interplay continued as Borel’s Trésor was used in the revision of Ménage’s dictionary which was published in 1694. Amatuzzi concludes with the point that the textual relationships she unpacks bear witness to the liveliness of lexicographical exchange in seventeenth-century France, and to the dynamism of the dictionary text. In Chapter Five, Fredric Dolezal examines the work of the English contemporaries of Borel’s whose place in lively intellectual exchange is most evident: John Wilkins and William Lloyd, respectively the leading author of the Essay towards a real character and a philosophical language of 1668, and the provider of “continual assistance” to Wilkins, most notably the compilation (partly from bilingual English–Latin dict-

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ionaries) of an “Alphabetical dictionary” to stand beside the “Philosophical tables” of the Essay. The philosophical language on which Wilkins and Lloyd worked had to analyse English lexical items rationally before providing them with equivalents. As Wilkins remarked, a verb such as set, taken together with all the phrasal verbs formed from it like set up, set down, and set out, may have more than a hundred senses; for his purposes, this meant that the concepts denoted by its various senses might have a great many different places in his system. Dolezal discusses Wilkins and Lloyd’s responses to this challenge, with particular attention to their lexicographical metalanguage and its implications, concluding with the argument that the “Alphabetical dictionary” is a “compendium of the many possibilities of lexicography” which from its publication invited its readers to take part in intellectual exchange. The physical bulk and excellent typography of the Essay sometimes tend to obscure the point of its title: that Wilkins and Lloyd really were essaying ideas, trying them out. The same kind of argument might be made for other dictionaries, as indeed is suggested by Peter Gilliver’s contribution to the present volume (Chapter Thirteen). Whereas Wilkins and Lloyd invited their readers to debate, the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century lexicographers and encyclopedists whose work is discussed in Linda Mitchell’s contribution often had less intellectual messages for their readers. For instance, the compiler or compilers of the Ladies dictionary published by John Dunton in 1694 packed it with an odd mixture of lexical material out of Blount’s Glossographia, cosmetic receipts, improving essays, and historical exempla (see Dunton 1694/2010); the woman reader who turned to it for advice would pick up a good deal of conduct-book material from it. Other dictionaries might have better-focused agendas, like Thomas Wilson’s fiercely protestant Christian dictionarie of 1612, or the spelling dictionary of 1766 which concludes with what purports to be a father’s letter to his daughter pleading with her to avoid grammatical solecisms. In many of these cases, the dictionary is in a double network of relationships, both with the other texts on which it draws or to which it gives material, and with the readers who may find its advice impressive or otherwise, the latter network being much harder to reconstruct than the former. Samuel Johnson’s rueful account of having been “desirous that every quotation should be useful to some other end than the illustration of a word” before he learned the practicalities of dictionary-making is cited by Mitchell, and leads forward to Chapter Seven, Giovanni Iamartino’s account of Johnson’s lexicographical treatment of women’s language and of words relating to women themselves. Women’s language (or at least

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language labelled as such by Johnson) in fact turns out to be a marginal presence in the dictionary, although an interesting one, a matter of three or four senses of words, founded on quotations from Pope and Swift. Words referring to women’s bodies, costume, station in life, relations with men, and so on, are far more numerous, and Iamartino separates these into thematic groups, each of which he analyses separately. The delicate job of eliciting the sexual politics of the Dictionary from the wording of definitions and the choice of quotations is as always complicated, as Iamartino points out, by the difficulty of distinguishing the lexicographer’s own attitudes from those of the society whose usage he reports. When Johnson writes that virago is “commonly used in detestation for an impudent turbulent woman,” does he endorse the detestation, and what is to be made of “impudent” and “turbulent”? A younger contemporary of Johnson’s, the medical lexicographer George Motherbyʊuncle of Robert Motherby, whose Scots–German Pocket dictionary of the Scottish idiom (1826; cf. McConchie 2009, 123– 124) would repay further studyʊis the subject of Roderick McConchie’s contribution. Motherby’s dictionary is to some extent, like Dunton’s Ladies dictionary, a compilation from printed sources, and McConchie samples its full range of sources (with particular attention to their recency) and examines their use in specific entries, concluding that Motherby “has to be seen as re-organising and prioritising medical knowledge for his own generation”, and that “his dictionary must be assessed in that light rather than simply dismissed as either plagiarised or derivative.” Like Miyoshi’s contribution before it in this volume or, for instance, Brown’s after it, McConchie’s discusses a dictionary as part of a longer traditionʊand one in which the redeployment of earlier material may be a contribution to the transmission of that material rather than a failure in originality (cf. Dolezal 2007, 5). Robert Motherby’s dictionary, indeed, was avowedly based on an earlier book (Picken 1818; see R. Motherby 1826, vi), but is a pioneering contribution to the bilingual lexicography of Scots. Chapter Nine, Thora van Male’s study of the ornamented initial letters in the Encyclopédie explores what she has called the iconophor: “an image whose first distinctive feature consists of the letter which begins the name of its referent” (van Male 2001, 41; see also eadem 2004). These images are widespread in French lexicography, as her absorbing book Art dico (2005) demonstrates: Adam, arches, arthropods and armour may decorate an A, as may the kiwi (aptéryx) and the rainbow (arc-en-ciel); zebras, zebus, and zodiacs take their place around a Z. The Encyclopédie, van Male proposes here, is the first work in the French lexicographical tradition to be ornamented with iconophors (A to I in volumes 1 to 7; J to

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Z in the Supplement), the work of the engraver Jean-Michel Baptiste Papillon. Her discussion of this witty and sometimes enigmatic feature of the Encyclopédie and its place in the Enlightenment project of the work as a whole ends with reproductions of four letters which defy ready decoding: private jokes of Papillon’s, or riddles awaiting solution? Anatoly Liberman’s account of the development of the English etymological dictionary from Minsheu to the present day weaves two strands together: a historian’s critical overview of a series of more or less successful etymological dictionaries, and a practising etymological lexicographer’s reflections on the work which is yet to be done in the field. The analytic method of Liberman’s dictionary-in-progress (the first volume of which is Liberman 2008), which reviews past discussions rather than merely stating its own conclusions, makes history and practice inseparable. Writing the etymology of dwell, for instance, does not call for an approach to the “congested perfection” of the entry in the Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology but might well call for an account of what Minsheu, Meric Casaubon, Skeat, H. C. Wyld, and many others (e.g. the sources listed at Liberman 2010, 551) had to say about it. One consequence of such an account is a nuanced sense of the place of the individual in a lexicographical tradition. For instance, in contrast with the eminent historian of lexicography whose study of Minsheu concluded that he “deserves recognition as a compiler” but “should be regarded as a scholarly poseur” (Schäfer 1973, 35), Liberman argues that “the history of English etymological lexicography cannot do without a respectful assessment of his dictionary” (see also Liberman 2009, 272). Chapter Eleven, Julie Coleman’s on dictionaries of rhyming slang, begins with the first notices of rhyming slang (as in Adam and Eve “believe”, plates of meat “feet”) from the mid-nineteenth century to dictionaries of First World War slang, and then moving on to its first freestanding dictionary, informally published in 1931 and 1932 for the use of customers of a London pub, and to its wide coverage in subsequent printed dictionaries: the numerous online wordlists of rhyming slang would be another story. The interest of these works, many of them lightweight in every sense, often lies not so much in the authenticity of the language they purport to register, as in their cultural role as souvenirs of a touristic London (or of England in general), or as affirmations of an identity overlapping with or developing from that of the cheeky Cockney with whom rhyming slang is often associated. Here, the senses of self of dictionary maker and dictionary buyer are strongly relevant to the story of dictionary publication.

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Laura Pinnavaia’s contribution turns to a major figure in nineteenthcentury English lexicography, Charles Richardson, whose New dictionary was published in book form in 1836–1837, having previously appeared in instalments as part of the serially-published Encyclopaedia metropolitana (1818–1845).5 The Encyclopaedia was a brainchild of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s, and it was he who had originally intended to compile the dictionary. This dictionary was not itself compiled on historical principles (Aarsleff 1967/1983, 251–252), but it anticipated the historical method of the Deutsches Wörterbuch and the Oxford English Dictionary in its dependence on chronologically ordered sequences of quotations: Coleridge’s influence on the latter was transmitted through Richardson’s New dictionary as well as through his own grandson Hartley Coleridge’s editorship of the dictionary project which was to become OED (see McKusick 1992, 4–23). An early review remarked that “in regard to Richardson’s vocabulary, we have seen it alleged that a large number of words are not to be found, which are contained in Johnson’s and Webster’s 5 Coleridge’s introduction to the Encyclopaedia metropolitana, “General introduction, or, A preliminary treatise on method”, was completed around 24 November 1817 (Coleridge 1788–1818/1995, 627), and is therefore sometimes dated to that year, which is then given as the year when the Encyclopaedia, and hence Richardson’s dictionary, began to be published. However, there seems to be no evidence of a separate printed publication of the “Treatise on method” in 1817 (pace Yeo 1991, 34), and the most authoritative modern edition of the “Treatise” (Coleridge ed. cit., 625) identifies it as having first been published in the first fascicle of the Encyclopaedia in 1818. This was advertised in advance as to be published on 1 January 1818 (see the advertisement reproduced in Coleridge, ed. cit., 577) but in fact appears only to have been published on 14 February 1818, when it was announced in The Times as “PUBLISHED THIS DAY”. So Richardson’s dictionary is not a work of 1817, pace Reddick (2009, 175; also Cowie 2009, 425), but of 1818 onwards, as is the whole of the Encyclopaedia. I have not seen copies of the original fascicles, each of which included material from each of the four sections of the encyclopedia, the last of which, the “Alphabetical” section, included Richardson’s dictionary. (The bound volumes of the Encyclopaedia redistribute this material, the “Alphabetical” section being in vols. 14–25 of the 25-volume edition). The advertisement of the second fascicle, “published a few days since”, in The Times of 13 May 1818 states that it includes “the usual portion of the … Alphabetical division, in which are the interesting articles Aeronautics, Ætna, Afghaunistaun, Africa, Agricultural Implements, and Albania; and a newly-formed English Lexicon, with the authorities chronologically arranged”. This suggests strongly that Richardson’s dictionary began to be published with this second fascicle, in May 1818. Instalments of the dictionary appear to have continued to be published in the fascicles of the Encyclopaedia until fascicle 58 in 1844 (advertised as “Just published” in The Times of 7 September), fascicle 59 of 1845 being a general index.

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Dictionaries” (North American review 1837, 202), and Pinnavaia investigates this question, asking how Richardson’s wordlist differs from Johnson’s; which words current since Johnson’s time Richardson might have included in the New dictionary; and what his motives were for selecting his wordlist. This chapter concludes with a reflection on the way in which Richardson’s work was a forerunner of OED, and here, the early reviewer quoted above was perhaps prescient: after a comparison of Richardson with Webster (1828), he writes that “We do not despair of a great dictionary of the English language, far preferable to either of those on which we have so freely remarked, but we do not wish it to appear before the two living authors have reaped a generous reward for their Herculean labors” (205). Chapter Thirteen, Peter Gilliver’s discussion of the editorial decisions which James Murray made and revised around the time of the publication of the first fascicles of what would become the Oxford English Dictionary, tells part of the story of that “great dictionary of the English language”. The examples of Richardson and Webster could give Murray little guidance in the very different lexicographical project which he conducted, and those of the Grimms and other Continental predecessors were likewise often insufficient. Murray had to formulate inclusion criteria for incompletely naturalized foreign words (e.g. acalepha); words only attested in other dictionaries (abannition); scientific and technical terms (adenoma); and words derived from proper nouns (Aberdonian). He also had to consider the treatment of words formed from productive combining elements like anthra-, of other families of derived forms (archbishopess, archbishopling …), and of grammatically tricky words such as abandoned, which is sometimes evidently a past participle, sometimes an adjective, and sometimes used in contexts which suggest that it could be analysed in either way. Finally, he had to confront the points at which the historical evidence appeared to be at odds with the logical sense-development of a given word, and the points at which the philological vocabulary of the 1870s and 1880s did not seem to include a name for a process which he wanted to identify. These challenges are discussed by Gilliver from the perspective of a current editor of OED and that of a historian of the dictionary; nearly all the examples mentioned above are illustrated with reproductions of Murray’s original slips in the OED archives. It was at the beginning of the dictionary that Murray was most often developing policy on the fly. But as Gilliver concludes, examination of later ranges of the dictionary may well turn up similar “inhomogeneities”: similar signs of the flexibility and responsiveness of Murray’s lexicographical thought.

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Anne Dykstra considers a very different nineteenth-century dictionary, the Lexicon Frisicum compiled up to the lemma FEER by Joost Hiddes Halbertsma, and published posthumously in 1872. Its metalanguage is Latin, by no means an obvious choice for a dictionary of a vernacular in the third quarter of the nineteenth century, even in the Low Countries, where a tradition of excellence in Latin was very strong, and continues to this day (IJsewijn 1990, 148–156; cf. also Waquet 1998/2001, 124–129). Dykstra discusses contemporary and more recent responses to Halbertsma’s use of Latin, with particular attention to the limited use of the language by the Grimms in the definitions of the first volumes of the Deutsches Wörterbuch, and the use of the vernacular by Matthias de Vries in that of the Woordenboek der Nederlandsche taal. He ends with the challenging question, what else could Halbertsma have done? Frisian words were of great interest to scholars in England and elsewhere who would have found editorial matter in Frisian or Dutch rather challenging; Halbertsma read English fluently, but was unhappy with his command of the written language; a defining language such as French or German (in both of which Halbertsma had written: see De Jong 2005, 53 and passim) would have created problems of its own.In the present day, as Jozef IJsewijn has justly remarked (1990, vii), The loss of Latin as the international academic means of communication was and is a heavy blow to all scholars and scientists who speak a minor language. As a native speaker of Dutch myself, I know the problem at firsthand. Latin put us all at the same level, since everybody had to learn it and, writing in Latin, one could never hurt the linguistic sensitivity of native speakers. Now, to be born in an English-speaking country is an immense privilege.

Halbertsma’s dilemma continues to be relevant. In Chapter Fifteen, Laura Santone discusses the “Dictionnaire critique” of Georges Bataille and others, a dictionary whose entries appeared, in analphabetic order, in 1929 and 1930 as a series of contributions to the short-lived review Documents: Doctrines, archéologie, beaux-arts, ethnographie (see Bataille et al. 1929–1930 in the bibliography of the present volume for a list of the entries). Documents was, despite its sober title, a Dionysian project which set out to present “a series of challenges to those disciplines that were implied by its rubric” (Ades et al. 2006, 14), and the “Dictionnaire critique” was no exception; it interrogated the “tasks of words” rather their banal meanings, through a wordlist which included cheminée d’usine “factory chimney” and Keaton (Buster). As Santone argues, an entry like that for œil “eye”, illustrated on a single opening by

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Dali’s Le sang est plus doux que le miel, a photograph of a disturbingly exophthalmic Joan Crawford, and the cover of a penny shocker in the series “L’œil de la police”, is much closer to Bataille’s own violent erotic novella L’histoire de l’œil (written the year before the entry) than to a respectable dictionary. The “Dictionnaire critique”, like Wilkins and Lloyd’s “Alphabetical dictionary”, came out of a sparkling intellectual milieu, self-consciously clever and innovative, investigating, to recall Fredric Dolezal’s words, “the possibilities of lexicography”. Sylvia Brown’s study of Edmund Peckʊthe founder of the first permanent mission on Baffin Island in the Canadian Arcticʊand the “myth of the missionary lexicographer” investigates the Eskimo–English dictionary of 1925 which is conventionally attributed to Peck. Working from Peck’s personal papers and from the original manuscript of the dictionary, which is written on the interleaves and in the margins of a copy of an Inuktitut–German dictionary compiled by earlier missionaries, Brown disentangles the story of its making, and that of Peck’s own language learning. Missionary lexicography is bound to depend regularly on the help of informants, but the range of contributors to what became known as Peck’s dictionary is particularly wide, and their contributions can be assessed with more precision than usual. The stereotype of the heroic solitary lexicographer dates back in English-language writing to Johnson and beyond; lonely and heroic as Peck’s evangelizing work may have been, his lexicographical work, such as it was (and Brown demonstrates that it was very limited), was by no means conducted in heroic solitude. The final chapter, by Michael Adams, discusses some of the legacies of what one might call a failed dictionary project, the Early Modern English dictionary imagined by William Craigie in 1919 and undertaken in two periods of activity at the University of Michigan in the twentieth century. The slips for the EMED were shipped in 1997 to Oxford (Brewer 2007, 76), where they are used in the editing of OED3, while the attractively decorated filing-cabinets which came with them add a note of gaiety to the open-plan office in which they are housed. But quite apart from the slips, Adams argues, the ideas developed by EMED editors had a significant impact on the Middle English Dictionary, and continue to contribute to the making of the Dictionary of American Regional English and the Dictionary of Old English. Moreover, parerga like the Michigan Early Modern English materials of 1975 and related projects like Tilley’s great dictionary of proverbs of 1950 are legacies of the EMED project as well: when it is seen as part of a network of dictionaries and associated publications, its achievement looks very much more robust than when it is seen in artificial isolation. The history of completed dictionaries, one

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might say, is only one part, and not always the most interesting, of the history of lexicographical activity and lexicographical thought.

3. Origins of the collection Scholarly work is by definition carried out in the awareness of its place in a tradition, and so every scholar has some sort of mental sketch of the historical background of her own work, scholarly lexicographers being no exception. But although a sense that dictionaries have a history must go back to antiquity, the formal written history of lexicography is comparatively recent. By the late seventeenth century, Daniel Georg Morhof’s Polyhistor, which set out to be a comprehensive guide to human learning, had chapters on ancient and recent dictionaries of ancient Greek (Morhof a1691/1708, 791–815). Accounts of the younger traditions of vernacular lexicography came later (e.g. Molbech 1827 and the more comprehensive Grimm 1854, cols. xix–xxvi). In the case of English, it was remarked as early as 1837 that “The history of English lexicography, … if it should fall into the right hands, might be wrought into a very curious and amusing book” (North American review 1837, 186), but the invitation appears not to have been taken up at once, and Henry Wheatley’s “Chronological notices of the dictionaries of the English language”, which appeared in the Transactions of the Philological Society in 1865, was a pioneering work. Wheatley was writing shortly after the inception of the Philological Society’s project for a new dictionary of English; thirty-five years later, James Murray, the chief editor of that dictionary, surveyed the “origins and development of English lexicography” in a public lecture at Oxford, the text of which was published (J. Murray 1900) and has become a classic. The milestone publications in the subsequent historiography of English-language lexicography have been Starnes and Noyes’s The English dictionary from Cawdrey to Johnson (1946), reissued with new prefatory material by Gabriele Stein (Stein 1991) and complemented by her The English dictionary before Cawdrey (1985); Hausmann, Reichmann, Wiegand, and Zgusta’s Wörterbücher / Dictionnaires / Dictionaries (1991), which for the first time offered a synchronic and diachronic survey of lexicography across the world; and the multi-authored Oxford history of English lexicography (Cowie 2009). The period between Starnes and Noyes’s English dictionary and Cowie’s Oxford history is one in which the history of lexicography has developed from its pioneering beginnings to a flourishing subdiscipline both of the study of dictionaries and their making (so, for instance, Sidney Landau’s widely used textbook Dictionaries: The art and craft of

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lexicography has a historical chapter) and of the history of the language sciences. A sign of the maturation of the subdiscipline was the organization by Julie Coleman in 2002 of the first International Conference on Historical Lexicography and Lexicology (ICHLL), which took place at the University of Leicester. It was intended as a successor to two roundtable meetings of the 1970s, which brought the editors of historical dictionaries together (papers from these meetings were published as Accademia della Crusca 1973 and Pijnenburg and Tollenaere 1980). The scope of ICHLL1 was, however, much wider than theirs, and a number of the papers which were presented at Leicester dealt with the history of dictionaries rather than with the current making of historical dictionaries— hence the title, Historical dictionaries and historical dictionary research, of a collection of articles based on some of those papers (Coleman and McDermott 2004). ICHLL2, which took place two years later in Gargnano, organized by Giovanni Iamartino, and ICHLL3, which took place in Leiden in 2006, organized by Marijke Mooijaart and Marijke van der Wal, both likewise welcomed presentations on the history of dictionaries, and books originating in those conferences included articles on the subject (Considine and Iamartino 2007, Mooijaart and van der Wal 2008). The seventeen chapters of this volume originate in presentations given at ICHLL4, which took place in Edmonton, Canada, in June 2008, supported by the University of Alberta and by a generous grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. Two companion volumes present articles developed from presentations which discussed current projects in historical lexicography and from presentations which discussed questions of historical lexicology (Considine 2010a, 2010b). The decision to offer three volumes all of which originate in the Edmonton conference has been taken with two ends in view: firstly, to make each volume as coherent as possible, and secondly, to ensure that contributors had the opportunity to develop their ideas as satisfying articles rather than simply writing up their presentations briefly for publication, as would have been necessary to keep a single-volume collection within bounds. Like other volumes with an ICHLL background, this is meant to be more than a proceedings volume (cf. Considine 2007, viii, and Wild 2008, 450).

CHAPTER ONE “FOR THE BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE ORDER OF THIS DICTIONARIE, PERUSE THE PREFACE TO THE READER”: TOPICS IN THE OUTSIDE MATTER OF FRENCH AND ENGLISH DICTIONARIES (1580–1673) HEBERTO FERNANDEZ AND MONIQUE C. CORMIER

1. Introduction For almost one hundred years, the works of Claudius Holyband and Randle Cotgrave (the latter expanded by Robert Sherwood and James Howell) dominated French and English bilingual lexicography. In this chapter, the subjects discussed by these lexicographers in the outside matter of their dictionaries are studied and compared to see what light they shed on the scope and compilation principles of each dictionary. The shift from Holyband’s pedagogical approach to Howell’s normative intention is also noted. The corpus—consulted via Early English Books Online—comprises Holyband’s Treasurie of the French tong (1580) and Dictionarie French and English (1593); the second edition of Cotgrave’s Dictionarie of the French and English tongues (1632), with Robert Sherwood’s added English–French part; and its three further editions revised by James Howell (1650, 1660, and 1673–1672).

2. Claudius Holyband’s Treasurie (1580) Claudius Holyband was a pioneer in the teaching of the French language in England during the second half of the sixteenth century. The monodirectional French–English dictionary entitled The treasurie of the

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French tong (1580) and the enlarged edition, A dictionary French and English (1593), are among his reference publications for teaching French, together with such manuals as The French Littelton (1566), De pronuntiatione linguae gallicae (1580), and A treatise for declining of verbes (1580).1 The front matter of The treasurie of the French tong comprises a title page, a dedication, and a preface. The title-page of the dictionary reads The Treasurie of the French tong: Teaching the waye to varie all sortes of Verbes: Enriched so plentifully with Wordes and Phrases (for the benefit of the studious in that language) as the like hath not before bin published ... For the better understanding of the order of this Dictionarie, peruse the Preface to the Reader.

It highlights the main features of the book, namely, a fuller treatment of verb conjugations and the inclusion of new words and phrases for students of French.2 Holyband also directs the reader to the preface “for the better understanding of the order of this Dictionarie”, in other words, for an explanation of the arrangement or structure of the work. By 1580, Holyband had produced a number of manuals for teaching French. He was a consummate teacher and had a clear didactic outlook when compiling the Treasurie in an attempt “to resolue thee [the reader] of euery ambiguitie that may rise in our [French] language”. Concerning the macro- and microstructures, Holyband claimed, first, to have “expounded all the harde wordes by diuers and sundrie examples” (on his use of examples, see Kibbee 1985) and, second, to have given the “theame and principall Tenses of all our most difficulte Verbes”. Verbs are listed in the infinitive, followed by the present indicative, the first perfect tense (“j’aimay, I loued”), the second perfect (“j’ay aimé, I have loued”), and the future tense (“j’aimeray, I shall or will loue”). In this way, according to Holyband, students would be able to conjugate any verb throughout all the moods and tenses because they derived from those presented in the dictionary. Holyband noted that he dealt more fully with verb conjugation in his Treatise for declining of verbes and that the dictionary, together with the Treatise and his French Littleton, formed a trilogy of references to help students become fluent in French. Before ending the preface with 1

On Holyband’s life and work, see Farrer 1908/1971; Lambley 1920, 134 ff.; Byrne 1953; Alston 1970a and 1970b; Anderson 1978, 26 ff.; Stein 1985, 245 ff.; Eccles 1986; and Cormier and Francoeur 2004. 2 According to Kibbee (1989, 68; 71), the Dictionarie French and English (Harrison 1571) contains some 10,500 entries and Holyband’s Treasurie some 17,500.

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some remarks on pronunciation and verb morphology, Holyband described his method of glossing, explaining that in some cases he used a periphrasis to gloss a headword, for lack of a suitable equivalent, but that such a way of glossing was preferable to giving a wrong equivalent: But some perchaunce, wil saye, that hee hathe not the proper exposition of many wordes, but only by circumlocution: whiche in deede I doe confesse: but whether it be not better to finde th’Interpretation of the Frenche by circumlocution, than by a false Englishing, as dydde those whiche brake the Ice before, as they doe terme it, let the indifferent, iudge thereof. (sig. ¶3r–v) 3

Metalexicographical topics prevail in the front matter of the Treasurie, where Holyband highlighted the fuller treatment of verbs and the additions to the macrostructure. As for the microstructure, he mentioned the use of examples to explain hard words and periphrases where he could provide no equivalent. Metalinguistic topics were limited to some remarks on pronunciation and verb morphology.

3. Claudius Holyband’s “faisceau de plusieurs mots, peu de sentences, et moins de proverbes” (1593) In 1593, Holyband published A dictionarie French and English, an enlarged edition of the Treasurieʊsome 20,500 entries, according to Kibbee (1989, 73)ʊwith an identical front matter (title page, dedication, and preface). The wording of the 1593 title page is similar to that of the Treasurie, but there is no mention of verb conjugation nor of additions to the macrostructure, even though it is an enlarged edition. Nevertheless, this compilation is also “for the benefite of the studious in that language [French]” (title-page), and the reader is likewise directed to the preface “[f]or the better understanding of the order of this dictionarie” (ibid.). The dedication to Edward la Zouche, eleventh Baron Zouche of Haryngworth (1556–1625; for him, see Knafla 2004), contains some biographical data. As a token of gratitude, Holyband offered his patron Lord Zouche “ce present faisceau de plusieurs mots, peu de sentences, et moins de proverbes icy semez et espars, en ce mien Dictionaire” (sig. A3r), a phrase that summarizes the contents of the dictionary. Further on, Holyband explained that his purpose was to contribute to “l’esclarcisse3

Here Holyband refers to the preface of the Dictionarie French and English (Harrison 1571), “qu’on a l’habitude d’attribuer à Lucas Harrison et que Holyband a ou bien produit lui-même ou bien copié sans scrupule” (Hausmann 1991, 2956).

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ment et facilité de nostre langue Françoise” (ibid.), which shows the didactic intention underlying the book. The preface is almost identical to that of the Treasurie. There are some changes in spelling and wording, and some examples were changed, but Holyband again conceived the dictionary as part of a set of reference works for teaching French: “that is, the French Littleton, or my sayd booke De Pronuntiatione, this Dictionarie, & my Treatise of Verbes” (sig. A4v). The remark about the use of periphrases in the microstructure was deleted in this preface. An important new feature in the 1593 dictionary is the indication of gender: “Finally, our learner shall knowe our three genders, thus: the Masculine gender is knowne by this letter, m: the Feminine by f: the Common of two, com” (ibid.). To sum up, the 1580 and 1593 dictionaries are structurally identical: a title page, followed by a dedication and a preface. The contents of the front matter texts are very similar too, except for the different dedications. As for the title page, the mention of what Holyband thought his innovation in 1580, namely, a fuller treatment of irregular verbs, was deleted in the 1593 edition; the mention of the “wordes and phrases” added in 1580 was also deleted. However, in the 1593 dedication, Holyband mentioned the inclusion of proverbs and maxims and, in the preface, gender marking. Both dictionaries were compiled from a didactic point of view, and the target public was students of French.

4. Robert Sherwood’s “ce mien petit labeur” (1632) The importance of Cotgrave’s dictionary of 1611 has been recognized by a number of scholars.4 Cotgrave’s “bundle of words”, as he calls it in the dedication, went through five editions, three of them during the author’s lifetime. The front matter comprises a title page, a dedication to William Cecil, second Earl of Exeter (1566–1640), a preface “Au favorable Lecteur François” by Jean de L’Oiseau de Tourval, and a paragraph “To the Reader” introducing the “Errata”. The back matter comprises a short French grammar, with a table of verb conjugations The preface by Tourval deals with the content of the dictionary and was discussed from a perspective similar to ours by Naïs (1968) and 4 The most comprehensive study of the sources of Cotgrave’s dictionary is that of Smalley (1948); other scholars who discuss the dictionary are Farrer (1908/1971, 85–95), Starnes (1937, 1015–1017), Naïs (1968), Anderson (1978, 30–39), P. M. Smith (1980), and Rickard (1983 and 1985). On Cotgrave’s life, see Eccles (1982, 26) and Leigh 2004a.

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Rickard (1983). 5 Cotgrave did not take a prescriptive approach, but was open to collecting words from any author; he included French regionalisms, and archaic and obscure words culled from a wide variety of books, probably because his purpose was to help the English read any kind of book written in French. The target public was therefore broader than that of Holyband’s dictionaries because the dictionary was destined for both English and French users, as shown in Tourval’s preface. The back matter contains a short French grammar, divided into twenty-two sections dealing with pronunciation and the parts of speech, entitled “Briefe Directions for such as desire to learne the French Tongue”, with “A Table of the Conjugations of perfect Verbes” inserted between pages four and five. In our discussion of the Holyband dictionaries, we saw that he included some rudiments of grammar, such as pronunciation, gender, and conjugation of irregular verbs. Cotgrave went further than Holyband and succinctly elaborated on those and other aspects of French. Moreover, Holyband designed his dictionary to be part of a set of equally important works for teaching French, while Cotgrave placed his grammatical synopsis at the end of the dictionary, which could mean that for him the lexicon was paramount, as Naïs (1968, 345) explains: “Tout se passe comme si l’auteur considérait qu’un dictionnaire (bien complet) suffit pour comprendre la langue; et, pour savoir la parler, il suffit d’y ajouter quelques rudiments de phonétique et de morphologie.” The grammar and table of verbs at the end of Cotgrave’s dictionary provide a fuller treatment of two features introduced by Holyband in the microstructure of his dictionary. The objective is still didactic, but while Holyband was a consummate teacher, Cotgrave was first and foremost a lexicographer. In 1632, the grammarian and language teacher Robert Sherwood (for him, see Leigh 2004b) turned Cotgrave’s work of 1611 into a bidirectional dictionary by adding an English–French part; the sources of this English– French compilation are discussed by Starnes (1937, 1018) and O’Connor (1990, 57–58). Sherwood built the English-French part upon the same structural pattern as Cotgrave 1611, with a front matter and a back matter. The 1632 French–English part is a reprint of 1611, with only minor changes; the title page states that to Cotgrave’s French–English dictionary “is also annexed a most copious Dictionarie, of the English set before the French by R.[obert] S.[herwood] L.[ondoner]”. Some changes in spelling appear in the dedication, the preface by Tourval, and the paragraph

5

Tourval was a friend of Cotgrave’s who, according to Lee (1904–1906, 101), was an able linguist and translator of King James’ books into French.

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introducing the errata. The French grammar in the back matter is identical to that of the 1611 edition. The front matter of Sherwood’s publication comprises a separate title page for the English–French part, a dedication, and a preface; the back matter comprises a section of remarks on English pronunciation, followed by verb conjugations and, finally, the errata. The purpose of the Holyband (1580, 1593) and Cotgrave (1611) dictionaries was to teach French, while Sherwood (1632) targeted a wider public, and the separate title page states that this dictionary was “[c]ompiled for the commoditie of all such as are desirous of both the Languages”. Sherwood’s dedication “[a]ux favorables Lecteurs François, Alemans, & autres” shows that the dictionary was not compiled only for English and French users. In other words, this part was compiled with a broader public in mind, a step further than Holyband (students of French) and Cotgrave (English and French publics). Sherwood called his compilation “ce mien petit labeur” (sig. )(2r), but stressed the comprehensiveness of the macrostructure: “je pense avoir comprins [sic] tous le [sic] mots, ou la plus grande partie, de la langue Angloise” (ibid.). Like Holyband’s, Sherwood’s main concerns were pronunciation and verb conjugation: “j’y ay mis à la fin, quelque courtes reigles, pour vous aider à prononcer icelle langue; & aussi tous les Verbes anomales, que j’ay peu amasser”, a reference to the “Adresses bien briesves pour aider aux Estrangers à prononcer la langue Angloise”, and the “Conjugaisons des verbes tant reguliers qu’irreguliers” in the back matter. The dedication is followed by the preface “To the English Reader”, where Sherwood explained the organization of the microstructure: “In giuing the French interpretation to the English words, I haue, for the most part, obserued to set downe first the Proper; then, the Translated and Metaphoricall” (sig. )(2v).6 For the first time, a lexicographer in the French and English tradition clearly explained the structure of his glosses. Sherwood (1632) closely followed the structure laid down by Cotgrave in the 1611 first edition: macro- and microstructural choices are explained in the front matter while grammatical information is in the back. Sherwood stressed that, with the inclusion of the English–French part, the dictionary would be useful to a wider public to learn both languages. Moreover, he explained something his predecessors had not: the order he followed in the microstructure, first giving the literal meaning, then the figurative and metaphorical.

6

Proper and translated mean “literal” and “figurative” respectively.

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5. James Howell’s “Newly Refin’d and Amplifi’d” Dictionary (1650, 1660, 1673-1672) 5.1. The Edition of 1650 The third edition of Cotgrave’s dictionary was published in 1650, with the “Animadversions and Supplements” of the Welsh man of letters James Howell (c. 1594–1666; for him, see Woolf 2004). Howell’s edition of Cotgrave–Sherwood (1632) contains several additions to the outside matter. The French–English part includes front matter comprising the title page, a new epistle dedicatory, a “French Grammar” preceded by a “Proeme”, remarks on French pronouns and adverbs, a dialogue, a section illustrating the advantages of the modernized French orthography, Cotgrave’s dedication, and Tourval’s preface. The English-French part, on the other hand, is almost identical to the previous edition of 1632, containing in the front matter a separate title page, a dedication, and Sherwood’s preface to the English reader, to which Howell added “A Caution to the Reader”. The back matter contains remarks on English pronunciation, verb conjugations, and a short English–French topical vocabulary. Howell deleted Cotgrave’s “To the Reader” paragraph and the “Errata”, moved the French grammar from the back matter to the front, and added four texts in this part: an epistle dedicatory, a dialogue, remarks on French pronouns and adverbs, and remarks on the French Academy’s modifications to French orthography. Howell attached a small topical vocabulary to the back matter of the English–French part and removed the Errata page. The deletion of the errata in both parts of the dictionary makes sense because this was a revised edition. Howell’s new epistle dedicatory was a six-page essay on the history of French which, according to Lambley (1920, 192), was “taken, without acknowledgement, from Pasquier’s Recherches”. Lambley refers to the work of a French lawyer and man of letters, Etienne Pasquier (1529– 1615), who in 1560 published the first book of his Recherches de la France, a work on French history and literature. We scanned this book trying to find specific proof of Howell’s borrowings from Pasquier. The epistle seems to consist of excerpts from Pasquier’s book; in fact, Howell’s quotation from Guillaume de Lorris’ Roman de la Rose (sig. a3r) can be found verbatim in chapter forty-six, book eight of Pasquier (1560/1996, 1653). Likewise, Howell notes that he borrowed two passages from “two of the most approved ancientest Authors in French … Geoffroy de Villardovin, Marshall of Champagne, and Hugues de Bersy, a Monke of Clugny” (sig. a3v), but actually the first passage comes from chapter three,

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book eight, and the second from chapter three, book seven, of Pasquier (1560–1621/1996, 1517 and 1387 respectively). Howell may not have borrowed his entire epistle from Pasquier, but he certainly consulted the Recherches. The epistle is dedicated to “the Nobility and Gentry of Great Britain That are desirous to speak French for their pleasure, and ornament” and to “all Marchant Adventurers as well English, as the worthy Company of Dutch here resident, or others to whom the said Language is necessary for commerce and Forren correspondence”. At the time of the first edition of Cotgrave’s dictionary in 1611, there was already an exchange of courtiers, diplomats, merchants, students, and travelers between England and France; Howell’s dedication is a step further in the process of targeting a wider audience. Howell understood that, for a dictionary to serve the pragmatic needs of merchants and travellers, he had to adopt the reforms introduced by the French Academy. As Naïs (1968, 346) points out, “Voilà un public auquel Cotgrave ne pensait sûrement pas, mais son existence même obligeait à distinguer les formes vieillies et littéraires, dont il n’avait que faire pour écrire ses lettres de commerce.” Language change and evolution, language as a living organism, the change in words and meanings, and the idea of a standard: these are the linguistic topics discussed in the epistle. Howell began by mentioning the changing character of all things: “Ther is no quality so incident to all earthly things as corruption and change.”7 And if everything changes, then so does language. Howell thought language change was the result of outside causes and new words entering a particular language and old ones dying: For Languages are like Lawes or Coines, which commonly receive some change at every fist [sc. shift?] of Princes: Or as slow Rivers by insensible alluvions take in and let out the waters that feed them, yet are they said to have still the same beds; So Languages by a regardles kind of adoption of some new words, and manumission of old, doe often vary, yet the whole bulke of the same speech keeps entire. (sig. a2v)

On the same page of the epistle, Howell continued to elaborate on the origin of French, and invoked the idea of language as a living organism that grows and decays: “Now, as all other things have their degrees of 7

Guy Miège used this phrase in a modified form in the preface to his New Dictionary French and English (1677, sig. A3r): “Change, the common Fate of Sublunary things, is of all others That of living Languages, which sometimes are in a flourishing, and sometimes in a declining condition.”

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growth, so languages have the like before they attain a perfection.” For example, Latin attained perfection in the times of Cicero and Sallust, but later “began to degenerat and decline very much, and out of her ruines sprang up the Italian, Spanish and French. The French language being set thus upon a Latin stock … hath receiv’d since sundry alterations, or habitudes.” Languages differ from one another, claimed Howell, due to the “humor” and “inclination” of the people who speak them (sig. a3r). On the next two pages, Howell developed these topics, giving the examples he copied from Pasquier; he also discussed word change and meaning variation. Towards the end of his preface, he commented on French dialects and modern French and introduced the idea of a standard: Touching the Modern French that is now spoken in the Kings Court, in the Courts of Parlement, and in the Universities of France, ther hath been lately a great competition which was the best; but by the learnedst and most indifferent persons it was adjudgd that the stile of the Kings Court was the smoothest and most elegant, because the other two did smell the one of Pedantery, the other of wrangling and Chiquanery. (sig. a4v)

Howell praised Cotgrave’s dictionary, but thought it needed updating, and therefore marked old words with the dagger symbol: The former work [Cotgrave’s] is not awhit lessend by this review, only som of those words that are now absolete, and held pedantic, forc’d or affected, are distinguished by this mark † from others that have now the vogue in the refined Court French, which I would not presume to do only of my self without the coadjutorship of a noble and knowing French gentleman. (ibid.)

Howell also praised Richelieu and the dictionary project which had been undertaken by the French Academy: Hee also had a privat place in Paris call’d L’Academie de beaux Esprits where 40 of the choisest wits of France used to meet every Munday to refine and garble the French language of all pedantic, and old words, as also of som superfluous consonants, and put such another Dictionary to light as Crusca in Italian; ther wanted not som instructions from thence towards this. (ibid.)

For Howell a refined dictionary meant one that reflected the changes which he believed were being introduced by the French Academy and that contained the “refined Court-French now current”. In this sense he foll-

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owed a prescriptive approach, contrary to Cotgrave’s openness to archaic and obscure words. Howell added a “Proeme” to the “French Grammar”, where he discussed the relationship between the lexicon and grammar. We saw that for Cotgrave, grammar was an appendix to the lexicon, whereas for Howell it was of utmost importance when learning a language: What Foundations are to materiall fabriques, the same is Grammar to a language, If the Foundation be not well layed, ‘twill be but a poor tottring superstructure; If grammaticall grounds go not before, ther is no language can be had in any perfection. … Grammar may be compared to the Feet or supporters, which the other two use to goe upon, and indeed all other Sciences, specially the knowledg of Languages. (sig. b1r)

And coming to his dictionary: Now, for a Dictionary, which contains the whole bulk of a Language, to go before the Grammar, is to make the Building precede the Basis: Therfore ‘twas held more consentaneous to reason and congruous to order, that the Grammar should be put here in the first place, for Art observes the method of Nature, to make us creep before we go: Moreover the exemplifying words and sentences in French are here English’d all along, for one will come with more facility to pronounce a word aright, when he carrieth the sence of it along with him. (ibid.)

The French grammar is that of Cotgrave (1632) with minor changes; for example, verb conjugation was placed at the beginning of the “Of a Verb” section (sig. b4r). The grammar is followed by a section explaining the usage of French pronouns and adverbs: “Of En and Y, Pas and Point” (sig. d1r). Afterwards, there comes a “Dialogue twixt Sylvander and Cloriman, consisting of some extraordinary and difficult criticall Phrases which are meer Gallicismes, and pure Idiomes of the French toung” (sigs. d1v–d2v); this dialogue illustrates “some peculiar phrases, and modes of speaking that are proper only to the French language”. The last text Howell added is a section where he contrasts two paragraphs in French, the second of which is written using the modernized orthography, the “refined French”; these are followed by the English version (sig. d2r). At the end of this section, Howell claims to have given “the Rudiments and chief fundamentalls of the French Toung” (ibid.) for the learner to better profit from the dictionary, and refers readers to Charles Maupas’ Grammaire et syntaxe françoise (1607) for more advanced studies. Cotgrave’s dedication and Tourval’s preface are reprinted from the 1632 edition with differences in spelling. In accordance with Howell’s

Topics in the Outside Matter of French and English Dictionaries

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prescriptive approach, the first page of entries is entitled “A Dictionarie of the French & English Tongues, Newly Refin’d and Amplifi’d” instead of “A Dictionarie of the French and English Tongues” as in previous editions. That Howell was concerned primarily with students of the French language can be seen in the amount of text added to the French–English part of the dictionary; in comparison, very little was added to the English– French part. There is a paragraph entitled “A Caution to the Reader” at the end of Sherwood’s preface to the English reader, where Howell says that errors were corrected and that “those French words which are obsolete, and out of use, are printed in a Roman Letter, to distinguish them from those words which are sterling and now current among the French Nation; all which are to be found in the Italic Letter” (sig. Xxxx4v). Therefore, he followed the same practice as in the first part, distinguishing old words from new ones. The back matter of the English-French part contains Sherwood’s synopsis of English grammar (pronunciation guide of English plus a list of verb conjugations). Howell added, “for the ease of the French Student, and the further advantage of his memory” (sig. Gg4v), a topical vocabulary of five hundred and six entries under thirteen headings. At the end (sig. Gg5v), there is a list of twenty words and phrases “derived from sounds and are peculiar onely to the French”, and a final note. Let us sum up Howell’s modifications to the 1632 Cotgrave–Sherwood dictionary. In the French–English part, he moved the grammar to the front and included a number of texts dealing with linguistic subjects, history of French, and grammatical issues. The dialogue exemplifies idiomatic French and shows Howell’s concern for the spoken language, as opposed to only reading French books, which was Cotgrave’s priority. In the English–French part, Howell included a topical vocabulary in accordance with his goal of producing a comprehensive work (grammar, dialogue, dictionary, topical vocabulary, etc.) for teaching both French and English to any user. Howell’s idea of a refined, standard French reveals a prescriptive approach and shows the influence of the French Academy on a bilingual dictionary for the first time.

5.2. The Editions of 1660 and 1673–1672 The fourth edition of Cotgrave’s dictionary appeared in 1660. Although the English–French part remains identical in structure and content to the 1650 edition, there are two changes in the front matter of the French–English part. The long title outlines the changes introduced in the 1650 edition plus new features of the 1660 edition, namely, Howell’s remarks and supplements, the distinction of archaisms, the grammar and

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dialogues, proverbs, the recognition of the Academy’s authority, and the expansion of the macrostructure: A French and English Dictionary … with Another in English and French …, with Supplements of many hundreds of words never before printed; with accurate castigations throughout the whole Work, and distinctions of the obsolete words from those that are now in use. Together, with a large Grammar, and a Dialogue consisting of all Gallicismes, with additions of the most usefull and significant Proverbs, with other refinements according to Cardinall Richeleiu’s late Academy.

The mention of the French Academy surely added prestige to the dictionary. For more advanced readers, Howell had in 1650 referred the reader to the grammar by Maupas, but the 1660 edition was presented as a complete manual of French useful to any public, including young students: “For the furtherance of young Learners, and the advantage of all others that endeavour to arrive to the most exact knowledge of the French Language”. There is also a “Postscript” at the end of the epistle dedicatory where Howell explained how the macrostructure was enlarged: the printer gave interleaved copies of the 1650 edition to “the most knowing persons, true Lovers of the French”, so that they could insert new words as they found them in speech or writing. Neologisms and terminology were also added: this Dictionary is enriched with many hundreds of words never before printed, amongst the rest those that are most usefull of the Mechanicks, as to the knowledge of trades, are included; as also other new invented terms, which the admired Monsieur Scudery, and other late Romancers, have so happily publisht in their printed volumes together with the additions of the most significant Proverbs, most refined Gallicismes, and other helps for the advantage of those that would arrive to the most exact knowledge of the French. (sig. a6v)

Howell stressed the quality and comprehensiveness of this edition, which he considered to be “as absolute as Riders and Holyokes for the Latin, Floreo with the deserving Torriano for the Italian, the French themselves being greater buyers of this Book, then of any Dictionary extant for their own Language, or our English” (ibid.). The other texts in the front matter have the same content as in the 1650 edition. After Howell’s death in 1666, a fifth and last edition of Cotgrave’s dictionary was published in 1673. The English–French part has a separate title page dated 1672. It was a reprint of the previous edition, with changes in layout.

Topics in the Outside Matter of French and English Dictionaries

13

6. Conclusion If we retrace our steps, we see that metalexicographical topics prevail in the front matter of Holyband (1580, 1593): the expansion of the word list, the use of examples to explain hard words, the method of glossing by periphrasis, the treatment of verb conjugations, and the indication of gender. Metalinguistic topics are limited to a few remarks on pronunciation and verb morphology. Cotgrave (1611) started off with written sources and compiled a dictionary that included French regionalisms, archaic and obscure words; he also included a brief French grammar and a table of verb conjugations, expanding two features introduced by Holyband. Sherwood (1632) followed Cotgrave’s pattern, but also explained the structure of the gloss in the preface. Afterwards, Howell added several texts to the French–English part that show his intention to produce a comprehensive work for learning both languages, although French was still the priority. Metalinguistic topics were more important to Howell, who discussed language change and evolution, and the concept of a prestige or standard language; as for the microstructure, he marked archaisms with the dagger or a change in font. Notice how the overall conception of the dictionary evolved from its being one part of a set of publications (Holyband) to its becoming a comprehensive tool for language learning (Howell). All these lexicographers mention their target public, gradually expanded from Holyband’s students of French, and Sherwood’s British, French and foreign readers, to Howell’s merchants and everyone interested in things French. But Howell’s aim was not only to teach and describe the language in use; he also promoted the standards set by the French Academy. This prescriptive approach was followed later by such lexicographers as Guy Miège and Abel Boyer.

CHAPTER TWO CAWDREY’S TABLE ALPHABETICALL (1604) RECONSIDERED: ITS DRIVING FORCE FOR EARLY ENGLISH LEXICOGRAPHY KUSUJIRO MIYOSHI

1. Introduction Among English dictionaries whose first editions were published in the seventeenth century, Robert Cawdrey’s Table Alphabeticall (1604), the first English dictionary, and John Bullokar’s English Expositor (1616), the second one, are in sharp contrast with each other in respect of their “length of life”. As Gabriele Stein (1991, xiv; xv–xxi) has pointed out, while the former ceased to be published thirteen years after its first edition, with the fourth edition (1617) as the last, the latter went through nineteen editions until 1775, meaning that it enjoyed more than one century and a half of “life”. In spite of this marked difference, what if the Table was a most indispensable reference work for Bullokar to compile his Expositor, and even exerted its strong influence on other English dictionaries via the Expositor? My presentation attempts to investigate this point, which is apparently yet to be clarified in the many statements made in the literature on the early history of English lexicography. As to Bullokar’s Expositor, De Witt Starnes and Gertrude Noyes outlined its contents in their renowned book, The English Dictionary from Cawdrey to Johnson 1604-1755 (1946), spending six pages on it. There they also expressed their view about how Cawdrey’s Table influenced the Expositor, which seems to have been widely accepted among the authorities until today. However, as far as Bullokar’s Expositor is concerned, Starnes and Noyes’s analysis is apparently mostly based on descriptions in its

Cawdrey’s Table Alphabeticall Reconsidered

15

introductory materials, conducting little examination of their relationship with the actuality of Bullokar’s usual practice in compiling the body of the dictionary. This practice of Starnes and Noyes’s even seems to have resulted in their mistaken perception of the fundamental difference between the Table and the Expositor. So, they became sceptical about Cawdrey’s strong influence on Bullokar, remarking (1946, 192) that “The Table Alphabeticall was ... a beginning and no more.” Actually, however, Bullokar incorporated well over half of the entrywords in the Table into his Expositor, quite frequently copying Cawdrey’s definitions as well. Furthermore, those definitions in the Expositor are also incorporated to a considerable extent into Henry Cockeram’s English Dictionarie (1623), the third English dictionary, which, according to Stein (1991, xxii–xxvi), went through twelve editions in forty-seven years until 1670. As to the order of my analysis in this presentation, I will, firstly, discuss a sampling method based on which a comparison between the Table and the Expositor is to be conducted (Section 2). Secondly, as a preparation for the following analysis, I will point out a misunderstanding about the nature of the Expositor which apparently prevails among the authorities (Section 3). Then, thirdly, Cawdrey’s influence on Bullokar will be examined in terms of their entry-words and definitions, respectively (Sections 4 and 5). And, fourthly, I will make a brief examination of Cawdrey’s indirect influence on Cockeram’s Dictionarie via the Expositor in respect of their definitions, whose purpose is also to provide an inference about the historical continuity of lexicographical practice (Section 6). At the end of this introductory section, before taking up the main subjects, I need to make some remarks here about one procedure to be adopted here. That is, it is an acknowledged fact among the authorities that Cawdrey and Bullokar both used a Latin–English bilingual dictionary, Thomas Thomas’s Dictionarium linguae latinae et anglicanae (1587?), as a reference book to compile their respective dictionaries. For this reason, when Bullokar and Cawdrey give the same definitions for the same entrywords, it is probable that Bullokar took them from Thomas’s Dictionarium, not from Cawdrey’s Table. However, it is still true that Bullokar perused the Table when compiling his Expositor, which is also widely acknowledged. Therefore, even if Bullokar actually referred to the Dictionarium when the three lexicographers gave the same definitions, there will be little problem in regarding Bullokar as having followed Cawdrey’s footsteps, and saying that Bullokar took such and such definitions from the Table.

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2. Formulating a Sampling Method In collating Cawdrey’s Table with its two sources, namely Thomas’s Dictionarium and Edmund Coote’s English school-master (1596), Starnes and Noyes (1946, 17–18) formulated a sampling method of analysing entries in the three books for words beginning with the nine letters I, L, M, N, O, P, R, S and T. This method seems to be reasonable and applicable to the comparison of most alphabetically-arranged dictionaries and glossaries, in that their selection of entries will fairly represent the whole of their bodies. However, Starnes and Noyes’s way of using the method was limited to presenting an overview of the three books, even without mentioning how many entries each of them has in these alphabetical ranges. In this presentation, trying to develop the method, I will apply it to a comparative analysis of Cawdrey’s Table and Bullokar’s Expositor. In performing this task, I want to indicate the fact here that there are 1,211 entries in the Table and 1,975 in the Expositor, respectively, which begin with the nine letters. These entries in the two dictionaries are to comprise the scope of my analysis hereafter.

3. How Bullokar Actually Treated Words of Foreign Origin and Obsolete and Archaic Words Before applying the sampling method discussed in the previous section, it will be appropriate to point out a misunderstanding which concerns the basic nature of the Table and the Expositor. This misunderstanding, being derived from the title page and introductory materials to the two dictionaries, is seemingly accepted by quite a few authorities. The difference between the dictionaries does not seem to be as clear-cut as has usually been thought. Noyes, following the title page to the Table, claimed in her paper “The first English dictionary: Cawdrey’s Table Alphabeticall” that the dictionary is of daily words, unlike others published in the seventeenth century: Whereas Bullokar, Cockeram, Blount and Phillips made their dictionaries storehouses of difficult and elegant words exclusively, Cawdrey’s interest, as expressed on his title page, was in “hard usual words”. (Noyes 1943, 600–601)

Three years after this remark, she, with Starnes, stated the following, this time based on the introductory materials to the Expositor:

Cawdrey’s Table Alphabeticall Reconsidered

17

Bullokar ... seems more sympathetic than Cawdrey to the custom English writers have of usurping “strange words” from foreign languages; and Bullokar emphasizes more than his predecessor the necessity of giving special attention to hard words of foreign origin and to “olde words growne out of use”. (Starnes and Noyes 1946, 21)

This passage is immediately followed by their decisive statement that “Thus The Expositor even more than A Table is a dictionary of ‘hard’ words” (ibid.). Therefore, Starnes and Noyes seem to have thought that Bullokar’s Expositor can be distinguished from Cawdrey’s Table in respect of its treatment of words of foreign origin and obsolete and archaic words. However, is their perspective actually in accord with the contents of the bodies of the two dictionaries? As to the point about words of foreign origin, Bullokar disregards many of these words in Cawdrey’s Table. Cawdrey actually treats this type of word, as Bullokar does. On the first page of the body of his Table, Cawdrey made these remarks about his abbreviated statements of etymological information: “(g. or gr.) standeth for Greeke. The French words have this (§) before them”. He applied the mark “g.” or “gr.” to 91 entry-words, and the mark “§” to 149 within the ranges sampled. Out of these, Bullokar deletes 23 entry-words marked with the “g.” and “gr.”, and 83 marked with the “§”. With regard to obsolete and archaic words, Bullokar treats a surprisingly small number of these words. In his explanatory notes to the Expositor, he states “Remember also that euery word marked with this marke * is an olde word, onely vsed of some ancient writers, and now growne out of vse” (sig. A4v). Bullokar only put the asterisk to 37 entrywords out of the 1,975, representing 1.87% of the ranges sampled. In this way, Bullokar’s treatment of the two types of words does not seem to be performed in a way which makes the Expositor clearly distinguishable from the Table. Starnes and Noyes’s related statements seem to suggest a potential pitfall in analyzing the two dictionaries based on their phrases in the title and their introductory materials. In the following two sections, which concern Cawdrey’s influence on Bullokar in terms of the selection of words and the ways of defining them, I will try to directly examine the contents of the bodies of the dictionaries, being careful not to be swayed by descriptions in their introductory materials, as well as in their title pages. As to Cawdrey’s apparently strange expression “hard usual words”, which caused Starnes and Noyes to misunderstand the nature of the Table, this seems to be closely related to his life; concerning this point, Sylvia

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Brown’s analysis (2001) and John Simpson’s (2007) provide highly suggestive information.

4. Cawdrey’s Influence on Bullokar: Entry-words When we examine entry-words in the Table and the Expositor from the alphabetical ranges identified in Section 2, the table below can be produced. In this table, the second and third columns show the numbers of entry-words in the Table and Expositor which begin with the respective letters; the fourth column shows the number of entry-words which the two dictionaries have in common in each range; and in the fifth and sixth columns, each number in the fourth column is converted into a percentage.

I L M N O P R S T Total

Table

Expositor

244 60 122 33 69 239 145 209 90 1211

402 121 208 55 117 394 195 334 149 1975

entrywords in common 153 30 78 19 42 146 89 116 51 724

% of entrywords in T 62.7 50.0 63.9 57.6 60.9 61.1 61.4 55.5 56.6 59.8

% of entrywords in E 38.1 24.8 37.5 34.5 35.9 37.1 45.6 34.7 34.2 36.7

Table 2.1: Entry-words in the Table and the Expositor Concerning entry-words in the Expositor, Starnes and Noyes (1946, 23) claimed that “many words defined by Cawdrey are omitted from the Expositor”. It is not clear what they meant by “many”. With regard to this point, the figures in the table above indicate that 59.8% of entry-words, or 724 out of the 1,211, in the Table are also listed in the Expositor, so the Expositor omits 40.2% (100% – 59.8%) of entry-words from the Table. However, at the same time, it is notable here that well more than half of entry-words in the Table are also seen in the Expositor. We might say that the entry-words which the Expositor takes in from the Table are “more many” in number than the entry-words whose number Starnes and Noyes indicated by the word “many”. As for the side of the Expositor, 36.7% of all entry-words within the ranges examined, or 724 out of the

Cawdrey’s Table Alphabeticall Reconsidered

19

1,975, are comprised of those borrowed from the Table. Besides, the table also shows that in each of the nine groups of entry-words, no less than 50% of entry-words in the Table are in common with those in the Expositor.

5. Cawdrey’s Influence on Bullokar: Definitions Referring to Bullokar’s definitions in his Expositor, Starnes and Noyes (1946, 22) remarked that “he ... contracted a debt to Cawdrey’s A Table Alphabeticall”. How much and in what way, then, does Bullokar owe Cawdrey in this respect? This seems to be another question to which an answer has not been given by any authority. Bullokar used Cawdrey’s definitions in two ways. The one is copying them verbatim or abbreviating them, and the other incorporating phrases in them into his own definitions, each of which I will discuss in this order. In his Expositor, Bullokar copied or abbreviated Cawdrey’s definitions in 10.8% of entries, or 131 out of the 1,211 in the Table, as in the following examples: laudable Table: worthie of praise Expositor: Worthie of praise symmetrie Table: a due proportion of one part with another Expositor: Due proportion of one part with another

Such instances are seen here and there throughout the whole of the Expositor. Specifically, we can find this type of definition in 24 entries in the range I, 4 in L, 14 in M, 5 in N, 12 in O, 25 in P, 14 in R, 22 in S, and 11 in the range T . Among the authorities, Bullokar’s definitions are often regarded as generally much longer and more satisfactory than Cawdrey’s. As to this point, Starnes and Noyes remarked the following, even criticizing Bullokar’s for being sometimes unnecessarily long: Bullokar’s definitions are often more detailed and generally more satisfactory than those of Cawdrey, though the doctor of Chichester [Bullokar] sometimes extends unduly his definitions, inserting from his medical lore or pseudo-science all sorts of curious information on animals, herbs, stones, and what not. (1946, 21)

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In the same way as Starnes and Noyes, Charles Barber (1976, 108) also claimed that “Bullokar’s definitions tend to be longer than Cawdrey’s; he still has many brief ones, but not infrequently runs up to fifty or a hundred words, and occasionally more”. This opinion of Barber’s is convincing, being followed by several concrete examples. However, as more than one out of ten definitions in the Expositor is taken from the Table as above, we should be careful not to stretch such an opinion. Besides, Bullokar’s definitions include much shorter ones than Cawdrey’s as the following: malediction Table: flaundring (sic), ill report, or backbiting, or cursing Expositor: A cursing

In addition to the practice of copying and abbreviating Cawdrey’s definitions, Bullokar also referred to Cawdrey’s definitions in 32.6% of entries, or 395 out of the 1,211 in the Table. That is, Bullokar’s definitions in the 395 entries of the Expositor include phrases which are seen in Cawdrey’s in their counterparts of the Table. They are like the following: impenetrable Table: that cannot be pierced, or entered into Expositor: So hard that it cannot be pierced monarchie Table: the rule of one prince alone Expositor: The rule of one Prince alone, or a countrey so governed

When coming to know Bullokar’s practice as shown above, we will hardly be able to admit claims that his way of defining entry-words was more innovative than Cawdrey’s when all that differs is the length of the definition. In this section, I analyzed Bullokar’s use of Cawdrey’s definitions. Bullokar used them in two ways: copying or abbreviating them, and incorporating them in his definitions. As to the former, he used Cawdrey’s definitions in 131 of the entries of the Expositor sampled here, and as to the latter, Bullokar referred to Cawdrey’s practice in defining words, when providing 395 entries in the same dictionary. This means that, on the whole, Bullokar’s definitions in 26.6% of entries in his Expositor are influenced by Cawdrey’s Table. As for the side of the Table, Cawdrey’s

Cawdrey’s Table Alphabeticall Reconsidered

21

definitions in 43.4% of entries, or 526 out of the 1,211, exerted influence on Bullokar’s Expositor.

6. From Cawdrey’s Table to Cockeram’s Dictionarie Here, I want to compare Bullokar’s Expositor and Cockeram’s Dictionary with respect to the definitions which Bullokar takes from Cawdrey. The result of this analysis will suggest how much of Cawdrey’s lexicographical technique influenced other dictionaries indirectly, via the Expositor. My analysis in the previous section revealed the fact that Bullokar copied or abbreviated Cawdrey’s definitions in 131 entries in the Expositor within the range sampled here. Out of the 131 entries, 121 have counterparts in Cockeram’s Dictionarie. What definitions, then, did Cockeram give in these entries? In the 121 entries, he defined their entrywords in these three ways: (1) copying or abbreviating Bullokar’s definitions in 102 entries; (2) incorporating phrases in the definitions into 14; (3) giving totally different definitions in 5. This means that in almost all of the entries—to be precise, in 116 (102+14) entries out of the 121— Cockeram, wittingly or unwittingly, introduced Cawdrey’s definitions into his Dictionarie through Bullokar’s Expositor. Especially, it is worthy of note that such definitions as the following were passed on from the Table to Cockeram’s Dictionarie via the Expositor, without being altered: peccaui: I have offended proselyte: A stranger conuerted to our religion transubstantiation: A changing of one substance into another Such definitions are conspicuous among others by Cawdrey, in that most of his definitions are quite short and synonymous with their entrywords. And, it may safely be said that in these definitions one aspect of the historical continuity of English lexicography is revealed in respect of its practice.

7. Conclusion There are two ways to analyse the historical dictionary; the one is investigating its innovativeness and the other its conservativeness or

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influence by its predecessors. In each case, we should be aware not to be swayed by the catch-phrases of and descriptions in the introductory materials to the dictionary. With this recognition in mind, I have, in this presentation, conducted an investigation of the influence of Cawdrey’s Table on Bullokar’s Expositor and Cockeram’s Dictionarie, diving into the bodies of the three dictionaries. And, through this investigation, the following points have become clarified: (1) Bullokar incorporates 59.8% of entry-words in the Table into his Expositor. (2) Bullokar is influenced by Cawdrey’s definitions in 43.4% of entries in the Table. (3) Out of 131 definitions which Bullokar copied or abbreviated Cawdrey’s in his Expositor, 121 exerted strong influence on Cockeram’s practice in his Dictionarie. These three points can be regarded as eloquently pointing out how greatly Cawdrey’s Table was influential throughout the first stage of early English lexicography; after Cockeram’s Dictionarie, its next stage began, the English monolingual etymological dictionary commencing to be compiled. Besides, the analysis in this paper may suggest the possibility that the Table exerted a further influence. That is, as pointed out at the beginning of this paper, Bullokar’s Expositor enjoyed more than one century and a half of life, being revised nineteen times. According to Noyes’s paper “Some interrelations of English dictionaries of the seventeenth century” (1939), the revisions until the 1707 edition, which was regarded as the final edition of the dictionary at Starnes and Noyes’ time, were largely confined to the increase of entry-words. If this is actually the case, Cawdrey’s Table, which ceased to be published in 1617, may have continued to indirectly influence other English dictionaries at least until 1707, or possibly until 1775, the year when the actual final edition of the Expositor was published, as seen in the case of Cockeram’s Dictionarie.

CHAPTER THREE HENRY COCKERAM: THE SOCIAL WORLD OF A SEVENTEENTHCENTURY LEXICOGRAPHER JOHN CONSIDINE

1. The obscurity of Henry Cockeram The names of the first three makers of free-standing general dictionaries of English are familiar: Robert Cawdrey in 1604, John Bullokar in 1616, and Henry Cockeram in 1623. The lives of the first two are likewise far from obscure. Sylvia Brown (2001) has explored Cawdrey’s background as a Puritan clergyman and its implications for his work on the Table alphabeticall, and there is a good notice of him in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Bately 2004b). Bullokar’s life and family context—his father William is well known as a pioneering grammarian and spelling reformer, and one of his sons, Blessed Thomas Bullokar, was martyred as a seminary priest—are likewise helpfully documented in the ODNB (Bately 2004a; Salmon 2004; McCann 2004). Much less, however, is known about Cockeram. All that his notice in the ODNB, by Joan Beal, reports about his life is this: In the dedication to Richard Boyle, earl of Cork, Cockeram claims to be “tied in double bonds of bloud and friendship” to a Sir William Hull. That Cockeram had some connection with Ireland is also suggested by the existence of an issue of the fifth edition of his English Dictionarie (1637), for Andrew Crooke and Thomas Allot, “to be sold at their shop neere the Castle-Bridge in Dublin”. The first edition is prefaced by dedicatory verses from six of Cockeram’s friends, one of whom is the playwright John Webster. We also learn from these dedicatory verses that Cockeram was a citizen of Exeter. He may have been the Henrye Cockram who married Elizabethe Strashley at Holy Trinity, Exeter, on 2 February 1613. (Beal 2004a)

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Beal assigns him floruit dates of 1623–1658, and these are inferred from the successive editions of the Dictionarie: he was flourishing when the first edition came out in 1623 (the liminary poems are evidently addressed to a living man), and Beal proposes that he was still flourishing when the eleventh edition appeared in 1658. The twelfth edition, of 1670, was reworked by the ejected minister Samuel Clarke, and this suggests that Cockeram was dead or incapacitated by that time. Starnes and Noyes (1946, 30) note substantial revisions in editions of the dictionary up to that of 1642, suggesting that Cockeram lived long enough to mark up a copy of the previous edition of the Dictionarie, that of 1639ʊthough since it is by no means evident that dictionaries can only be revised by their authors, even this date is open to question. It is in fact possible to discover more about Henry Cockeram than this. The following paper does not present all the events of his life, many of which are probably beyond recovery, but it places him in as rich a social context as possible. This will, I shall argue, suggest why Cockeram made a dictionary at all.

2. Evidence from the dedication of the Dictionarie In the dedication of his Dictionarie, Cockeram addresses Richard Boyle, first Earl of Cork, who at the time was fifty-seven years old, and extremely rich after many years of clever practice, sharp practice, and malpractice administering and investing in land in Ireland. Cockeram writes (sig. A3v) of his “ambition of being knowne vnto your Lordship” and his interest in offering “a more steady and particular duty” to him. Nobody had ever dedicated a book to Cork before, and he was never a significant patron of authors.1 What attracted Cockeram to him was “the assurance of your loue and fauours to that noble Gentleman, Sir William Hull, to whom as I am tied in double bonds of bloud and friendship, so, I am so much obliged vnto him, that I cannot deuise a better rent than to do you seruice” (ibid.). Sir William Hull is a minor figure in the history of Jacobean Ireland (for him, see Appleby 1989–1990, 79–87). He was a seafaring man, who had spent a couple of years as a pirate in the Mediterranean; having settled in Leamcon, on the coast of County Cork, where he first appears in 1601, he became deputy vice-admiral of the province of Munster, a post which gave him responsiblility for coastal defences. Leamcon thereafter became 1 Three books and a section of a fourth would be dedicated to him subsequently: see Williams 1962, 22.

Henry Cockeram

25

a nest of pirates, protected by Hull. In May 1621, William Hull, “captain in Ireland”, had been knighted at Theobalds, one of the king’s houses in England (Shaw 1906, 2:176). One of his connections with Henry Cockeram is that he had married Elizabeth Cockeram, the lexicographer’s sister, in Exeter in 1597.2 By 1622, Elizabeth had died, and in that year William married the earl of Cork’s sister-in-law. This explains why Henry Cockeram wanted to recommend himself to Lord Cork in 1623: Sir William Hull now made a link between the Cockerams and the Boyles, and distant as the connection was by some standardsʊCockeram’s former brother-in-law had now married Cork’s brother’s widowʊit was close enough to be significant by the rules of Jacobean dynastic politics (see Canny 1982, 43–59). None of the Cockerams had ever been so closely related to an earl before. William Hull almost certainly had a second connection with Henry Cockeram. In a document of 1623, Henry Cockeram of Exeter attempted to recover the sum of one hundred pounds which his father, Hugh Cockeram of Honiton, thirteen miles east of Exeter, had been owed by Sir Philip Sidney (see Eccles 1982, 25). Hugh had died in 1595, and his widow, Joan, had married one Henry Hull, but had never told him of the debt due to her first husband because he was so “profuse,” in the sense “lavish, extravagant”: she evidently feared that if the money were paid to her, he would spend it. By 1623, Henry Cockeram’s mother and stepfather were dead, and he could act on his own account to recover the money. There is no reason to believe that he was successful, but the suit is revealing, because it pinpoints a Henry Cockeram of Exeter who was a kinsman of the Hull family. There can be no doubt that this was Henry Cockeram the lexicographer. The marriage of Henry Hull of Exeter and Joanne Cockram of Honiton was licensed on 21 January 1596 (Vivian 1889, 11). The marriages of Henry Hull and Joan Cockeram in 1596 and of William Hull and Elizabeth Cockeram in 1597 were obviously connectedʊand in that case, the Henry Hull who married Joan Cockram can only have been William’s father, a merchant and shipowner, who became mayor of Exeter in 1605. He was a member of an old Devon family, the Hulls of Larkbeare (for them, see Appendix 2 at pages 42–44 below). Their house was on the boundary between the parishes of St Leonard’s and Holy Trinity on the edge of 2 See Lismore Papers 1886, 2:375, and details of other sources in Appendix 2 below. Elizabeth Cockeram’s name is rendered as Lockeshaw in the inaccurate pedigree in ffolliott 1958, 126, and this must result from the transcription of the form Cockerham in a seventeenth-century manuscript, in which ffolliott misread C as an L with a curving ascender, and the three minims of m as the three minims of w.

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seventeenth-century Exeter (see the map at the back of MacCaffrey 1958). If the Henry Cockram who was married in Holy Trinity Church in 1613 was a long-standing parishioner of that church, he must formerly have been a neighbour of the Hulls. Three other names can now be tentatively connected with Henry the lexicographer, one through the Sidneys and two through Honiton. Firstly, a John Cockeram had served Sir Henry Sidney as “receiver and paymaster,” appearing in that capacity in a record of 1569 (Eccles 1982, 25). Secondly, an Andreas Cokerhame was rector of Gittesham, just outside Honiton, from 16 May 1571 to his death on 6 December 1580 (Clergy of the Church of England Database, ID 95663).3 Thirdly, a John Cockram was licensed as the schoolmaster at Allhallows School, Honiton, on 24 July 1640 (Clergy of the Church of England Database, ID 95665). In 1623, as we have seen, Henry Cockeram could be described as “of Exeter”. However, he almost certainly left the city soon afterwards, to join Sir William Hull in Ireland. Among Lord Cork’s memoranda for December 1624 is the note “Lent Sir Wm Hulls brother in law Mr Cockeram that dedicated his book to me, iiijli” (Lismore Papers 1886, 2:145; cf. 247). The loan was made in “ready moneis” (ed. cit. 3:185), and therefore presumably in person, so Cockeram must have been in Ireland at the time. There is a further reference in the Lismore Papers of the earl of Cork to a Henry Cockram who was a steward of Thomas, Lord Beaumont of Swords in the county of Dublin, received monies for Beaumont before his master’s death on 8 February 1625 (for this date, see ed. cit. 2:105), and gave Lord Cork a receipt for these monies on 24 October 1628 (2:284). The editor of the Lismore Papers, A. B. Grosart, supposed Henry Cockram the steward to be identical with Henry Cockeram the lexicographer (ed. cit. 2:417), and this is plausible. In that case, Cockeram was “of Exeter” in 1623, moved to Ireland in 1623 or 1624, was in the service of Lord Beaumont of Swords before February 1625, and was still in Ireland in 1628. The four pounds which he borrowed from Lord Cork in 1624 was still unpaid in 1632, when Cork made the debt overʊ“4li from Mr cockram, Sir Wm Huls Kinseman, that dedicated a book vnto me”ʊto his cousin John Naylor of Gray’s Inn (ed. cit. 3:185). After that date, no Cockram or Cockeram appears in the Lismore Papers.

3

There is a variant account in Feltham 1793, 115, which has Andrew Cockram as rector of Honiton until 1598, and another in Hertford 1936, 401. Another Cockram of Gittesham was Thomas Cockram, yeoman, who does not appear from his will of 1612 (Prerogative Court of Canterbury, Prob/11/121) to have been a connection of Henry the lexicographer.

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3. “H. C. Gent.” and the gentry family of Cockeram As Beal observes, liminary verses in Cockeram’s Dictionarie identify him as “of Exeter” (see sections 4.2, 4.3, and 4.4 below), and the title page identifies him as “H. C. Gent.” If he was a gentleman, and of Exeter, one might expect Cockeram to have been registered in the heralds’ visitations of Devon, the county in which Exeter is located. These visitations were tours of particular counties by the heralds who registered and controlled the use of coats of arms, and the documents they generated were collections of the arms and pedigrees of all the gentry of a particular county, each pedigree being submitted by the head of an armigerous family. The major Devon visitation records are those of 1564 and 1620 (Visitation of Devon 1564/1881 and 1620/1872 respectively). A Cockeram family—its name is usually spelt Cockram—does indeed appear in 1620 (63); for a pedigree, see Appendix 1 at pages 38–41 below. The head of the family in 1620 was Humphrey Cockeram of Collumpton, i.e. of Hillersdon House in the parish of Cullompton, fourteen miles from Exeter and eleven miles from Honiton. Humphrey’s second marriage was into a well-connected family, the Yonges of Colyton, which is between Cullompton and Honiton (A. Skinner 1928, 484; for the Yonges, see Visitation of Devon 1620/1872, 326). But apart from him, no Cockerams are mentioned in the 1620 visitations as having married into other armigerous Devon families, and none appear in the 1564 visitations at all; nor did Thomas Westcote, himself a member of an old family, include them in the ample collection of Devonshire pedigrees which he compiled around 1630 (Westcote 1630/1845; for the Westcotes, see ibid. 305–7 and Visitation of Devon 1620/1872, 302–3). The Cockerams apparently bought Hillersdon from the Hillersdon family in the middle of the sixteenth century (Lysons and Lysons 1822, 129), and their first appearance as landowners in the Devonshire inquisitiones post mortem is upon the death in 1583 of Humphrey’s grandfather George (Fry 1906, 66); he was identified as “merchant” in a document of 1573 (Oliver 1840, 114). This suggests that the Cockerams were a newly arrived family, at the outer margins of the local gentry. In fact, the members of the family who matriculated at Oriel College, Oxford, in the reign of Elizabeth did so as the sons of a plebeian rather than a gentleman.4 4 Clark 1887, 145 (Humphrey); 189 (Martin); 257 (George). There was some flexibility in the social status which might be declared at matriculation (see S. Porter 1997, 51), but if Humphrey and Martin’s (and George’s?) father Philip had been unquestionably a gentleman, their declaration of plebeian status would have been decidedly odd.

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George Cockram was valued at thirty pounds in the lay subsidy of 1581, his son Philip at eight, and his second son David at five (Stoate 1988). His third son, Robert, was not living in the parish and was therefore not rated in the subsidy, having become a fellow of Oriel College, Oxford. He retained his fellowship for half a century, and was buried at Cullompton after making a will in which he left “the young schollers ... in the Grammar School of Collumpton my Cooper’s Dictionary, to be chayned in or to a deske there to remayne to posteritie” (Hertford 1936, 402). One other Cockram was living at Cullompton at the time, and his name was Henry; he was valued at three pounds. He is not mentioned in George’s will of 1582 (Prerogative Court of Canterbury, Prob/11/66), which makes detailed bequests to his son and heir Philip and his younger sons David and Thomas. He was therefore presumably not one of George’s nearest relations, but may have been a first or second cousin of his: he was a Cockram of Cullompton wealthy enough to be named in the subsidy returns, and it seems unlikely that two unrelated men with the same unusual name should have been among the richest people in such a small town. This Henry Cockeram, the only Henry Cockeram of Cullompton in the early modern records, is not to be identified with Henry the lexicographer, who, as we shall see, was of a younger generation. No Henry Cockeram appears in the Cockeram pedigree of 1620, where the only other living male is Humphrey’s thirteen-year-old son John. But this pedigree is a minimal list documenting Humphrey’s inheritance from his grandfather George via his father Philip. It omits Philip’s brothers David and Thomas, Humphrey’s brother Martin, and younger Cockerams such as David’s sons (for all these members of the family, see Appendix 1 below). The fact that no Henry Cockeram appears in the visitation pedigree is therefore not an argument against the lexicographer’s membership of the gentry family. A stronger argument is that there were other Cockerams in Devon besides the armigerous family at Cullompton. For instance, Henry Cockeram, son of John Cockeram, was christened in 1582 in Spreyton, on the edge of Dartmoor.5 Henry Cokram served as churchwarden of Witheridge, in central Devonshire, in 1622, and Henry Cockeram, perhaps his son, in 1646. It was probably the latter whose name is on a Witheridge document of 1641 as “Henry Cockerham”; since he put his mark to it rather than signing it, he may have been illiterate or at least unused to

5

Christening record retrieved 10 June 2008 from parish register of St Michael’s Church, Spreyton, as entered into the International Genealogical Index.

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writing.6 However, Cockeram the lexicographer was described in his dictionary as “of Exeter,” not of Witheridge, at just the time that the elder Henry Cokram of Witheridge was serving as churchwarden, so the two are not to be identified. Moreover, the lexicographer’s claim to be a gentleman can only have been a claim to be a member of the Cockeram family of Cullompton, because this was the only Cockeram family whose members claimed gentility. He must nevertheless have been a poor cousin to the head of the family, and not even a very close one: the Cockerams of Cullompton regularly named their children after each other, but they named none of them Henry until the 1660s.7 By 1623 the lexicographer was “of Exeter,” and not of Cullompton, and his father had been of Honiton, so he was neither a close cousin nor a very near neighbour. The only local record known to me which might apply to Henry the lexicographer is the one mentioned by Beal, of the marriage of Henrye Cockram to Elizabethe Strashley at Holy Trinity, Exeter, on 2 February 1613. The Strashleys or Streshleys were another family on the lower margins of the gentry of Devon, recorded in the visitations as marrying into several armigerous families, but not given their own pedigree. There is no record of a Henry Cockeram’s matriculating at Oxford or Cambridge. In order to understand more about Henry Cockeram the lexicographer, we must turn to the liminary verses of his Dictionarie.

4. Evidence from the liminary verses of the Dictionarie The liminary veses in Cockeram’s Dictionarie are evidence of a closely knit social circle, to which Cockeram belonged.

4.1 Sir Nicholas Smith (1575–1622) The first, the acrostic “To his very good friend, Master Henry Cockeram, on his Vocabulary”, is by Sir Nicholas Smith, the purchaser of Larkbeare from the Hull family, identified not only as “Eques Auratus,” in other words “knight,” but also as “Encomiastes Posthumus,” which demonstrates that at least the first gathering of the Dictionarie was printed after Smith’s death on 4 November 1622. Sir Nicholas was the son of Sir 6

Witheridge 2000–2006, appendix 1, section “Church wardens”; ibid. chapter “Genealogy related lists,” section “1641 protestation return”. 7 Hertford (1936, 402) remarks of the lexicographer that “from investigations made there seems a strong possibility that he was connected with the Cullompton branch of the family,” suggesting that none of the records he had seen names him as a member of the family.

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George Smith, mayor of Exeter on three occasions; he was born in 1575, matriculated at Exeter College, Oxford, in 1590 (Foster 1891, 1377, entry 23), became a student of Lincoln’s Inn in 1595, and was one of the ample crop of knights dubbed by James I on his coronation day. The Smiths had made some good marriages: Sir Nicholas himself married a knight’s daughter, of an old though declining family; his sister Elizabeth married Sir Thomas Monke of Powderidge (her son George Monck would be created Duke of Albemarle); and his half-sister Grace married Bevil Grenville, grandson of the heroic Sir Richard Grenville of the Revenge (Visitation of Devon 1620/1872, 265; Lorigan 2004). Sir Nicholas had smart literary connections as well as these dynastic ones. A poem addressed to him by Sir John Roe circulated among the satires of Donne (Keynes 1973, 207). Another, “To the admirably witty, and excellently learned Sir Nicholas Smith, Knight, of Lorkbeare neere Exeter, my ancient friend”, was published in the Quodlibets of Robert Hayman, who had been his exact contemporary at Exeter College and a year below him at Lincoln’s Inn (Hayman 1628, 14). As Smith’s “very good friend” Cockeram appears, just as he did as William Hull’s brother-in-law, with connections to the leading families of the city of Exeter, and most strikingly to the current owners of Larkbeare as well as the previous ones. Smith’s connections also extended, like Cockeram’s own, into the gentry of Devonshire.

4.2 John Ford (1586–1639 or later) The second of the liminary verses in the Dictionarie, inscribed “To my industrious friend ... Mr. HENRY COCKRAM of EXETER”, is by “A friend and louer of thy paines, IOHN FORD.” This writer is universally identified as John Ford the dramatist (see Stock et al. 1991, 346–347). Ford was, like Cockeram, a member of a south Devonshire gentry family (Visitation of Devon 1620/1872, 108). He was born in 1586, and appears at Exeter College in 1601 and the Middle Temple in 1602 (Neill 2004). The Fords lived at Ilsington, thirteen miles south-west of Exeter, but Cockeram and Ford also had closer geographical connections. Ford’s great-uncle Sir John Popham owned the manors of Madford and Hemyock, half a dozen miles from Honiton and a mile or two further from Cullompton (Lysons and Lysons 1822, 250–272); Sir Nicholas Smith’s mother was, incidentally, the heir of a Madford landowner (Radcliffe 1901). Moreover, one of Ford’s early compositions was the pseudonymous Funerall elegye in memory of the late virtuous master William Peeter of Whipton neere Exetour, published anonymously in 1612, and Whipton is just a mile or

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two outside Exeter, on the road which goes to Cullompton (William Peter’s mother was from Bovey Tracey, a couple of miles’ walk from Ilsington).8 Ford was the only writer of liminary verses in Cockeram’s Dictionarie to comment on its Devonshire background: his poem begins Borne in the West? liue there? so far fro[m] Court? Fro[m] Oxford, Cambridge, London? yet report (Now in these daies of Eloquence) such change Of words? vnknown? vntaught? tis new & strange.

The lines seem patronizing until one thinks of Ford as a Devonshire man himself, after which perhaps there is a slightly defiant quality to them.

4.3 Thomas Spicer (1591–c.1625) The third of the liminary verses, “on this Verball of his esteemed friend, Master Henry Cockeram of Exeter”, is signed by Thomas Spicer, another member of the overlapping circles of the south-east Devon gentry and the Exeter municipal élite. The Spicers were an old Exeter family, two of whom had served as mayors of the city in the previous generation: Nicholas Spicer in 1592 and 1603, and Thomas Spicer in 1593 (Visitation of Devon 1620/1872, 273; MacCaffrey 1958, 288). The latter’s daughter Grace married Sir Nicholas Smith’s old friend Robert Hayman the poet (Galloway 1967, 82; W. Barker 2004). The Thomas Spicer who would have been writing liminary verses in 1623 was baptised in 1591.9 His elder brother Nicholas was the head of the family in 1620, and his younger brother Richard, to whom Hayman addressed a poem in his Quodlibets, calling him “my louing and kind Kinsman” (1628, 17), was at that time identified in the family’s visitation pedigree as “phesician to the Duke of Lennox” (for him, see Foster 1891, 1399 entry 30). Thomas’s occupation is not given in the pedigree, but it can be guessed: in the year 1623–1624, a number of citizens of Exeter were reported as having taken their children away from the solitary established grammar school in Exeter, the High School as it was called, to be taught by “one Thomas Spicer” instead;

8 For the Peter family, see Visitation of Devon 1620, 210, and Abrams 2002; for Ford’s elegy, see Monsarrat 2002 and Vickers 2002, 263–301. 9 Thomas Spicer, son of Christopher Spicer, was baptized at St Martin’s, Exeter, 22 October 1591, according to the record transcribed in the International Genealogical Index.

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Spicer died a couple of years later.10 Thomas Spicer’s being a schoolmaster would explain the odd, pedantic, Latinate form verbal for “dictionary,” attested in OED only from this text and a slightly earlier experiment in English hexameters.

4.4 Bartholomew Hore (fl. 1623) Spicer’s liminary poem was followed by one “on this Vocabulary of his good friend, Master Henry Cockeram of Exeter”, signed by Bartholomew Hore, evidently a cadet of the well-established family of Hore of Rushford near Chagford, seventeen miles west of Exeter and about seven miles from the Fords at Ilsington.11 He is probably to be identified with the Bartholomew Hore who signed a letter in support of Thomas Spicer during the Exeter schooling controversy of 1623–1624 (HMC Exeter 1916, 145).

4.5 John Day (1573/4–1638?) The fifth liminary poem, “To my very good friend, Master Cockeram, Author of this worke,” is signed by John Day, and Day is not a Devonshire gentry surname or one associated with the city of Exeterʊhence, while Ford, Spicer, and Hore all mentioned Exeter in the titles of their verses, Day did not. A John Day, son of the printer of that name, became a fellow of Oriel College ten years into Robert Cockram’s long fellowship and four years before Martin Cockram the future vicar matriculated; in 1622, he resigned his fellowship after making his second unsuccessful attempt to become provost of the college, and retired to a living in Suffolk (Catto 2004). Another literary John Dayʊnot, as far as can be ascertained, a connection of John Day of Orielʊis likelier to be the author: John Day the playwright, author of The blind beggar of Bednall-Green and The isle of gulls (Parr 2004). There is a striking connection between Day and the Cockeram family: in 1599, he and William Haughton wrote a melodrama of murder and haunting called Cox of Collumpton. The magician Simon Forman saw a performance, and left a note of the plot (Pitcher 1994), but the play itself is lost. There is only one Cullompton, the one in Devon, and it is a small wool town, prosperous in the sixteenth century but by no 10

HMC Exeter 145, 157–1588; the latter is a testimony of 25 October 1630 which refers to Spicer as having died “about 5 or 6 yeres ago”; cf. MacCaffrey 1958, 120 note 17. 11 There is no notice of a Bartholomew Hore in the main pedigree of the family (Visitation of Devon 1620, 156–157), but the daughter of a Bartholomew Hore of Rushford married the head of the Hilman family (ibid. 151).

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means famous: the story on which the play is based seems to have left no other trace. How did news from Cullompton come to John Day at the beginning of his career? It is very tempting to suppose that the answer is related to his later claim of friendship with a cadet of a Cullompton family. A further temptation would be to wonder whether, since no Coxes show up in seventeenth-century Cullompton parish registers, the name of the haunted family, Cox, was suggested to Day by the name Cockram.

4.6 John Webster (c1579–1638?) After Day’s poem comes one by John Webster, another writer with no Devonshire connection. Webster only wrote three other liminary poems: one addressed to Anthony Munday in 1602, the year in which he was collaborating with Munday on the lost play Caesar’s fall; one prefixed to Stephen Harrison’s Arches of triumph in 1603 together with a poem by Dekker, with whom he had just been collaborating on the lost or partially lost plays Lady Jane and Christmas comes but once a year; and one prefixed to Thomas Heywood’s Apology for actors in 1612, the year in which he and Heywood both worked on the volume of elegies A monumental column (see Webster a1638/1927, 3:259–265). Webster had been four years senior to Ford at the Middle Temple. They both made contributions to the anthology Sir Thomas Overbury’s wife in 1614–15, Ford wrote liminary verses for Webster’s Duchess of Malfi in 1623, and they would both collaborate again in 1624 on the lost play Keep the widow waking; bearing in mind that all Webster’s other liminary poems were written for current collaborators of his, it seems likely enough that Ford led Webster to write a poem for Cockeram’s Dictionarie. In that case, there is no good reason to suppose that Webster had any personal acquaintance with Cockeram. The heading of Webster’s poem, “To his industrious friend, Master Henry Cockeram,” imitates Ford’s “To my industrious friend ... Mr. HENRY COCKRAM of EXETER”, and so the word friend as used by Webster may be merely formulaic, despite its reiteration at the close of the poem; it certainly contrasts with Smith’s and Day’s “very good friend,” Spicer’s “esteemed friend,” and Hore’s “good friend.”

4.7 John Crugge or Crudge (fl. 1623) The last of the liminary verses in the Dictionarie, “To his worthily respected friend, Master Henry Cockeram”, returns to a warmer style of introduction and to the milieu of the élite families of Exeter, being signed by “Iohn Crugge.” The Crugge or Crudge family had risen and fallen

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rather abruptly in the sixteenth century: in 1521, two of its members paid one tenth the entire subsidy of the city (and were therefore at least supposed to have ten per cent of the total wealth of Exeter in their hands), but ten years later, much of the family property had been sold off, and the family neither played an important part in Exeter affairs thereafter nor featured in the visitation records of 1564 nor those of 1620 (Hoskins 1956, 7; 10–11). A John Crudge was buried at Cullompton on 1 March 1628, but the name is not so rare as to make identification with the verse-writer irresistible.

5. Cockeram and his dictionary in their local context The prelims of Cockeram’s dictionary place him squarely in a clearly defined social context. The people who called him a friend were for the most part members of Devonshire gentry families or leading Exeter civic ones. He might be a poor cousin of one of the less grand armigerous families of south-east Devon, but he was a gentleman. The dedication of the book refers to kinship and friendship with a cadet of another armigerous south Devonshire family, the son of a mayor of Exeter. Of the seven liminary poems which follow, three are by relatives of sixteenthcentury mayors of Exeter (Smith, Spicer, Crugge), and two more are by other members of the south Devonshire gentry (Ford, Hore). Three are by professional writers with London careers: one of these, Ford, was also a member of the south Devonshire gentry and another, Day, had a longstanding personal interest in Cullompton; the odd one out, Webster, was a colleague of Ford’s. Of the friends of Cockeram’s whose dates of birth can be ascertained, the eldest was born in 1573/4 and the youngest in 1591, and that suggests his own generation, as does the fact that his sister’s marriage license was dated 1597. Cockeram was very probably born in the 1570s or 1580s, and so he was middle-aged when his dictionary was published in 1623. Why was a middle-aged cadet of a gentry family in a provincial town interested in making a dictionary? It was clearly not a learned exercise, for like Cawdrey’s and Bullokar’s, Cockeram’s little dictionary is not a learned production. The title-page identifies it as for “Ladies and Gentlewomen, young Schollers, Clarkes, Merchants, as also Strangers of any Nation”. Ladies and gentlewomen are mentioned on Cawdrey’s title page and in Bullokar’s introduction, but Cockeram was the first lexicographer in the hard-word tradition to identify “young Schollers” as the second of his target audiences, and his doing so is surely significant.

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The seminal predecessor of the English monolingual dictionary was of course Coote’s Englishe schoole-maister (1596). Cawdrey emphasizes in the preface to his Table alphabeticall that he had been a schoolmaster himself, dedicating it to members of the Harrington family, one of whom “was my scholler ... when I taught the Grammer schoole at Okeham in the County of Rutland” (sig. A2v). Like other ejected ministers, he probably supported himself by more teaching after being deprived of his benefice in 1586.12 So it was that he had a manuscript wordlist in the first place, “long ago ... gathered by me” and so it was that it was sent to the printer after being “lately augmented by my sonne Thomas, who now is Schoolemaister in London” (sig. A2r). Bullokar likewise was prosecuted for being an unlicensed schoolmaster, and he likewise had compiled his wordlist long before sending it to the printer. It seems very reasonable to think of Cockeram’s dictionary as a schoolbook, and to think of Cockeram as a schoolmaster. This helps in particular to explain the third section of the Dictionarie, a series of classified lists of Greek and Roman deities and the like: this innovation in the nascent English dictionary tradition smells very strongly of the schoolroom. Cockeram was in that case a particular kind of schoolmaster: like Cawdrey and Bullokar, he did not have a university degree, and did not teach at one of the great schools like Westminster, which had long pedagogical traditions and a strong emphasis on the use of the Latin language as a medium for teaching. In fact, the dictionaries of Cawdrey, Bullokar, and Cockeram can be compared with another class of innovative small books in which the English language was registered and explored, the Anglo–Latin phraseologies of the early and middle seventeenth century, which helped boys understand how to translate English phrases and idioms into good idiomatic Latin. These too were often printed from well-used manuscript versions, and those which attended most closely to English were regularly the work of masters in provincial schools of the second rank: with the heavily Latinate Westminster Phrases can be compared the vernacular-oriented work of John Clarke of Lincoln, compiler of guides to phrases and proverbs, and his pupil William Walker of Louth, author of a famous guide to the so-called particles of English. If Cockeram’s Dictionarie was originally a pedagogical compilation, the fruit of years spent as a schoolmaster, his teaching career can be placed with some precision in the life of the city. The authors of liminary poems agree that he was an Exeter man, so he need not be associated with the little grammar school at Cullompton to which his kinsman Thomas Cockram 12

I owe this point to Sylvia Brown.

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bequeathed his copy of Cooper’s dictionary. If he was a teacher, it was in Exeter. In 1623, there was only one school in the city, the High School, overseen by the dean and chapter of Exeter Cathedral. Its master was William Perriman, who had been there for twenty years, and was said, in the words of the petition signed by Bartholomew Hore, to be given to “crewell and tirannical whippinge,” which led some of his charges to refuse “ever to goe to schoole to him, chusinge rather to hange themselves, drowne themselves, cut theire owne throats or otherwise murder or mischiefe themselves” (HMC Exeter 145). Some parents sent their children to schools in the country rather than subject them to Perriman, but others “did put theire children to schoole to one Thomas Spicer, where for the most part they profitted more in one quarter of a yeare then they did in Two yeares at the said Perriman’s Schoole” (ibid.). The debate over the future of schooling in Exeter went on for some years, the leading citizens tending to argue for the establishment of a second school in the city, and the dean and chapter (and Perriman himself) arguing that this would simply damage the good work being done in the existing one. If Cockeram was a teacher, it was in Exeter, and if he was a teacher in Exeter, his friendship with Hore and Spicer makes it clear that he was not on Perriman’s side in this civic quarrel. In that case he was teaching either as a freelance or in association with Spicer. And in that case, the Dictionarie may have served a double purpose in Cockeram’s life. On the one hand, it gave him a symbolic gift to offer to his very grand new marriage connection, the earl of Cork. But on the other, it was a demonstration that the best pedagogical work in Exeter was not being done by William Perriman; on the contrary, it could be associated with Thomas Spicer and at least one of his allies. This latter point helps to explain why all the liminary verses vanished from editions of Cockeram’s dictionary after the first. They located the book in its original milieu, and aligned its maker with one side in a division in 1620s Exeter. As soon as the Dictionarie was taken up by the London market and reprinted, the complex and allusive statement of its social origins which was provided by the liminary verses—the network of clues to Cockeram’s place in the Devonshire gentry and to his place in Exeter civic politics—could be stripped out. Moreover, Cockeram’s move to Ireland made his old Exeter connections much less important than they had been. The social contexts of Cockeram’s dictionary helped to shape it, even though they ceased to be acknowledged after the first edition. Provincial networks of study and discussion like the loosely defined group in Lincolnshire to which Clarke and Walker belonged were an important part

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of the intellectual life of seventeenth-century England, and dozens of them could be sketched, for instance that centred on the Harrington family of Combe in Warwickshire, to which Robert Cawdrey expressed his indebtedness and by which Philemon Holland, another schoolmaster (and lexicographer), was patronized. The intellectual worlds of Lincolnshire or Exeter or Combe House were important, but they were inevitably not as rich and sophisticated as those of the more famous centres. Spicer and Hore both emphasized that the words Cockeram registered were farfetched, and this was not simply a reference to the miles of travel between Exeter and the universities and metropolis. More even than Cawdrey and Bullokar, Cockeram liked to register very rare words, a number of which appear to be his own coinages. There is something clumsy and also elaborate about his taste in vocabulary. It might be associated with the aesthetic to which historians of architecture in seventeenth-century England have (following Summerson 1954, 97–105) given the name artisan mannerism: scrolly, ambitious, a little heavy-handed. This is not surprising in a dictionary written both to impress a rich and unbookish dedicatee and to show off the talents of a provincial schoolmaster.

6. Conclusion The new information about Henry Cockeram which has been presented in this article can be summed up as follows. He was a peripheral member of a minor gentry family, the Cockerams of Cullompton in Devon; his father, Hugh Cockeram of Honiton, had had dealings with the Sidney family, by which he was owed a significant sum of money. Born in the 1570s or 1580s, Henry the lexicographer was by 1623 identified as a citizen of Exeter, where he probably occupied himself as a schoolmaster. His social circle included members of local bourgeois and gentry families, including the playwright John Ford; through Ford, he had some connection with John Webster; he may have been long acquainted with the playwright John Day. In 1597, his sister Elizabeth married one William Hull, who made a career for himself in Ireland, was knighted, and became a connection of the earl of Cork. Soon after his dictionary was published, Cockeram went to Ireland. He made himself known to Lord Cork in 1624, and borrowed some money from him, which he had difficulty in repaying. He was probably employed around 1625 as steward to Lord Beaumont of Swords. The date of his death is not known, but a document of 1632 suggests that he was still alive in that year.

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Appendix 1: The Cockrams of Cullompton Based on Cullompton Parish register entries for seventeenth-century baptisms and burials (Cullompton a1699); the sixteenth-century registers are lost.

GEORGE (I) COCKRAM was one of the overseers of the will of John Lane of Cullompton in 1528, and had issue * WILLIAM, who settled at Purbeck and founded the Dorset branch of the family. He was doubtless an ancestor of Bruen Cockeram of Dorset, who was born in 1591 and matriculated at Oriel College, Oxford, on 11 October 1611 (BA 30 June 1614; rector of Swanage, Dorset, 1614; MA 23 June 1617; Bruen’s son John was born 1646 and matriculated at New Inn Hall, Oxford, 1 April 1664).

* GEORGE (II), of Hillersdon Manor, Cullompton; valued at ǧ30 in 1581 subsidy; married Edith, and died before 16 November 1584, having had issue: 1. PHILIP, born before 1553; valued at ǧ8 in 1581 subsidy; heir of his father’s lands; married Anne Parris of Bampton, Devon (who survived him and was buried 3 February 1625); buried 22 May 1608, having had a daughter and two sons: * Elizabeth, buried 18 May 1603 1. Humphrey, the head of the family in 1620. Born 1571; matriculated Oriel College, Oxford, 2 July 1585, at the age of 14 (Clark 1887, 145); married Jane Huckmore of Coningsbury, Devon (who died before 1604), and 2ndly Alice, daughter of John Yonge of Colyton, Devon (who married him 5 November 1604 [A. Skinner 1928, 484] and was buried 22 November 1627); he was buried 22 January 1636, having had issue 1. Anne (by his first wife), born before 1604 and unmarried in 1620 2. John (by his second wife), born 1607, buried 7 June 1626 2. Martin, born 1576; matriculated Oriel College, Oxford, 4 February 1592; BA 29 January 1597; MA 10 July 1601; vicar of Holcombe Rogus, Devon, 1608; died 28 July 1613 (for him, see Foster 1891, 296, entry 23; Clergy of the Church of England Database, record ID 108318).

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2. DAVID (I), younger son of George (II), born before 1553; valued at ǧ5 in 1581 subsidy; bequeathed ǧ300 in his father’s will; Wynifred, wife of David Cockeram, buried 7 February 1622, was probably his wife rather than David (II)’s; he was buried 29 October 1634, having had issue * George (III) Cockram, born 1584; matriculated Oriel College, Oxford, 4 June 1602; married Anstice, daughter of Richard Clarke, who predeceased him, and made a will 1 October 1643 (proved 23 July 1646), at which time he was living at Lower Growen in the parish of Collompton. He had issue 1. Agnes, baptized 11 August 1622, alive in 1643 2. George, baptised 25 March 1624, perh. died in infancy 3. George, baptized 15 September 1626, his father’s heir, who had issue 1. George, baptized 30 April 1657. 2. Rebecca, baptized 7 August 1659 3. Henry, baptized 23 February 1662 4. George, baptized 9 July 1665 4. Richard, baptized 11 February 1629 and buried 5 September 1630 5. Robert, baptized 3 April 1630, alive in 1643 6. John, baptized 3 June 1632, alive in 1643 7. Jane, baptized 27 September 1635, alive in 1643 8? Mary, alive in 1643 * David (II), married Melony, and had issue 1. Katherin, baptized 20 September 1626 and buried 8 December 1635 2. Elizabeth, baptized 10 August 1628 3. Wynifred, baptized 10 November 1630 4. David, baptized 8 July 1633 5. Bethseba, baptized 14 July 1636 6. Christopher, baptized 29 July 1638 and died 1674 7. Anne, baptized 19 April 1641 8. George, baptized 6 October 1643 9. William, baptized 12 April 1646.

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* Thomas (I), married Susan or Susanna, who had died before he made his will on 1 January 1645; he died before 10 November 1646, having had issue 1. Susanna, baptized 6 March 1634 2. Thomas (II), baptized 9 April 1635 3. David, baptized 1 March 1637 4. Humfry, baptized 4 April 1639 5. George, baptized 10 February 1641 6. Winifred, baptized 17 May 1643 [Thomas, baptized 7 April 1645, is identified as Thomas (I)’s son in the parish register, but Thomas (I)’s will of January 1645 identifies his wife as dead and makes no reference to a second wife.] * Robert (II), perhaps a brother of George, David, and Thomas, married Elizabeth (and may have died before 1645, since he is not mentioned in Thomas’s will of that date) and had issue * Phillip, a daughter, buried 14 September 1638 1. Robert, baptized 7 November 1637 2. Humfry, baptized 20 December 1639 and buried 15 April 1641. * Bathsheba, executrix of Robert (I)’s will, died 1642. * Two other daughters, who married Richard Crosse of Glaslowman and Richard Crosse of Hillersdon, these two being identified in Thomas’s will of 1645 as :my brothers in lawe” 3. ROBERT (I), third son of George (II), born 1553; B. A. Oriel College, Oxford, 7 February 1577–8; fellow 1578; M. A. 12 April 1581; buried 3 May 1632. Bequeathed ǧ300 in his father’s will. * A DAUGHTER of George (II) married Thomas Mannynge, who was living in 1582 when George made his will, and had issue * Walter Mannynge, to whom George bequeathed ǧ100 * Johan (Joan) Mannynge, to whom George also bequeathed ǧ100 * George (II) presumably had TWO OTHER DAUGHTERS, married to “Humfrey Parris and John Ratcliff my sonnes in lawe,” whom he asked to be the supervisors of his will.

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The will of George (II) Cockram also mentions “my sister Margaret ffarr,” to whom ǧ5 is bequeathed, and “George Morgan my sisters sonne,” to whom 20 shillings is bequeathed; “sister” may here mean full sister, half sister, or sister in law. The license for the marriage of Margaret Cockram of Cullompton and John Barter (of the same?) was issued on 10 December 1579 (Vivian 1889, 5). Together with George (II), John Cockram, merchant, of Cullompton, “supplied arms and armour for the defence of their country” during the reign of Elizabeth I. His will was proved in 1572. There can be no doubt that he was the brother or cousin of George (II): two wealthy merchants with the same unusual last name, both living at the same time in the same small town, were clearly connected. One Henry Cockram was living at Cullompton in 1581, and valued at ǧ3 in the subsidy of that year. He is not mentioned in George (II) Cockram’s will, and may therefore have been the son of John Cockram: he was a Cockram of Cullompton wealthy enough to be named in the subsidy returns, and if he was not the son of George it seems likely that he was the son of the only other wealthy Cockeram of Cullompton of George’s generation. In that case he was a first or second cousin of Philip, David, and Thomas Cockeram. Henry Cockeram the lexicographer (born in the 1570s or 1580s? and alive in 1632) and his sister Elizabeth, who married Sir William Hull in 1597 and had died by 1622, were the children of Hugh Cockeram of Honiton, who died in 1595, and whose widow Joan married Henry Hull of Exeter in 1596 and had died by 1623. The lexicographer’s claim to gentility was evidently not unfounded: his mother and sister both married members of the same gentry family, and a number of his friends were gentlemen. Since the only Cockrams who claimed to be gentry were the Cullompton family, the lexicographer’s father Hugh must have been a cadet of this family, conceivably a son or brother of the Henry alive in 1581. In that case the lexicographer was a second or third cousin of Humphrey Cockram, head of the family in 1620.

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Appendix 2: The Hulls of Larkbeare and Leamcon Based on Visitation of Devon 1564/1881 and Burke 1862, 740.

JOHN HULL (I), son and heir of Henry Hull of Larkbere and his wife Margaret or Margery, daughter and heir of John Talbot of Exeter, gentleman, married firstly Elizabeth, and had issue

HENRY HULL (II), who married Christiana Martyn and had issue Elizabeth, who died in infancy. John married secondly Joan, daughter of Richard St Clere of Ashburton, Esq., and had issue * ELEANOR, who married Thomas Butler or Buller of Exeter * JOHN HULL (II), who married Joan, daughter of Nicholas Trickkey, and had issue * JOHN HULL (III), who married Joan, daughter of Walter Trench of St Mary Ottery, and died without issue * WILLIAM HULL (I), who married firstly Matilda Collyn or Colbin of Cornwall, and had issue * Catherine, who married Thomas Pomfrett of Exeter * John Hull (IV) * Matthew Hull, of Larkbere in 1564, who married Joan, daughter of Thomas Yeard of Newton Bushell, and had issue * Margaret, who married Robert Waller, son and heir of Sir George Waller of Exeter * Anne * Alice * Thomas * George, who married Margaret, daughter of Walter Raleigh of Fardel and sister of Sir Walter Raleigh the courtier and author; she was the widow of Lawrence Radford. He sold Larkbeare to the Smith family (Westcote 1630/1845, 517; Pink 1901). William Hull (I) married secondly Ursula Larder, and had issue

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Henry Hull (III), who settled at Exeter and was mayor of Exeter in 1605. He married Juliana, daughter of Thomas Spurway, and had issue * William Hull (II), of whom below * Henry Hull (IV), who died in infancy * Henry Hull (V), who settled in Clonakilty, County Cork (see Appleby 1989–1990, 83), and married Hester, daughter of Humphrey Jobson (her will was proved in 1639). They had issue, seven sons and five daughters. * Mary, wife of Richard King, of Plymouth * Ursula, wife of Henry Cloyton * Margaret, wife of Thomas Bower * Alice, wife of John Edes * Elizabeth, wife of John Akeland, of Akeland, Devon. Henry Hull (III) was presumably the Henry Hull of Exeter who married Joan, widow of Hugh Cockeram of Honiton and mother of Henry the lexicographer, by license dated 21 January 1596. This Henry Hull and his wife Joan were both dead by 1623. William Hull (II) had settled at Leamcon, County Cork, by 1601. He married firstly Elizabeth Cockeram, sister of Henry Cockeram the lexicographer, on 19 May 1597 at St Kerrian’s church, Exeter (the parish register record is available through the International Genealogical Index), the marriage license being dated 18 May 1597 (Vivian 1889, 14), and secondly Elizabeth, widow of John Boyle, Bishop of Cork (1563–1620); John Boyle was the elder brother of Richard Boyle (1566–1643), first earl of Cork. By his first wife he had issue: * Augustine Hull, who married Thomasine, daughter of Sir Robert Pigott, of Ireland, and had issue a daughter Elizabeth. * William Hull (III), who married firstly Jane, one of the nine daughters of Richard Boyle (c1574–1645), Archbishop of Tuam and cousin of the first earl of Cork, and secondly Frances, daughter of Thomas Bennett, and had issue by both. * Henry Hull (VI)

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* John Hull (V) * Elizabeth * Mary, who married Edward Boyle, son of her stepmother’s first husband John Boyle, bishop of Cork. By his second wife, William Hull (II) had issue: * Boyle Hull, who married and had issue a daughter Margaret.

CHAPTER FOUR L’APPORT DE NICOT ET MÉNAGE AU TRESOR DE RECHERCHES ET ANTIQUITEZ GAULOISES ET FRANÇOISES DE PIERRE BOREL ANTONELLA AMATUZZI

En 1655 Pierre Borel, savant archéologue, chimiste et médecin né à Castres en 1620, publie le Tresor de recherches et antiquitez gauloises et françoises. L’importance de cet ouvrage a été soulignée par les historiens de la langue française et les spécialistes de lexicographie qui en ont mis en valeur les aspects essentiels : il s’agit d’un des premiers dictionnaires d’ ’ancien français’ ; il affiche des préoccupations étymologiques ; il recense beaucoup de régionalismes, notamment d’origine provençale. Héritier des glossaires et des lexiques médiévaux, le Tresor, largement consulté par les auteurs des grands dictionnaires français des XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles,1 se situe à mi-chemin entre les dictionnaires de langue et les manuels préencyclopédiques car Borel déborde le cadre strict du ‘trésor’ lexical en accompagnant le discours sur les signes langagiers au discours sur les réalités extralinguistiques. Dans sa préface il dresse une liste des auteurs et des ouvrages dont il s’est servi pour son travail, ce qui nous donne des renseignements précieux sur les matériaux à partir desquels il a rédigé son dictionnaire. Ce long inventaire, qui est révélateur de sa personnalité et qui reflète ses lectures et le contenu de sa bibliothèque, impressionne pour sa richesse et sa variété. Il comprend plus de 400 noms ou titres. En particulier, à côté des grands auteurs grecs et latins, font leur apparition pour le Moyen Âge Le roman de la rose, Le roman de Brut, Le chevalier à la charrette de Chrétien de Troyes, des chansons de geste 1

Furetière (1690) le cite par exemple dans les entrées bot, cadastre, coq, flan, parpaillot, talisman, Richelet (1680) dans talisman, Thomas Corneille (1694) dans bourrée, bramer, coqueluche, Féraud (1787–1788) dans gouge.

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comme Auberi le Bourguignon et Garin le Lorrain, des écrivains comme Thibaut de Champagne, Colin Muset, Alain Chartier, Villehardoin, Rutebeuf, Froissart, Christine de Pisan. Une part de tout relief est faite à la poésie lyrique des troubadours et des auteurs du domaine d’oc, tels que Albert de Sisteron, Uc de Saint Circ, Pierre Cardenal, Bertran de Marseille, Martial d’Auvergne, et Pierre de Provence, sont exploités. Pour les textes en langue d’oïl (qui sont quand-même les plus nombreux), le Catalogue de Borel ne se limite pas à la littérature en ancien français mais inclut celle des XVe et XVIe siècles (nous retrouvons Pierre Gringore, Clément Marot, Rabelais, Montaigne, Ronsard, Du Bellay, Du Bartas, Corrozet, Henri Estienne, Etienne Tabourot des Accords) et également de la première moitié du XVIIe siècle. Il mentionne en effet un grand nombre d’écrivains qui lui sont pratiquement contemporains comme Guez de Balzac, Perrot d’Ablancourt, Saint Amant, Vincent Voiture, Pierre de Marca (pour son Histoire de Béarn). Des ouvrages qui retracent l’histoire de France comme les Antiquitez, chroniques et singularitez de Paris (1561) ; Les recherches de la France d’Estienne Pasquier (1560–1621) ; Les antiquités et recherches des villes, châteaux, et places plus remarquables de toute la France (1609) et l’Histoire des roys, ducs, et comtes de Bourgongne et d’Arles (1619) d’André Du Chesne ; l’Histoire générale de France avec l’état de l’Église et de l’Empire de Scipion Dupleix (1621–1628) forment l’ossature de son dictionnaire. Il se sert de répertoires bio-bibliographies comme la Bibliothèque françoise de François Grudé, sieur de La Croix du Maine (1584) et la Bibliotheque d’Antoine du Verdier, seigneur de Vauprivas (1585). Parmi la multitude de noms et de titres signalés nous concentrerons notre attention sur deux ouvrages ‘lexicographiques’ ʊ le Thresor de la langue francoyse tant ancienne que moderne de Jean Nicot2 et les Origines de la langue française de Gilles Ménage3 ʊ fréquemment cités par Borel à l’intérieur des articles.4 2

Réélaboration du Dictionaire francoislatin (1539, 1549) de Robert Estienne, il est à la base du développement de la lexicographie française, et il “offre des explications sur le sens des mots, sur l’orthographe, le genre, l’étymologie et sur de nombreuses expressions” (Matoré 1968, 60). Pour une analyse de cet ouvrage cf. Wooldridge 1980. 3 La première édition de cet ouvrage, qui fonde les études étymologiques, remonte à 1650. Il sera largement remanié et republié en 1694 avec le titre de Dictionnaire étymologique ou origines de la langue françoise. Cf. Leroy-Turcan 1991. 4 En réalité dans la liste de Borel nous lisons : « Nicod, en son Dictionnaire et en ses Cantiques » (sig. c3r) et « M. Ménage en ses Origines Françoises » (sig. c2v). Si l’identification de l’ouvrage de Gilles Ménage ne pose pas de problème

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Nous chercherons à évaluer la dette de Borel envers ses deux prédécesseurs immédiats : quel est leur apport à la construction du Tresor ? Borel est-il totalement tributaire de ces deux travaux ? Comment s’en démarque-t-il ? Il faut souligner tout d’abord que les trois ouvrages que nous prenons en considération se fixent pratiquement les mêmes objectifs : ils se situent dans une perspective résolument historique qui vise à la récupération de la culture et de la civilisation anciennes de la France (et de la Gaule) à travers l’explication de l’ancienne langue. Nicot n’a pas écrit de préface à son dictionnaire, publié posthume, mais l’éditeur David Douceur, dans l’épître dédicatoire, s’exprime sur l’utilité du dictionnaire qu’il va publier en souhaitant que par le restablissement de nostre parler ancien (plus ferme, plus court, et plus significatif, que celuy qui a depuis esté receu) l’on reprenne le chemin de pouuoir revenir à la generosité, constance, et magnanimité de nos peres: Dont mesmes les actes et proüesses depuis trois, quatre, et cinq cents ans (faulte d’estre entenduës) ne peuuent estre ni goustées assez par les nostres, ni admirées par les estrangers, sans l’entiere et pleine congnoissonce de la langue, telle qu’elle estoit lors, que leurs histoires ont esté escrites. (sig. ʌ2r)

Quant à Ménage, le titre même de son ouvrage (Origines de la langue françoise) et son choix de suivre une démarche étymologique vont dans cette même direction. Dans sa Préface, longue et articulée, Borel proclame son intention de voir les changements que les mots de nostre Langue ont eus, voyant quels ils estoient auant Iesus-Christ et en chaque Siecle apres lui (sig. l4v).

Il explique les conceptions qui l’ont guidé dans l’élaboration de son ouvrage, qu’il précise avoir composé

(Origines, 1650), il est moins aisé d’établir à quelle édition du Dictionnaire de Nicot se réfère Borel. En effet Nicot travailla à la réédition de 1573 du Dictionnaire françois-latin d’Estienne préparée par Jacques Dupuys et se consacra ensuite à l’édition publiée posthume en 1606, qu’il voulut intituler Thresor. Nous avons vérifié les renvois que Borel fait à Nicot dans ces deux éditions, qui diffèrent peu du point de vue de la nomenclature, pour essayer d’établir s’il était possible de remonter à l’édition que Borel aurait utilisée mais aucun élément ne nous a permis de pencher pour l’une ou pour l’autre. Nous faisons donc référence à l’édition du Thresor de 1606, la plus complète, pour nos citations.

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Chapter Four pour le soulagement et la satisfaction des Curieux qui seront bien-aises en lisant les Liures écrits en vieux François, de n’estre pas arrestez par tant de mots dont on n’use plus maintenant, et qui ont quelquefois des significations assez belles, et des origines tres-anciennes, mais qu’il est difficile d’entendre sans une longue méditation. (sig. ã2v)

et il énonce en onze points les « utilitez » de son ouvrage, en affirmant par exemple que son dictionnaire sera utile à l’explication des anciens Manuscrits […] à entendre les Actes anciens […] à entendre les anciennes Inscriptions, Epitaphes, et autres Monumens de l’antiquité, […] pour s’instruire en mille choses vtiles à l’intelligence des Arts et des Sciences, pour entendre les Armoiries et leurs termes, les anciennes Machines de guerre, les Priuileges, les Chartres etc. et en retirer de belles remarques qu’on peut habiller à la mode, le faisant parler plus intelligiblement et faire ainsi part au public des perles qui sont cachées dans ce fumier. (sigs. l4r–m1r)

Pour revenir plus strictement à la nomenclature, une vérification ponctuelle nous a permis d’établir que, sur un total d’environ 6300 entrées, Nicot est cité au moins 80 fois et Ménage au moins 110. Ils figurent donc parmi les sources les plus exploitées, tout de suite après le Roman de la Rose, Perceval le Gaullois et Ovide et au même rang que Villon, Guillaume Coquillart et la Farce de Maitre Pathelin. Ce classement, qui ne peut être qu’approximatif car souvent les citations sont obscures (la mention ‘Perceval’ peut par exemple indiquer chez Borel aussi bien ‘Perceual le Galois MS in fol. de la Bibliotheque de M. de Masnau […] Où il y a plus de soixante mille Vers’ que ‘Perceual d’Orie Geneuois, Poëte en langue Prouençale, Gouuerneur d’Auignon et d’Arles’5), prouve néanmoins que l’apport de Nicot et de Ménage au Tresor est consistant. En particulier on peut affirmer que Borel est tributaire de Nicot pour des articles concernant essentiellement des termes de la langue générale (absconser, acoint, acomparager, adayer, adirer, cottir, driller, arruner, rebaudi) et des termes qui désignent des réalités communes dans la civilisation du Moyen Âge (asservagir, avallage, esbanoy, haquet) alors 5 C’est ce qu’on lit dans le catalogue initial (sig. c3v). Il s’agit d’un côté de l’une des nombreuses rédactions en vers du Conte du Graal de Chrétien de Troyes (et non pas de la mise en prose du même titre imprimée à Paris en 1530, même si le nombre de vers déclaré par Borel paraît excessif, car la version longue du texte en comporte environ 19600) et de l’autre de Perceval Doria, poète en langue italienne et provençale, appartenant à l’école sicilienne, mort en 1264. Sur lui cf. Dictionnaire des lettres françaises (1964), 1129.

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que pour les technicismes Borel a recours à des sources plus sélectionnées par rapport aux domaines thématiques spécifiques.6 C’est surtout la personnalité de Nicot et le projet de ce savant de préparer une archive de la langue que Borel a dû apprécier. Quant à Ménage, il se taille la part belle pour ce qui est de la réflexion étymologique, à laquelle Borel est particulièrement sensible. Il est pratiquement toujours mentionné en relation avec les explications étymologiques proposées dans ses Origines et il est référence privilégiée et autorité incontestée en la matière.7 Le respect que Borel montre envers son précurseur est témoigné par le fait qu’il le désigne toujours comme ‘Monsieur Ménage’ et qu’il le qualifie souvent de ‘docte’. En plus, il faut noter que dans sa préface Borel cite la Requeste présentée par les Dictionnaires de Ménage (1646, 19). Il écrit : Il n’y a point de Langue viue qui dans vn train ordinaire ne soit sujette a changement, quand bien il n’y en auroit aucune occasion Estrangere; car la seule fantaisie des hommes qui s’ennuyent des vieux mots (comme de toutes les vieilles choses) est assez capable de les changer: Ce que le docte M. Menage a fort bien remarqué en sa Requeste des Dictionnaires. Or nos chers Maistres du langage, Vous sçauez qu’on ne fixe point 6 Pour la chasse Borel mentionne Le roman des deduis de Gace de la Buigne (composé entre 1359 et 1377, cf. La Buigne a1377/1951) et Les livres du roy Modus et de la royne Ratio, traité de chasse d’Henri de Ferrières (publié dès 1486 à Chambéry et puis à Paris, cf. Ferrières c1377/1932) ; pour l’alchimie il cite Paracelse (1493–1541), L’Harmonie mystique ou accord des philosophes chymiques de David Lagneau (1636), et Le Livre des figures hiérogliphiques d’Abraham le Juif faussement attribué à Nicolas Flamel (cf. Livre des figures 1970). Pour l’art militaire il se base sur le Traité sur l’art de la guerre de Bérault Stuart, Seigneur d’Aubigny (cf. Stuart a1508/1976) ; pour l’héraldique et le droit sur l’Indice des droits royaux et seigneuriaux (Ragueau 1583), les Origines des chevaliers armoiries et héraux et les Origines des dignitez et magistrats de France de Claude Fauchet (1600a, 1600b), et sur l’Indice armorial, ou Sommaire explication des mots usitez au blason des armoiries, par Louvan Géliot (1635); pour la médecine, la pharmacologie, et la botanique sur le Promptuaire des médecines de Thibaud Lespleigny (1537) et l’ Hortus sanitatis, probablement dans la traduction française de Jehan Cuba, intitulée Jardin de santé (1500). 7 La proximité des deux ouvrages est témoignée aussi par le fait qu’en 1750 le Tresor fut publié à la suite du Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue françoise de Gilles Ménage, paginé à part au tome II, sous le titre Dictionnaire des termes du vieux français ou Trésor des recherches et antiquités gauloises et françaises, augmenté de tout ce qui s’est trouvé de plus dans les dictionnaires de Nicot, Monet et plusieurs autres.

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Chapter Four Les Langues viues en un point; Tel mot qui fut hier à la mode, Aujourd’huy se trouue incommode; Et tel qui fut hier descrié, Passe aujourd’huy pour mot trié; Apres tout, c’est le seul Vsage Qui fait et deffait le langage. (Borel 1655, sig. e2r–v)

En évoquant ce texte, qui avait suscité de vives polémiques avec l’Académie Française, Borel semble vouloir adhérer à la conception de Ménage selon qui diachronie et synchronie sont complémentaires et indissociables. Contraire à la synchronie absolue et normative de l’Illustre Compagnie, Ménage proposait plutôt, comme l’observe Isabelle LeroyTurcan, «une synchronie aux multiples facettes des usages réels qu’on peut nommer synchronie épaisse […] obligatoirement enracinée dans la diachronie» (1995, 245–265). Si on passe à analyser plus spécifiquement la structure des articles du Tresor, qui sont de valeur très inégale, nous remarquons que Borel traite ses sources de manière extrêmement différente. Il se limite souvent à citer Nicot ou Ménage, qui ont le rôle de cautionner une information, comme dans les exemples suivants : ACOINT, familier selon Nicod. ARRUNER, c. ranger. Nicod. PIEGE Ce mot vient de pedica. Ménage

Ce faisant il élimine une partie des informations que Nicot ou Ménage donnaient. C’est le cas de Limier où l’article succinct de Borel fait l’impasse sur la réflexion étymologique proposée par Nicot. Ainsi nous trouvons dans le Tresor : LIMIER, c. vn chien dressé à guetter les Cerfs. Nicod.

alors que l’article de Nicot était beaucoup plus ample : Limier, m. acut. Est le chien qu’on a fait et dressé à quester le cerf ou autre telle beste qu’on veut courir, avec lequel le veneur va au matin destourner le cerf, et le lance quand on le veut courir, Canis vestigator. […] On le peut tirer de Limen Grec latinisé, qui signifie port, demeure, station. […] Aussi disent les veneurs que le Limier lance le cerf hors de sa chambre, et le desbuche. Du Fouillous au chap. 3. de la

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venerie, parlant des chiens fauues, Ceux qui sont retroussez et herigotez, sont bons à faire des Limiers. Bailler le devoir du limier, Libamenta ferae indagatori cani porrigere, B. Limier de hautes erres, qui assentit la beste par les foyes qui sont de plusieurs iours et de vieux temps, dont l’opposite est de bonnes erres, ou de bon temps. Limier de hautes et bonnes erres.

Parfois, au contraire, Borel reformule l’article en détaillant la définition et en ajoutant des éléments textuels qui proviennent de son histoire personnelle, comme c’est le cas de francisque, une arme ancienne qu’il dit posséder. Nicot écrivait: Francisque, ou bien Françoise, f. penacut. En ancien langage des François, estoit appelée l’espée dont iceux François de jadis usoyent, qui pouuoit estre differente en façon des autres, Aimoinus livre 1. chap. 12.

Ménage : FRANCISQVE. C’est vne façon de hache longue dont se seruoient les anciens François qu’ils appelloient autrement ançon, à ce que dit le Président Fauchet en son traité de la Milice. Isidore dit que ce sont les Espagnols qui l’ont ainsi appellée du nom des François. Franciscae genus securis quas ab usu Francorum Hispani Franciscas appellarunt. Voyez M. de Saumaise sur l’Histoire Auguste pag. 247. Franciscus a esté fait de Francus, comme de Romanus Romaniscus, qui a esté corrompu ensuitte en Romanescus. Devant Saint François d’Assise ie ne trouve point qu’aucun ait porté le nom de Franciscus.

Et Borel : FRANCISQVE. C’estoit vne longue hache, selon Procope et Fauchet. La francisque ou ançon (de vncus forsan). C’est vne façon de hache longuette, qu’on lançoit contre l’Escu; et de la pesanteur du coup, elle le faisoit tomber, ou bien le brisoit, ou faisoit pancher. I’ay vne arme ancienne, qui est celle-là, à mon aduis. Elle a vn manche de fer, long de 4 pans, gros comme le bras, et creux au dedans, et à la cime vne petite hache qui se peut oster et remettre, qui a au derriere vne pointe de fer forte, pour enfoncer et percer les casques: Et dans le manche y a vn petit moulin, pour moudre vn peu de farine, afin que chaque Soldat puisse aux heures perduës, moudre son bled.

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Plus souvent il donne des renseignements complémentaires qui proviennent de son intérêt pour la langue et la culture occitanes. Un exemple significatif : l’article houseaux. Nicot se limitait à fournir l’équivalent latin : Des Houseaux, Ocrea ocreae.

Ménage donne l’étymologie: HOVSEAV. De hosellum diminutif de hosa, qui a esté fait de l’Alleman hose. Le Glossaire Latin-Saxon. Caliga, ocreae, HOSA.8

Borel intègre avec une citation qu’il tire du Roman de la Rose et, comme il arrive fréquemment, il propose une étymologie descendante, qui explique non pas l’origine du mot mais sa filiation : HOVSEAVX, ou heuses, c. vne ancienne sorte de chaussures, et comme des surbotes. Nicod. Il vient de l’Allemand hose, id est Caligae. R. de la Rose. Souliers à las, aussi houseaux, Ayez souuent frez et nouueaux, Et qu’ils soient beaux et fetis. On disoit aussi en Latin osatus, pour chaussé. Cathol. paruum. D’où vient le mot de triqueouse, c. gamache, ou guestre, que les Montagnars de Languedoc appellent de gairaudes.

Nous sommes confrontés là à un cas de ce que nous pouvons définir une ‘découverte de lecture’. Cet article contient en effet deux lexèmes cachés qui manquent à la nomenclature: si gamache et guestre font l’objet d’articles dans le Tresor, ni gueraude ni triquehouse ne figurent en entrée et seulement une lecture attentive permet de les repérer. Ce sont les origines languedociennes de Borel et sa connaissance de la langue occitane qui lui permettent de connaître le mot gairaudes qui n’apparaît dans aucuns des dictionnaires et glossaires français de l’époque ou précédents. Et on peut faire confiance à Borel car il s’agit d’une forme diffusée au sud de la France, désignant une ‘grande guêtre de toile’ (FEW XVII, 535 b s.v. warôn ‘respecter’, ‘protéger’), recensée dans le Dictionnaire provençalfrançais de Simon-Jude Honnorat (1846–1848), où nous lisons : gairaudas : Espèce de guêtres. 8

Le mot houseaux dérive selon le FEW (XVI, 228 s.v. hosa) de l’ancien français hose/huese ‘botte, guêtre’ lequel vient du germanique hosa ‘culotte pantalon’.

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L’autre item caché, le mot triquehouse, apparaît comme entrée chez Nicot Triquehouse, Pero peronis. Qui a des triquehouses chaussées, Peronatus

alors qu’il est absent chez Ménage. Borel ne nous révèle pas la source de ses renseignements mais l’origine de ce mot, qu’il dérive de heuses, est parfaitement justifiée. Triquehouse viendrait en effet selon le FEW (XVII, 255a) du moyen néerlandais strickhose, ‘enveloppe de tissu qui couvre la jambe’, très vraisemblablement formé à partir de l’allemand Hose ‘culotte, pantalon’. Un autre cas de ‘découverte de lecture’ est caché à l’intérieur de l’article bacon. Pour Nicot c’est du lard : Bacon, Lugd. et Delphin. idem est quod nobis, Lard, Lardum.

La définition de Ménage est plus complète : BACON. On appelle ainsi du lard dans le Lyonnois, dans le Dauphiné et dans la Lorraine. Dans la Prouence ce mot se prend pour vn pourceau salé tout entier. Il se prend en la mesme signification parmy les Anglois, et aussi pour ces pieces de lard qu’on pend au plancher. Ie ne sçay s’ils ont emprunté ce mot là de nous, ou si nous le tenons d’eux. Il y a plus d’apparence qu’ils le tiennent de nous. Voyez le President Fauchet en la vie du Poëte Iean Chapelain.

Chez Borel nous lisons: BACON, c. poisson salé; ou du lard, selon Monsieur Ménage. I’estime que ce mot s’employe à tout ce qui est seché à la fumée, qu’on appelle aussi boucané.

Si cet article ne nous apprend guère de plus à propos de l’origine du mot bacon9 et semble plutôt créer une certaine confusion quant à la définition, car Borel hésite entre le poisson et le lard sans trancher précisément, elle est très intéressante parce qu’elle contient l’’item caché’ boucané, qui représenterait une des premières attestations de ce mot.

9

Probablement emprunt de l’anglais bacon, lui-même dérivé de l’ancien bas francique *bakko, forme que l’on peut déduire de l’ancien haut allemand bahho, et du moyen haut allemand backe, bache ‘jambon, flèche de lard’, à rattacher à l’ancien haut allemand bah et à l’anglo-saxon boec, ‘dos’ (FEW, XV, 1re partie, 29b).

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Selon le FEW (XX, 72–73 s.v. mokaém) le verbe boucaner dérive du substantif boucan, attesté pour la première fois en 1578 chez Jean de Léry, (Histoire d’un Voyage fait en la terre du Bresil, autrement dite Ammerique) et désigne le «gril sur lequel les Indiens d’Amérique fumaient la viande». Nous ne savons pas comment Borel a pu connaître ce mot qui n’est contenu avec cette acception ni chez Nicot10 ni chez Ménage mais, d’après nos recherches, le Tresor serait l’un des premiers ouvrages lexicographiques à le recenser après Cotgrave (1611) et avant les dictionnaires de Furetière (1690) et de l’Académie (1694).11 Borel étant très soucieux de l’origine et de la filiation des mots, c’est justement dans le domaine de l’étymologie qu’il ose innover le plus et que l’apport de sa personnalité se manifeste de manière plus originale. Parfois son innovation n’est qu’apparente, plus rarement il a de bonnes intuitions, comme dans le cas de laquais : LAQUET, c. vn laquais. Voy Page. On l’appelloit aussi un Naquet ou Page, c. un villageois ou païsan, de pagus, village. […] Ou ce mot de laquay vient du langage Basque; car laquais, veut dire seruiteur, en cette Langue-là. Or c’est le païs d’où viennent les meilleurs laquais, du moins, ceux qui courent le mieux. D’où vient qu’on dit d’vn bon coureur, qu’ il a la jambe d’vn Basque.

Ce mot mérite qu’on s’arrête un instant. Son étymologie est très incertaine. L’hypothèse avancée par Borel ne doit pas être écartée car elle est encore soutenue dans le Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánicos de Joan Corominas (1980–1983, 3: 546–548), qui n’accepte pas la position du FEW selon lequel l’origine remonterait au mot turc ulaq, coureur. Remarquons que pour argumenter sa thèse Borel fait très intelligemment le 10 Chez Nicot, à l’entrée Boucaner on lit: « hircum imitari ». Chez Richelet (1680) on trouvera : « BOUCAN s.m Bordel ». Ces deux acceptions seraient à rattacher au verbe boucaner « imiter, faire le bouc », mot attesté de 1549 à 1663 qui eut également le sens de «fréquenter les mauvais lieux». Cette étymologie, proposée par ) est la plus vraisemblable, le bouc étant souvent FEW (XIV, 640, s.v. pris comme symbole de débauche, de lasciveté et d’opiniâtreté. 11 Cotgrave (1611): «BOUCANÉ : Ridden by a goat; also, rosted, broiled, or scorched on a wooden gridiron»... Furetière (1690) : «BOUCANER Faire cuire du poisson ou de la chair à la manière des sauvages et le faire secher à la cheminée ou le faire soter sans sel. On le desseche aussi sur une espece de gril fait de bastons élevés de trois pieds au dessus du feu». Dictionnaire de l’Académie (1694) : «BOUCANER. v. a. Faire cuire, faire rostir la viande à la maniere des Sauvages. Il se dit aussi, De ceux qui vont à la chasse des boeufs sauvages ou autres bestes, pour en avoir les cuirs. | BOUCANIER. s. m. Celuy qui va à cette sorte de chasse».

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lien entre ce mot et l’expression ‘courir comme un basque’ (signifiant marcher vite et pendant longtemps) recensée dans la première édition du Dictionnaire de l’Académie Française et dans Furetière. Dans ce complexe réseaux intertextuel nous avons pu constater que Ménage tient compte des observations de Borel pour la rédaction plus ample de ses Origines qui parut en 1694. Ainsi pour l’entrée laquais il écrit : LAQUAIS. […] L’Auteur des Antiquitez de Cahors, dit que Laquay est un mot Basque, qui signifie serviteur. Et comme les meilleurs laquais nous viennent de Biscaye; car nous disons jambe de Basque; il y a beaucoup d’apparence que ce mot nous est aussi venu de Biscaye.

Ménage cite précisément Borel par exemple dans l’article Basquine, absent dans l’édition de 1650 des Origines et ajouté dans celle de 1694. BASQUINE. Mr. Borel dans ses Antiquités Gauloises : C’estoit une robe fort ample, qui se tenoit ouverte et estendue au moyen d’un cercle. VASQUINE est aussi ce que les Dames vestent entre la chemise et la cotte.12

On dirait une sorte de dialogue à distance où Ménage n’hésite pas à répliquer sèchement à Borel en le critiquant et en montrant sa supériorité. Par exemple pour l’article flans Borel avait écrit FLANS […] Ce sont de petites tartes, dites aussi flandrelets, (ou plustost flans de lait,) pour auoir esté inuentées en Flandres, où le lait abonde.

Ménage précise : FLANS On appelle ainsi à Paris, en Picardie, en Normandie, et ailleurs, une sorte de tarte […]. Je ne say d’où vient ce mot. Bourdelot le dérive à flando ou à flendo. A flando, parce qu’il faut manger les flancs chauds. A flendo: parce qu’ils se donnent aux enfans pour les appaiser; Qui sont deux étymologies également mauvaises. Celle de Mr Borel, dans ses Antiquitez Gauloises n’est pas meilleure. Il dérive flandrelets; qui est comme nous 12

En effet l’article de Borel disait : « BASQNINE, [sic] verdugal, ou hocheplis ; c’estoit une robe fort ample qui se tenoit ouuerte et estenduë au moyen d’vn cercle. Vasquine est aussi ce que les Demoiselles vestent entre la chemise et la cotte ». Nous lisons dans le TLF : « BASQUINE […] Empr. à l’esp. basquina « seconde jupe que les femmes mettent sur la première pour sortir dans la rue » […] dér. de basco « natif du pays basque » […] suff. -ina (-ine*). La longue coexistence des formes vasquine et basquine s’explique par le fait qu’en esp. b et v se confondent dans la prononciation ».

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Chapter Four appellons les flans en Anjou; du mot de Flandre, et de celui de lait : pour avoir été inventez, dit-il, en Flandre, où le lait abonde.13

Dans l’édition de 1694 à l’entrée bourreau Ménage cite précisément Borel : BOURREAU. J’ay dit dans la premiere édition de ces Etymologies, que je ne savois pas d’où venoit ce mot. Ce qui a fait dire […] à Mr Borel, dans ses Antiquités Gauloises : BOURREAU : Voy bourrée, où j’en ay donné l’étymologie véritable, que personne n’avoit encore remarquée. Car Mr Ménage avoue, en son Dictionnaire Etymologique, ne l’avoir pu trouver. On le pourroit aussi faire venir, comme Mr Guido Patin, docte Médecin de la Faculté de Paris, a remarqué, de burrus, cestadire roux: parceque les rousseaux sont ordinairement violens : ce qui est une qualité qui est requise aux Bourreaux : ou acause qu’il est vêtu en divers lieux de couleur rouge et jaune. Et au mot bourrée il avoit dit, que les Bourreaux avoient été ainsi appelés parcequ’ils fustigent avec des verges faites de bourrée. Toutes ces étymologies sont ridicules.14

Les deux articles de Borel mentionnés sont les suivants : BOURÉE, ou bourrée, c. feu clair, comme de paille, ou genest et petites busches, selon Coquillard. C’est aussi une poignée de verges de saules etc. selon Monet: D’où peut-estre est venu le mot de bourreau, parce qu’il fustige auec ces verges. BOURREAV : voy Bourée, où i’en ay donné l’etymologie véritable, que personne n’auoit encore remarquée: car M. Ménage avouë en son Dictionnaire Etymologique, ne l’avoir pû trouuer. On le pourroit aussi faire venir, comme M. Guido Patin Docte Medecin de la Faculté de Paris a remarqué, de burrus, c. roux; parce que les rousseaux sont ordinairement violens : Ce qui est vne qualité qui est requise aux bourreaux, ou à cause qu’il est vétu en divers lieux de couleur rouge et jaune.

Notre analyse nous permet d’affirmer que Borel a construit son ouvrage à partir d’un riche corpus de textes et d’auteurs parmi lesquels Nicot et Ménage lui ont fourni le projet et le modèle lexicographique.

13

Le FEW (XV, 2e partie, 132b-134a) fait dériver ce mot du germanique occidental *flado ‘gâteau, galette, crêpe’ et cite Borel pour la forme flandrelet. 14 En réalité l’origine de ce mot serait selon le FEW (I, 642a) bǎrra ‘laine vierge’ à partir duquel avait été formé le verbe bourrer, bourreler, avec le sens de maltraiter.

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Bien que, contrairement à ses deux devanciers, Borel écrive une préface qui contient un discours métalinguistique explicite, sa culture et sa sensibilité lexicographique sont sans doute moins pointues que celles de Nicot et Ménage. Toutefois ses interventions, ses opinions, ses intérêts, confèrent à son ouvrage des caractéristiques propres qui méritent d’être mises en valeur. De la lecture d’un texte éminemment impersonnel, comme un dictionnaire, ressort un tempérament unique, passionné, original qui a su imposer ses préférences, sa compétence, son savoir et qui a contribué à la description du lexique de l’ancien et du moyen français jusqu’au français préclassique. Mais c’est surtout la lecture parallèle du dictionnaire de Borel avec ceux de Nicot et de Ménage qui s’est révélée extrêmement profitable et fructueuse : le dialogue qui se tisse entre les auteurs à travers de nombreux renvois, annotations et commentaires témoigne de la vivacité du débat lexicographique en France au milieu du XVIIe siècle. En tenant compte de cette intertexualité nous pouvons obtenir une compréhension plus approfondie du texte dictionnairique et apprécier son dynamisme.

CHAPTER FIVE COLLOCATIONS AND THE PHILOSOPHICAL LANGUAGE OF JOHN WILKINS IN WILLIAM LLOYD’S LEXICOGRAPHY OF POSSIBILITIES (“AN ALPHABETICAL DICTIONARY”, 1668) FREDRIC S F DOLEZAL

And as for the principal difficulties, which I met with in any other part of this Work, I must acknowledge my self obliged to the continual assistance I have had, from my most Learned and worthy Friend, Dr. William Lloyd, then whom (so far as I am able to judge,) this Nation could not have afforded a fitter Person, either for that great Industry, or Accurate judgment, both in Philological, and Philosophical matters, required to such a Work. And particularly I must wholy ascribe to him that tedious and difficult task, of suting the Tables to the Dictionary, and the drawing up of the Dictionary it self, which upon tryal, I doubt not, will be found to be the most perfect, that was ever yet made for the English Tongue. (Wilkins– Lloyd 1668, sig. c1r)1

1. Regarding the Philosophical Language and a Philosophical Dictionary “This book first arose out of a passage in Borges”: so begins the preface to Michel Foucault’s The order of things (1966/1971, xv). The passage that Foucault refers to is found in Jorge Luis Borges’ essay “The Analytical Language of John Wilkins” (1942/1964), which opens,

1

William Lloyd (1627–1717), was a protégé, ally, and friend of John Wilkins; he was quite active in the political and ecclesiastical life of his time. According to Shapiro (1969: 219), “The Duke of Buckingham, though unmentioned by Wilkins, also helped work on the dictionary.”

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I have noticed that the 14th addition of Encyclopedia Britannica does not include the article on John Wilkins. This omission can be considered justified if we remember how trivial this article was (20 lines purely biographical data space...) ... it is an error if we consider the speculative works of Wilkins ... In the universal language which Wilkins invented in the 17th century, each word is defined by itself. (101)

While Borges writes that the Wilkins project is distinguished by its “ambiguities, redundancies and deficiencies”, he also says, “Wilkins’s analytical language is not the least admirable of those schemes” and reports that “Mauthner observes that children could learn Wilkins’s language without knowing that it was artificial; later, in school, they would discover that it was also a universal key in the secret Encyclopedia” (103). Borges has noticed an absence, Foucault has read his Borges, and An essay towards a real character and a philosophical language (Wilkins 1668) finds an audience. The audience, however, is not entirely inquisitive: Borges tells us that he only read excerpts and commentaries on Wilkins’s Essay; Foucault, though he digs into his Locke and Bacon, does not mention Wilkins during his archaeological excavations in search for the artifacts of classification that presume the possibility of representing human knowledge in an orderly universe.2 The contemplation of a Universe of Things may be the basis for this genealogy of ideas, but it is the word made print, the search for definition, that underwrites whatever order things may appear to have. obviously there is no classification of the universe that is not arbitrary and conjectural. The reason is very simple: we do not know what the universe is ... we must suspect that there is no universe in the organic, unifying sense inherent in that ambitious word. If there is, we must conjecture its purpose; we must conjecture the words, the definitions, the etymologies, the synonymies of God’s secret dictionary. (Borges 1942/1964, 104) 2

It is certainly a serious gap in Foucault’s study that he does not take into consideration what is perhaps the best example of an attempt to understand epistemology as a reflection of the classification of the world by means of an empirical analysis of linguistic meaning. In an essay comparing Wilkins’s methods in his religious writings with the Essay (see also Dolezal 1994 and Cram 1994), Leonardi (2003, 102) argues that “this perspective leads us to consider the Essay as a component of the continuum of Wilkins’ speculation rather than as a serendipitous outcome, elicited by the universalistic interests of contemporary culture. In fact, this text is proposed as a complete epistemological instrument for acquiring real knowledge”. Furthermore, since Locke knew his Wilkins, it would make more sense to speak of Locke’s ideas on human understanding as an evocation of Wilkinsian epistemology and Wilkinsian linguistics rather than call them purely Lockean.

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It is the naming of parts, things, which ends in ambiguities and speculations. The search for extralinguistic universals and descriptions of knowledge that are not bound to a particular natural language is an attempt to remove or transcend the well-known constraints of natural language, an attempt to construct communication systems free of ambiguities, redundancies, and deficiencies. No matter how scientifically or mathematically this problem has been approached, it never seems far removed from grasping at Borges’ “secret dictionary of God”. Wilkins wanted to avoid “those barren, empty speculations” about “Materia prima, and Vniversale”, for they were an example of “cob webs of learning” (Wilkins 1640: 236); the method he preferred derives from his earliest work on astronomy and mathematics: “the demonstrations of Astronomy … are as infallible as truth it self” (ibid. 236–237). The “truth” is not found in ideas or things, but in “demonstrations”: that is, observation, identification, and explanation taken as a unified process. The proof begins with the visible and measurable.

2. The Lexicographic Turn Dictionary is the prosaic word that connects philosophical and poetic flights of linguistic speculation and archaeological excavations of human knowledge. Perhaps dictionaries mostly escape the notice of incisive literary critics because the pretense of ordering and classifying everything that is named under the sun is hidden inside a system that appears rather innocuous and ordinary to readers of Western languages, the alphabetical order. A dictionary based on metaphysical principles, however, will likely attract the commentary of the wits of any age. It is Wilkins’s universal language based on a classification of things and ideas in the worldʊnot called a dictionary, but “philosophical tables”ʊthat is most provocatively appealing. The purpose of this present essay is to consider not just the ideas, or content, of the Essay, but also the presentation and transmission of ideas in print; my inclination has been to study the artifacts of knowledge production as bibliography, a task more prosaic than the figurative physical labor of an archaeological expedition. This essay does not intend to explore the possible meanings of “knowledge”. It will suffice to note that the “Philosophical tables” and “Alphabetical dictionary” appear to us as a reasonable representation of what we know about the usages of the English language. Wilkins takes the well-known, priority of the senses, to promote empirical research, to expand the university curriculum, and to separate the authority of scripture from the authority of natural knowledge. Language that is dependent upon

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limited knowledge of the world cannot impede a new understanding of the world; it is experience mediated through demonstrable analysis that provides authority to our use of words. The authority and reliability of the mode and product of the transmission of ideas was a concern of Wilkins, as well as the early membership of the Royal Society: Whereas there is nothing more necessary for promoting the improvement of Philosophical Matters, than the communicating to such, as apply their Studies and Endeavours that way, such things as are discovered or put in practise by others; it is therefore thought fit to employ the Press, as the most proper way to gratifie those, whose engagement in such Studies, and delight in the advancement of Learning and profitable Discoveries, doth entitle them to the knowledge of what this Kingdom, or other parts of the World, do, from time to time, afford. (Oldenburg 1665, 1)3

The present essay is a continuation of previous studies of the lexicographical and lexicological methods and procedures of Wilkins– Lloyd.4 Lloyd’s lexicographic practices in conjunction with the “Philosophical tables” (“Conteining a regular enumeration and description of all those things and notions to which names are to be assigned” [Wilkins–Lloyd 1668, 22]) supply us not only with an array of fixed and variable collocations, but also with a study of definitions which are constructed by re-composing syntactic units and by arranging lexical items in contiguous and discontinuous paradigmatic sets.5 It will be necessary to use some terms used in present day metalexicography and linguistic analysis, which creates an uneasy anachronistic explanatory overlay. I hope to show that principles of linguistic collocation can describe a broader textual frame of discourse units that includes the concatenation of phrasemes, lexemes, and other discreet syntagmatic and paradigmatic units. Wilkins and Lloyd’s attempt to classify all things and words under 3

The attention that Wilkins and his fellows paid to questions of authority and textuality is discussed in R. Lewis (2002); he concludes that “the publication of Wilkins’s Essay points up several salient aspects of Restoration philosophical– scientific publishing in England ... the need for scientific works to be trusted; their utility in providing credit and status to the institutions attached to them ... and the difficulty of achieving philosophically–scientifically acceptable levels of accuracy in the publication of such texts ... Wilkins was a canny operator with a shrewd understanding of the conventions of print culture” (142). 4 See Dolezal 1983 and 1985 and Knappe 2004a and 2004b. 5 For a comprehensive study of the tables in the tradition of the topical dictionary see Hüllen 1999/2006, 250–264.

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discourse inspired them to attempt a solution to representing linguistic (and lexical) meaning; their work not only inspired succeeding lexicographers and others interested in taxonomy and classification schemes, but it also continues to be a worthy object of study concerning the possibilities of lexicography and the representation of knowledge. The universal language was meant to address one of the concerns Wilkins had concerning the relationship of language and thought: the proliferation in a natural language of semantically opaque lexical and syntactic compositions. The philosophical language was intended to make all signifiers transparent. Wilkins makes the case that in order for English speakers to find the unitary and transparent universal concept, the dictionary needs to explicate, and thus translate, the underlying linguistic structure of phrases and collocations; it is no wonder then that Lloyd’s dictionary with its hundreds of phrasal verbs stands apart from the prevailing hard-word monolingual dictionary practice of his contemporaries. Wilkins does not indicate just how it was that he saw the usefulness of compiling an alphabetical dictionary that would also serve to crossreference the philosophical tables, rather than doing the much simpler task of putting together and appending a simple alphabetical list, or index, of the headwords found in the tables; clearly, he saw the need to provide a way for the universal language learner and user to have linguistically informed access to the conceptual units of the language. As a consequence, his project became an exercise in dictionary making.6

2.1 Heteroglossia: A Farrago of Text Types and the Transmission of Knowledge The tables together with the dictionary display such a grand farrago of text types selected, combined, and sifted together that there is no easy typology that will categorize the whole text (see Appendix 1 and Appendix 3). Most of the definitions in the dictionary are lexicographical glosses which are written using a well developed lexicographical metalanguage (for a discussion, see Dolezal 1985). The glosses regularly occur with semantic operators, including the particle “augmentative”: ladle is defined as “Spoon (augm” and quaff as “Drink (augm”; tippling is “Drinking 6

For discussion of the relationship between the dictionary and the tables, particularly as an exemplification of Wilkins’s theory of knowledge, see Leonardi 2003. See Knappe 2004a for discussion of the relationship as it concerns descriptive adequacy and English lexis. Subbiondo 1977/1992 investigates the tables and dictionary as a reflection of current trends in semantic theory, especially in regards to presupposition.

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(freq.” The first two of the examples below show typical entries from the dictionary; the third is an excerpt from the tables showing the semantic, grammatical, and pragmatic derivations of the concept SORRINESS.7

SORRINESS, mean, poor, vile, trivial, contemptible, despicable, frippery, Trash, Trumpery, Raff, Scum, Drugg, silly, slight, paultry, scurvy, poor, course, flat, pedling, cheap, worthless, Fellow, Sirrah, Companion, Rascal, Varlet, Wretch, Scoundril, Skip-jack, Scribe, Urchin, Flirt, Gill, Jade. (Wilkins–Lloyd 1668, 32)

The semantic operators, which Wilkins calls “Transcendental Particles” (318), are introduced, explained and exemplified in the philosophical (universal) grammar of Wilkins’s constructed language.8 Since the tables do not mark each derivative with its appropriate transcendental particle, we are left to decide the appropriate designation for “sorry (augm.)”. “Frippery” and “Trumpery” seem to be good candidates. The OED has two entries for riff-raff; in the first entry we find sense 2, “Worthless stuff; odds and ends; trumpery, trash, rubbish. Now chiefly dial.”; the second entry, for a form which is described as obsolete and rare (the second and last quotation being 1617), appears to be a record of the sense “Sorry … discourse” found in Lloyd’s dictionary: “A hurly-burly, a racket; a rude piece of verse.” It is not clear why the editors and compilers of the OED do not make more use of the “Philosophical tables” and “Alphabetical dictionary” as an authoritative record and source for illustrative quotations. Recently Gabriele Knappe (2004a) published an extensive analysis of the content and structure of the Lloyd dictionary, enhancing our understanding and appreciation of the Wilkins–Lloyd project especially as it pertains to phraseology. Knappe has also correctly called our attention

7

Here and throughout this paper, definitions from the “Alphabetical dictionary” are reproduced photographically to preserve their typographical features. 8 Those familiar with Igor Mel’þuk’s “Lexical Functions” in the ExplanatoryCombinatorial Dictionary (Mel’þuk and Zholkovskii 1984) will notice the close similarity in linguistic type and function between the Lexical Functions of Mel’þuk and the Transcendental Particles of Wilkins (cf. Mel’þuk 1998 and Dolezal 1983).

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more acutely to Lloyd’s role in organizing the linguistic data found not only in the dictionary but also in the universal language scheme.9 At the time William Lloyd began compiling “An alphabetical dictionary” there did not seem to be a perceived need nor demand for monolingual dictionaries that were as inclusive and comprehensive in their selection of English vocabulary as could be found in a number of bilingual dictionaries of the time. Knappe (2004b) has presented evidence that Lloyd derived part of the vocabulary in his dictionary from bilingual dictionaries (for example, the Rider–Holyoke dictionaries), and has thus marshaled further support for including the “Alphabetical dictionary” in the genealogy of English lexicography. A comparison of Appendices 1 and 2 partially illustrates the textual relationship between a bilingual dictionary (Wase 1662) and Lloyd’s work, and also the divergence of method between the two.

2.2 Bilingualism: The Philosophical Language and English The blend of lexicographic gloss, exemplifications, criterial semantic features, and cross-references to the “Philosophical tables” in “An alphabetical dictionary” create the impression of both heteroglossia and a bilingual method within the text frame of a monolingual dictionary. Because the lexicographic definitions in the dictionary “are either referred to their places in the philosophical tables, or explained by such words as are in those tables” (Wilkins–Lloyd 1668, sig. aaa1r), the glosses and the exemplifications are not always generalized abstracted occurrences of the English language; as we shall see in the following sections, the definitions are often written in the abstracted philosophical language. In other words, the whole project (the tables, the grammar, the phonetic system, and the dictionary) can be understood as the presentation of a target language, in this case the universal language, through the vehicle of a natural language. That is to say, when we consult the “Philosophical tables” we find two distinct languages: 1) the universal, or philosophical, language; and 2) the 9

See Knappe (2004b) for discussion of phraseology and of bilingual dictionaries: “The dictionaries by Christopher Wase (1661 to 1662) and Francis Goldman (1664) were the latest developments in English–Latin lexicography on the market at the time at which Lloyd was probably working on his Alphabetical Dictionary... a comparison of the first 100 headwords of the letter “B” in the Alphabetical Dictionary (babble–bavin) with Wase’s dictionary shows that Lloyd followed the bilingual tradition closely” (375). Christopher Wase (1627–1690), a well-known philologist, was highly regarded by John Evelyn, a correspondent and acquaintance of Wilkins.

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English language. Whatever the failures and successes of the project, we can see interference between words considered conceptually and words considered lexically, because the conceptual units in the tables (L2) are mostly represented by fairly ordinary English words (L1). It is for this reason that no matter the intent or design of the system, the final product, one might argue, works best as a description of English vocabulary. It should be clear, however, that the discrete methods and procedures, unstated as they are, were motivated by an empirically oriented study of “things” which intentionally or not produced an acutely applied descriptive and explanatory analysis of lexical meaning.

3. The Imperfection of Phraseology That is called figurative and irregular Syntax, which customary use, and not any natural propriety doth make significative; wherein there are some words always either redundant, or deficient, or transposed, or changed, from their proper notion. These Phraseologies are to be accounted an imperfection of Language … they do exceedingly encrease the difficulty of Learning Tongues, and do not adde to the brevity or perspicuity of expression, but rather cumber and darken it with ambiguities. (Wilkins– Lloyd 1668, 447) Signs ought always to be adequate unto the things or notions to be signified by them. (Wilkins–Lloyd 1668, 303)

The following list is a sample of verbal lexical and phrasal units that can be found in Lloyd’s dictionary: to Act in a play; bear down; bear off; bear out; ; cast about; cast in one’s teeth; come in; come forward; come to light; doing battle; Draw sword; draw blood; draw wine; draw out; fall in love with; fall out; hold one’s breath; Go through with it; hold off; keep away from; keep back; keep council; keep watch; lay hands on; lay waste; make the most; make good; make haste; make use of; Pack Jury; take Notice; Root out; set foot; take pains; take up time; yield up the ghost.

In addition to the verbal phrases mentioned above, the following is a sample of the form and variety of types of phraseological units included in the “Alphabetical dictionary”: at all; as it were; for as much; at last; at length; at once; by reason; by and by, down stream; good at; good for; over and above; for the most part; on

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Chapter Five all parts; safe and sound; underfoot; under hand and seal; well now; well then; as well.10

Wilkins understood the importance of “phraseology” as it pertained to understanding and describing the lexical structure of natural languages; he intended his philosophical language to correct, or at least mitigate, these perceived “imperfections”. He specifically mentions English verbs as being particularly troublesome, because some of the most ordinary of them have no “less then thirty or forty ... senses, according to their use in Phrases” (18). He may wish to proscribe phraseology, that is, phrasal verbs, idioms and other fixed expressions, from his philosophical language, but this proscription does not affect the description of the English language found in the dictionary, nor that recorded in the tables; in order to exemplify his point about the lexical structure of the English language, he refers the reader to the dictionary: As for the ambiguity of words by reason of Metaphor and Phraseology, this is in all instituted Languages so obvious and so various, that it is needless to give any instances of it; every Language having some peculiar phrases belonging to it, which, if they were to be translated verbatim into another Tongue, would seem wild and insignificant. In which our English doth too much abound, witness those words of Break, Bring, Cast, Cleare, Come, Cut, Draw, Fall, Hand, Keep, Lay, make, Pass, Put, Run, Set, Stand, Take, none of which have less then thirty or forty, and some of them about a hundred several senses, according to their use in Phrases, as may be seen in the Dictionary. And though the varieties of Phrases in Language may seem to contribute to the elegance and ornament of Speech; yet, like other affected ornaments, they prejudice the native simplicity of it, and contribute to the disguising of it with false appearances. Besides that, like other things of fashion, they are very changeable, every generation producing new ones; witness the present Age, especially the late times, wherein this grand imposture of Phrases hath almost eaten out solid Knowledge in all professions; such men generally being of most esteem who are skilled in these Canting forms of speech, though in nothing else. (17–18)

Phrasal verbs and other sorts of verbal collocations, and all collocations for that matter, bring to mind a variety of questions concerning

10

These are a sort of collocation (especially at all, at last, well now, by and by), that Rosamond Moon (1998) has found to occur most frequently, rather than idioms and other figurative fixed expressions, in text databases according to her study of collocations in corpus lexicography.

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meaning and compositionality.11 I suggest that the arrangement and order of lexical units in paradigmatic sets and taxonomic charts, collocations of concepts, are productive of narrative.12 Rather than concentrating on “things in the world”, or the onomasiological perspective, the emphasis here is on the graphic presentation of lexicological and lexicographical relationships and how that presentation produces the effect of a macro-collocation, or the instantiation of the paradigmatic sets as signifiers. The following questions are germane in my study of the representation, arrangement, or collocation of meaning and knowledge as found on the printed page: How much of the meaning that we ascribe to a lexical unit is actually the residual effect of its collocation with other lexical units on the syntactic and paradigmatic levels? In other words, do we separate the residual semantic effect of a frequent collocate of a discrete lexical unit from the meaning of the lexical unit considered in isolation? Furthermore, how much information on the paradigmatic level of analysis do we access when we read or hear a variable or even fixed collocation? That is, how 11

Knappe (2004b) offers an elaborate discussion of the principles of compositionality and phraseology; I include her conclusions as they pertain to Wilkins–Lloyd here: “William Lloyd (and John Wilkins) could not manage all the problems of phrasal lexicography, above all semantic compositionality and idiomaticity. The problems were enhanced by inconsistencies in the presentation. Wilkins’ and Lloyd’s Alphabetical Dictionary is an innovative and very well considered approach to the treatment of phraseological units ... which make this early masterpiece of lexicography comparable to the Oxford English Dictionary, surpassing in this respect Samuel Johnson’s celebrated Dictionary” (406). The following passage from Mel’þuk (1998, 24), which is an echo of the sentiment expressed in the preceding passage and the selection from Wilkins, illustrates the continuing complications of representing meaning: “At the same time, set phrases, or phrasings, represent one of the major difficulties in theoretical linguistics as well as in dictionary-making. Therefore, both linguistic theory, and lexicography should really concentrate on them ... A good dictionary of language L should include all the phrasings of L, because the main substantive property of a phrase name is its non-compositionality: it cannot construct it, for a given conceptual representation, from words or simpler phrases according to general rules of L, but has to be stored and used as a whole.” 12 This excerpt from a previous article (Dolezal 1994) summarizes my argument for a narrative of structure: “When enough lexical items have been distributed in a systematic way, there develops a discernible structure. We may call a simple structure a list of words; a more complex structure may be called the classification system. Be it simple or complex, the construct is really a list of words arranged in a variety of forms. Any proposition that can be made regarding the list of words must be manifested in relationships among the set (or list) of lexical items” (95).

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much do we access the paradigmatic relationships that are suggested by any lexical unit and then, further, the related pragmatic relationships that are suggested by the lexical units it frequently combines with as collocation? These questions are answered however obliquely in a consideration of the selection of entries and the form of definitions in “An alphabetical dictionary.” Lloyd was avid in collecting and organizing fixed and free expressions (syntactic units with high levels of predictability in regards to lexical membership): for example, “suck up the breath with [the] nose” (s.v. snuff). A typical example supplying a collocation of phrases for the purpose of restricting semantic interpretation can be found in this excerpted entry for measure (for the meaning of each item the dictionary user is referred to the appropriate tables included under the genus “Measure”)

Here is a similar collocation that is clearly a fixed expression (inc. means “inceptive”):

Lloyd applies a technique of supplying collocations and phrases in sets that reveal possible paradigmatic variation. For example, consider the entry for Sitting:

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There are a number of fixed and variable expressions under the entry sitting. A quick glance at the entry reveals a lack of thoroughness in recording the possible collocations. For now we confine the discussion to the following:

This excerpt illustrates the use of collocations as lexicographical metalanguage; that is, they limit the scope and range of the definition. Two of the collocations may be collocations found in the ordinary English of the time: Lloyd has made a distinction between the units “sitting as Commissioners / sitting as a hen” and “Sitting … As Bird”. 13 The “sitting as …” pair would seem to describe a set with at least two variables, “commissioners” and “hen”; “As Bird” would seem to be purely lexicographical metalanguage to narrow the range of application for a sense of the word “sitting”. The relevant selections (senses 33 and 4a, highly edited) from the entry for sit in the Oxford English Dictionary have some descriptive congruency with Lloyd’s entry: Of birds: To perch or roost; also, to rest the body on the ground or other surface. … 13

“To sit, as a hen, with eggs. Incubo are” occurs as an entry in Wase 1662; sitting as a hen may have some status as a phraseme according to these analyses.

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Chapter Five b. Of a hen or hen-bird: To sit upon, to hatch (eggs). 1600 Surflet Countrie Farme i. xvi. 107 Geese loue not almost to sit any but their owne egs. 1651 Baxter Inf. Bapt. 51 The Hen gathereth the youngest most tenderly: Yea, how long will she sit the very eggs? [in another section of sit:] To occupy a seat in the capacity of a judge or with some administrative function.

4. A Lexicon of the Mind and a Dictionary of De-Lemmas The “Philosophical tables” ideally comprise the finite set of concepts common to humankind; it is a system that evokes the empirical spirit of the natural philosophy espoused by Wilkins. The project is guided by human discourse and is an attempt to classify knowledge. The very nature of the universal language system and the universal grammar provides the basis for a mental lexicon (the term “mental lexicon” has no commonly accepted definition, so perhaps current work on constructing such a system could just as easily be called another way to search for God’s secret dictionary). However, because of the use of English lexical units to represent conceptual units in the dictionary and tables, the set of structured data (“Philosophical tables”) could also be called, though not exhaustively, an associative paradigm of lexical meanings, a word field, or an onomasiological chart of mid-seventeenth-century English. The term lexicon does occur in the Wilkins–Lloyd project (the “Alphabetical dictionary” defines it as “Catalogue of interpreted words”); the use of “mental lexicon” as a way of describing the tables is consistent with the philosophical perspective of Wilkins: the idea behind the universal language is predicated upon the common and universal shared experience of humankind. For instance, Wilkins writes, As men do generally agree in the same Principle of Reason, so do they likewise agree in the same Internal Notion or Apprehension of things. The External Expression of these Mental notions, whereby men communicate their thoughts to one another, is either to the Ear, or to the Eye ... That conceit which men have in their minds concerning a Horse or Tree, is the Notion or mental Image of that Beast, or natural thing, of such a nature, shape and use. The names given to these in several Languages, are such arbitrary sounds or words, as Nations of men have agreed upon, either casually or designedly, to express their Mental notions of them, (20)

Whether by hook or by crook, they created a highly refined system of logical and lexicographical definition. These two types of definition help explain the distinction that Wilkins draws between the “Philosophical

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tables” and the “Alphabetical dictionary”. In the “Advertisement to the Reader” before the “Alphabetical dictionary”, he writes, The design of the Philosophical Tables is to enumerate and describe all kinds of Things and Notions: And the Design of this Dictionary, is to reckon up and explain all kinds of words, or names of things. (sig. aaa2v)

Setting the things and notions of the tables in juxtaposition with words and names of the dictionary, the hierarchical and formal “Philosophical tables” contrast significantly with the systematic, but abstract and generalizing, construction of the dictionary entries. Their “Philosophical tables” and “Alphabetical dictionary” show a strong adherence to a method relying upon principles of collocation, cohesion, and predictable concatenation of lexical items and text units. Their logical and lexicographical definitions depend largely on understanding how each conceptual unit or lexical unit stands in relationship to other units, in continuous syntactic relationships, continuous paradigmatic relationships, and also discontinuous syntactic and paradigmatic relationships. These relationships can be seen on each page as the result of the systematic use of a notational system (see Appendix 3). Their definitions also depend upon the decomposition of English lexical units into conceptual units and semantic operators. The lexicographical definitions which depend on cross-referencing the “Philosophical tables” help illustrate these ideas:

The design of the macro and micro structure of the “Philosophical tables” and “Alphabetical dictionary” leads me to reconsider the ideas of canonical form and lemmatization; each radical word is presented in a canonical form (understood to be a “substantive”). The canonical form is the designatum of a conceptual unit in the universal language, not to be understood as an English word. In my analysis, the canonical forms, considered as conceptual units, are de-lemmatized English lexical units. The synonyms and other derived words that are listed with each radical word in the Tables, provide the re-lemmatization of the radical word who (for a typical example, see the list following the “radical” word JOINING in Appendix 3). In other words, each lemma (each of the items in the list) is a concatenation of possible semantic, pragmatic, and grammatical derivations of its respective radical words.

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The lexicographical metalanguage in the entry for sitting, which typifies the method in “An alphabetical dictionary”, has a highly abstracted canonical form (a de-lemmatized lexical unit).14 We will look at two distinct types: (1) “together-sitting” / “upon-sitting” and (2) “AC.VI.5”. The examples of type (1) follow a frequent pattern in the dictionary, for instance, this phrasal verb in the entry for put:

However, this method is not restricted to explaining phrasal verbs:

In her work on historical English phraseology Knappe (2004a) analyzes the phrasal verbs: On the syntagmatic level, phrases such as fall down with the explanation ‘down-fall’, put together, described as [together-put], or make league, explained as [league (make] are, by virtue of their circular definitions, certainly understood as phrases with literal meanings of the keywords. (401)

14

From the perspective of describing the entries as examples of a monolingual dictionary, the English language is both the object of lexicography (the terms to be defined) and the instrument of lexicography (the terms used to define). The entry is “conceived as the lexical abstraction of a lexical unit” (Zgusta 1971, 249).

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Her reading that the inverted, re-composed phrasal verbs (“together-put”) signify “literal meanings of the keywords” (though “direct sense” rather than “literal meaning” would be a more felicitous term) is supported by the excerpts below; at the same time, this analysis can be broadened by considering the dictionary as one important component of Wilkinsian epistemology as registered in lexicographical metalanguage15 (in this case the metalanguage is also representative of a systemic philosophical language):

The lexicographical metalanguage does give the appearance of circularity in the definitions of the phrasal verbs; however, the circularity is mitigated by “reading” the entries in the context of the tables, which the dictionary users are invited to do (hence the dictionary title page: “English words … referred to their places … or explained by such words in [the] Tables”). This is made quite clear when we look up together in the dictionary:

15

Leonardi (2003) cogently presents this idea: “In the essay Wilkins’ linguistic and scientific speculation merge; and knowledge ʊ which is a core concern throughout his production ʊ can be identified as the ‘thread’ that connects them ... In fact, the essay is a project for a philosophical and universal language designed for expressing and granting access to real knowledge” (86).

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Together is defined “society affirmed” in the tables of the philosophical grammar under Adverbs (313) : such as denote the Circumstance of IV. Society, Affirmed, or Denyed; Conjunction or Exclusion

The reference in the entry join to the tables (TA. II. 1 [39]) re-lemmatizes “together-put” and places it in its semantic paradigm: II. Causing of things to be together or asunder. 1. JOINING, annex, Connexion, couple, link, copulation, concatenation, conjunction, Coalition, coherent, copulative, conglutinate, combine, compact, set or put together. SEPARATING, Segregate, sunder, sever, dissever, divide, disjoin, disunite, dissect, dissolve, part, take in pieces, disjunctive.

In the same genus (see Appendix 3) the phrasal verb “putting together” is used to explain the radical “Applying” (“putting of things together”). Thus, even in the tables there is what at least appears to be a lexicographic gloss (the collocation of lexical items) and also a syntactic and semantic exemplification of the range of application for “putting together”. The sequence “together put” signals to the English reader that the significations of the two English words “together” and “put” have been removed from the context of ordinary English usage and have been recontextualized as an explanatory gloss written in the lexicographic metalanguage, and thus delexicalized as an English lexical unit; the compound English lexical unit has been reconstituted as a systemic conceptual unit, and presumably the concept has a precise, rather than a generalized lexical meaning. Now, I turn my attention to another type of lexicographical metalanguage, the use of the cross-referencing table locus illustrated in the entry for Sitting: AC.VI.5 (238). The table locus refers the user to a radical word in the tables:16 16

The radicals are overwhelmingly in the noun form; however, the noun forms are frequently nominalized derivatives of verbs: for example, SHEATHING, ROLLING, TICKLING, REASONING; the canonical form of the radicals is sometimes in the form of verbal collocations: RIDING AT ANCHOR, KEEPING A WIND, and FALLING TO THE LEEWARD.

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AC. = Genus of “Corporeal Action” VI. = Difference of “Gesture” 5. = Species signifying “altering the height, by motion of the … hipps”.

“Gesture” and “Posture” are re-lemmatized in the tables (238): GESTURE, Action, Behavior, Gesticulation, Mimic, doth denote such an Animal action or motion as alters the situation of the whole or parts of the body: To which the word POSTURE, Position, may be annexed by way of affinity; signifying the situation in which such motion is determined.

By examining lexical sets that have a semantic and paradigmatic cooccurrence, beyond the syntagmatic relationship, we extend the membership of lexical items that can be described and analyzed as collocations. By way of elaborating upon the above example, I include these other paired sets of concepts (radical words) from the tables: Walking/Running (240) Spitting/Blowing the nose (241) Ligament/Tendon (176) Question/Answer (50) Holding/Letting go (38).

The paired sets of radical words in the “Philosophical tables” can also be analyzed as paradigmatic units; when re-lemmatized as English lexical units, the conceptual sets can also be indicators of lexical co-occurrence. Are the tables the predictable outcome of classifying all words and things under discourse, or is the naturalness of the Wilkins–Lloyd tables the result of their empirical and intuitive analysis of the English usage of their time and of our own subjective judgments that recognize the “attraction” of the lexical items and concepts in the lists? These questions arise from reading current explorations of the nature of “collocates”, the sort of lexical sets familiar to readers of the Essay. For instance, Michael Stubbs, in an article section entitled “Attraction between word forms, lemmas and lexical sets”, makes the point that [w]hat regularly takes a much larger difference [than lemmatizing collocates] is to group the collocates into sets of approximate synonyms:

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Chapter Five aerial 12% obey 38%. (2002, 224)

In other words, in the database, the node word, aerial, occurs 5% of the time with bombardment and 12% of the time with all the collocates combined. He makes the point that it would be difficult to quantify this effect precisely since it would be difficult to get a consensus between observers as to exactly which words should be grouped in this way. … there are cases where a word has two senses, and two corresponding sets of collocates from different semantic fields: commanded commanded (224–225)

What we see here is a corpus-based consideration of the same sorts of linguistic data that Wilkins and Lloyd attempted to sort out in the dictionary and tables. Stubbs also says that “amongst other frequent patterns [of semantic relations between node and collocates], there are many cases of co-occurring antonyms” (226). While there may be good philosophical, or logical, reasons to sort conceptual units by pairs of antonyms as Wilkins and Lloyd do in the tables, and as Lloyd defines with his lexicographical metalanguage in the dictionary, their decisions also reflect, even describe, frequent linguistic patterns. Stubbs goes on to say that antonym pairs are “admittedly an ill-defined relation” (226). Wilkins shows awareness of this problem, for he writes (290) of the conceptual pairs that are “Opposites” and those that have “affinity” to one another. Using the lexical pairs found in Stubbs, we see that Eating and drinking are paired in the Wilkins-Lloyd system as discontinuous constituents but not as immediate constituents: one conceptual unit of paired radical words HUNGER … EATING

is linked on the page with the following pair of radical words: THIRST … DRINKING. (234)

“Landlord” and “tenant” are represented in “affinity” as semantic derivatives under their respective paired radical words (notice also the variety of collocations: paradigmatic and syntactic units):

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DEMISING, let, let out, let to farm, least, Lessor, Landlord, Broker, Rent, Principal, Interest, put to use. HIRING, farming, Hackney, mercenary, prostitute, Tenant, Lessee, Lease, Rent, Interest, Use, at livery, Gratis. (268)

It may be that what I have been calling collocation would better be described as a function of cohesion, text with text. On the other hand, it seems clear that Wilkins and Lloyd use these binary radical words to limit semantic scope and thereby define through semantic correspondence and relationship as displayed using a notational scheme (though not always consistent in its application). The same procedure using yet another set of notational devices can also be found in the dictionary. In the case of An Essay towards a Real Character and a Philosophical Language, the construction of a universal language required an accounting of universals, linguistic and extra-linguistic, which in turn required the construction of a conceptual lexicon. Wilkins and his philological partner William Lloyd faced the difficulty of how to produce and organize “the distinct expression of all things and notions that fall under discourse” (sig. a1v). He supplies this critique in a report of a conversation with Seth Ward (1617–1689) concerning previous attempts at producing a “Universal Character”: But for all such attemps to this purpose, which he had either seen or heard of, the Authors of them did generally mistake in their first foundations; whilst they did propose to themselves the framing of such a Character, from a Dictionary of Words, according to some particular Language, without reference to the nature of things, and that common Notion of them, wherein Mankind does agree, which must chiefly be respected, before any attempt of this nature could signifie anything, as to the main end of it. (sig. b2r)

As much as Wilkins wanted to create a table of de-lexicalized conceptual universals, he relied on the vocabulary and structure of the English language to represent them. Besides being a stimulus for considering and appreciating the task of formulating universals of language and thought, the Essay and dictionary are an authoritative, if not comprehensive, repository of the English language as spoken and written in the middle of the seventeenth century. The systematic arrangement and explication of a wide range of verbal collocations in the text frame of an English monolingual dictionary depended upon Lloyd’s selection and empirical analysis of English usage and vocabulary. The practical solutions to compiling the results of the analysis, not only of collocations, but of explicating and describing a large selection of ordinary English, makes Lloyd’s “An

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alphabetical dictionary” a compendium of the many possibilities of lexicography. A study of the Essay raises questions about dictionaries, definitions, and the authoritative representation of meaning and knowledge. The archaeological excavation, the bibliographical excursus, reminds us that the ambitious and flawed attempt of the Essay to classify the things and notions of the world still challenges those who would construct knowledge systems and other computer driven mirrors of natural languages. The Wilkins Essay pretends to nothing less than the distinct expression of everything that may be spoken or written. In other words, the design is to construct the world in such a way that the readers may enter discourse, which always implies collaboration. This new discourse will be regulated by “a just Enumeration and description” (Wilkins–Lloyd 1668, 20) of the worldʊthat falls under discourse. The regulations themselves are a product of inquiry and collaboration, in this case the deliberations and tabulations of the fellows and associates of the Royal Societyʊand finally with the readers of the Essay. Wilkins and Lloyd present their dictionary of metaphysics as meta-literature, a hopeful presentation of the possibility of a bibliography of knowledge.

Collocations in William Lloyd’s “Alphabetical Dictionary”

Appendix 1: Take (Wilkins–Lloyd 1668)

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Appendix 2: Take (Wase 1662)

Collocations in William Lloyd’s “Alphabetical Dictionary”

Appendix 3: Corporeal action (Wilkins 1668: 39)

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CHAPTER SIX DICTIONARIES AS BEHAVIOR GUIDES IN SEVENTEENTH- AND EIGHTEENTHCENTURY ENGLAND LINDA C. MITCHELL

Today we consider dictionaries to be unbiased lexicons, but in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century England that was not always the case. Dictionaries served a variety of purposes from shopping guides to historical accounts. Some lexicographers embedded thought-provoking political and religious propaganda in definitions. At times, entries were even entertaining, such as accounts of travel and local color. Many of these purposes have been recognized by scholars; however, one overlooked aspect is that lexicons could also function as behavior guides. Definitions were embedded with prescribed cultural values for the rising middle classes that helped shape how children and young adults thought and acted. These dictionaries contain excerpts from the Bible, examples from history, morals from fables, stories of heroes, profiles of kings and queens, and lessons from myths. The concept of teaching values through a reference book was not unique at the time. Since the Renaissance such resources as grammar texts, rhetoric books, and letter-writing instruction manuals had been providing advice to the upper classes about speaking, writing, and behaving.1 DictI would like to express my gratitude to Crystle Bruno (San José State University), Andrea T. Smith (San José State University), and Jameela Lares (University of Southern Mississippi) for responding to various drafts of this essay. 1 Book II of Aristotle’s Rhetoric states that the “rule of conduct is neither the noble nor the useful alone, but both at once. They are neither parsimonious nor prodigal, but preserve the due mean” (1390b). In the first century Quintilian describes the good man in De institutione oratoria (12.1). Letter-writing instruction manuals feature vignettes in their model letters to teach writing, to entertain, and to instill life skills.

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ionaries were now giving the same advice to the rising middle classes, describing how they should act, speak, and write. Just as there is linguistic security in having fixed rules of grammar, there is also personal security in having set rules to follow in social and moral situations. These directives for correct behavior appealed to the rising middle classes who wanted to imitate what they saw as traits of the upper class. Because readers equated dictionaries with linguistic credibility, they extended that credibility to other, more subjective areas that included social and personal behavior. These areas might include such actions as greeting people according to rank, being a good role model, or avoiding being seen with disreputable people. Thus, early modern dictionaries reflect cultural attitudes about social etiquette, public behavior, and moral choices. First, while dictionaries were not the foundational texts to offer advice on social etiquette, they were the most accessible to the rising classes. Such advice as to how to present a marriage proposal or how to act at a formal dinner party was presented in conduct books. However, not everyone had access to these specialized texts on manners. In contrast, dictionaries, like Bibles, were more commonly available in every household and often served as reference encyclopedias. One such encyclopedic dictionary that was supposedly written for young women was John Dunton’s The Ladies Dictionary (1694).2 Part of a woman’s social behavior is centered on “keeping house” (248–255, second sequence of pagination); Dunton lists such requirements for wives as dressing attractively, smiling pleasantly, keeping one’s house clean, and never disagreeing with one’s husband. In addition to his advice on keeping house, Dunton counsels that a young woman with good social etiquette should not show anger in public. Such explosive displays are “unseemly and discommendable in all, but more especially in Young Ladies, who like Doves, should be without the 2 Dunton himself specifies that his Ladies Dictionary had several purposes: to entertain and to inform. In the dedication, he writes that this “Essay…is intended for a General Entertainment” (sig. A2v) but he then asserts that nothing is “inserted in this WORK, but what I have sufficient Authority to back it” (ibid.). He compiled the book hoping that it would be enjoyable reading for young ladies. The content boasts such entries as intriguing stories from history and mythology, useful information on how to lose weight or increase breast size, and guides to social and moral conduct. Although the material makes for a decent reference book, many young ladies probably read it to experience things not common to their everyday life. Much of Dunton’s material comes from Hannah Woolley’s Gentlewoman’s Companion or a Guide to the Female Sex (1675). Nowhere does he mention the source of his material, and he lets the reader assume that he has written it himself.

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Gall that ferments and stirs up these kind of Passions to disturb and hurt the Mind, and spot the Names of those that indulge them with the Epethits of rash, pievish, revengeful and inconsiderate Anger” (15). He appeals to a young woman’s vanity by claiming that anger makes a “beauteous Face in a little time Monstrously deformed and contemptible, rendring the Voice of an unpleasing Sound, the Eyes fiery and staring” (ibid.). He uses the weather as a metaphor to explain anger: “Anger once let loose, quarrels with every thing, even a Spot falling upon the Angry Person’s Cloaths, though but of Rain, by the common Courses of Nature is a sufficient subject for it to insist upon, till a Tempest rises in the Mind, and Heaven is cavell’d withal for not restraining the Drops of the Clouds, till she was under a secure shelter” (ibid). To avoid “this dangerous evil,” a young woman should do two things. First, “Anger arising in your Breasts, instantly seal up your Lips, and let it not go forth, for like Fire, when it wants vent, it will suppress itself” (16). Second, “Observe that Humility is the most excellent natural Cure for Anger” (17). This argument against public display of emotions not only upholds social etiquette but also reinforces the submissive role assigned to females. The Ladies Dictionary also emphasizes that social etiquette should be demonstrated in appropriate conduct in speech. Dunton teaches a young girl “The perfection of the Art of Speech” so that “she may speak to a hundred persons, and yet vary her stile to each; which Art Alexander the Great, seems well to have known” (186). Her behavior should embody the qualities Socrates considered important to his disciples: “Discretion, Silence and Modesty” (69). He instructs a young woman that in conducting herself she is to speak with eloquence and to use pleasing gestures. He lists rules for discourse with strangers, and he emphasizes the necessity of being direct: “Speeches that have an Edge or Point, enter sooner the Affections, than Dull and Slow Expressions” (186). He argues in detail that “words on all occasions ought to become the Person that uses them; as when you speak before a Prince, you must make an Oration worthy of his hearing” (186). Dunton lists several rules for young women to observe in conversation: “Your Eyes too must be kept within Compass, their wanderings, restrained” so as not to be misinterpreted (71). A young woman, Dunton advises, must also be guarded in her speech: To enter into discourse with Strangers doth argue lightness and Indiscretion; If I might advise, their Carriage in this Nature should not be too loose, nor too precise. The Simpering Countenances, and such kind of Antick Gestures, are more suitable to the condition of Chamber-Maids, than Gentlewomen. Resolution and Modesty attended with Mildness do carry a constant and a sweet Correspondency (72).

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Dunton qualifies his instructions with the warning that if women present themselves in speech and gestures too loosely, they run the risk of portraying themselves as low class. Even though Dunton presents his commentary in an entertaining fashion, he never loses focus on what is considered acceptable behavior for females. He counsels them to be quiet and demure and avoid being noisy or impertinent: if she meets with any thing that looks like Applause, or Approbation, it sets her Afloat, and she sails in the Current of her Discourse without a Compass, till she looses herself, and knows not into what Latitude she is driven, but lies hulking on the Ocean of her conceited Opinions of herself, till she knows not where to make Land, nor to what Port the tedious Voyage of her Discourse is bound. (72)

In the following instruction he may be sending young ladies conflicting messages when he tells them to be direct, yet demure: let what is spoken at any time be to the purpose, and as brief as may be, for long Harangues, though never so Eloquent grow tiresom and tedious, for the Art of Speaking, is to speak a little, that may signifie a great deal in a few Sentences or Words. (187)

As for gestures for young women, others guess at the Disposition of her Heart by the dimension of her Motion, concluding a light Carriage most commonly discovers a loose Inclination; and that jetting, tossing the Head, bridling up the Chin, and walking stately, shews a haughtiness and Self-conceit (169 in second sequence of pagination).

The Ladies Dictionary contains enough information to qualify it for a finishing school course, which may have made it attractive to the rising middle classes who could not afford to send their daughters to such schools. Social etiquette in speech also means having good grammar. Using the English language correctly was important if someone wanted to do well in business or reach a desired social standing. Many lexicographers appeal to this desire by promising their superiority in identifying usage errors and preferred usage. For example, in the preface to A Vocabulary or pocket dictionary (1765), the author makes an appeal ad populum and claims that his dictionary “contains only those more difficult words which occur in sensible genteel company” (sig. ʌ2r–v). At the end of the tenth edition of

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the Spelling-dictionary of the English language attributed to John Newbery (1766) is a letter “inserted from the Lady’s Pocket-Book of the Year 1765” from a father to his daughter about errors to avoid in grammar: Now you are fourteen years of age, and very capable of comprehending the rules here laid down, for improving you in the grammar of your native language, I beg you will peruse them carefully once or twice a week, and I do not doubt but that in a short time you will get rid of those mistakes which the habit of conversing with women and illiterate men is apt to produce. (320).

The father implies that language reveals social class: How often have I heard you say, We was, … instead of we were. … I shall not pretend to give you a catalogue of the words misunderstood by the vulgar, as it would be almost endless, but shall mention only such as people of pretty good education are subject to misapply... Eminent for imminent … Learn instead of teach. (323–324)

He tells his daughter he has “laid before you such cautions as will not fail to instruct, though they are not sufficient to perfect you in your mother tongue” (325). He elaborates with a few words of warning about how humiliated she will be if she does not have correct grammar when she speaks with others: Accustom yourself to the correctness proposed in this letter, and though you know nothing of substantives, adjectives, adverbs, &c. you will live to blush for some men who, with all the advantages of a school and university education, will appear to you most wretchedly remiss on this subject. (325)

The father’s letter to his daughter again highlights the perception that good grammar is tied to good character and social status. Second, besides presenting instructions on social etiquette, early modern dictionaries comment on the appropriate behavior of public figures. Dictionaries frequently reserved a special section on public figures that were to serve as models either to emulate or to reject. In Book III of The English Dictionarie (1623), Henry Cockeram describes the wise, the foolish, the eloquent, tyrants, flatterers, musicians, painters, and poets. He tells a story about Emperor Maximilean [sic] who attempts to teach a beggar a lesson. The beggar tells Maximilean they are brothers and asks for alms and brotherly treatment. Maximilean shows little compassion when he gives the beggar a penny and tells him that if “that if all the rest of his brothers should deale so with him, that he would be richer then

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himselfe” (sig. I1r, s.v. “Men That Were Emperors”). As examples for females he includes the innocent, the chaste, the foolish, the shameless, the warlike, and the faithful. Cockeram tells the story of Acco, a “foolish old Woman, that would talke to her owne picture beholding it in a glasse, and seeing her beautie to decay fell mad, she would euermore seeme to refuse that which shee most desired, and to desire that which she most despised.” (sig. L1v, s.v. “Women of sundrie qualities”). For a faithful woman he describes “Britomartis, a beautifull Lady, who fearing to be rauished, by Mynos, cast her selfe into the water” (sig. K8v, s.v. “Women excelling for loue to their Husbands”). While these entries are entertaining, they also provide instructions for appropriate public behavior. Several early modern dictionaries reflect cultural attitudes about the public behavior of such figures as the Pope. Thomas Wilson shows no leniency toward the Pope in A Complete Christian Dictionary (1612). Wilson writes that the Pope is A Monstrous person, neither man nor woman; God, nor Diuell; but partaking in a diuellish and brutish Nature: being a man of sinne, wholy compounded of impiety, and iniquity; the Son of perdition, himselfe appointed to destruction, & thirsting after the ruine and destruction of others, whom he desires to lead (with him-selfe) vnto the pit of perdition. (364, s.v. Pope of Rome)

He accuses the Pope of “pretence of defending the Holie Catholicke Faith, and Church; yet being (indeed) the maine Aduersary of Christ, sitting in the Temple of God, as God; exercising Tyrany ouer mens Consciences, vsurping to bee Iudge of the Scriptures, and Lord of the Princes of the earth, to depose them at his will” (364–365). In The Complete English Dictionary (1772–1773), Frederick Barlow claims that the Pope cheats people: Most travellers have taken notice of the great poverty of the Pope’s subjects, which sufficiently shews what sort of a master they are under. The Pope engrosses all the corn in the country, paying but half the value of it; but when it is sold to the poor people, an extravagant price is always required. Even the bakers are obliged to buy their corn out of the Pope’s magazines, and have less measure than what it was bought in by. (s.v. Pope)

In The New Royal English Dictionary (1780) s.v. Pope, Charles Marriott is less critical, saying simply that the Pope is the “bishop of Rome, who claims sovereign power over all ecclesiastics and civil governors, as being the vicegerent of GOD; the immediate successor of St. Peter; endowed with

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infallibility, and invested with the keys of heaven and hell.” These excerpts demonstrate moral and social critique of the Pope’s observed public behavior rather than illustrating factual description. Although Marriott is less critical of the Pope than other lexicographers, he does not let Methodists off easily. He describes Methodists as “a new sect of religious, which arose about the year 1738, so called from their affectation of being more strict observers of rule, and pretending to greater lights than the regular clergy.” He states that “Their distinguishing doctrine seems to be a revival of antinomianism, and a pretence of extraordinary illuminations from the Holy Ghost; the new birth, which they seem to confine to their followers, and such highflown notions of their own perfections as to brand the rest of the clergy with a total ignorance of the nature of Christianity.” He refers to the “scandalous proceedings of some of the leaders of that sect,” and claims that “Methodism seems to be on the decline.” Again, Marriott uses the platform of the dictionary as a social critique on the public behavior of Methodists. In The Complete English Dictionary (1772–1773) s.v. Luther, Barlow describes Martin Luther’s role as a religious figure. He describes Luther in both a positive manner (“warm spirit and lively imagination”) and a negative one (“he was rather too fond of punning, for one who had assumed the character of a reformer; in his judgments he was likewise too precipitate”). Although more forgiving of this religious figure, much like his criticism of the Pope, Barlow questions the public actions and behaviors of Martin Luther. Public figures such as kings and queens served several purposes in dictionaries. Often these entries took the form of narratives or vignettes that entertained the reader, taught a history lesson, and depicted a moral failing. The fourth edition of Daniel Fenning’s The Royal English Dictionary (1771) details “The LIVES of the most eminent POETS and other ingenious and illustrious MEN, who have flourished in these Kingdoms” (title page), each with a lesson on how these men were models to emulate. Fenning describes the life of writer Bonnell Thornton, Esq., who was “much lamented by all his friends and acquaintance as a very valuable member of society, and an excellent companion.” Dictionary entries emphasize that men should conduct themselves in public with honor and principle. The title page of Marriott’s New Royal English Dictionary also observes that The Lives of the most eminent Personages which England has produced, can no where be introduced with more propriety than in an English Dictionary; we have, therefore, enriched our Performance with the entertaining and instructive Memoirs of the most illustrious Characters in

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the British Annals, whether Poets, Statesmen, Admirals, Generals or Divines.

One consistent theme is that a royal person should not have vices that will affect his or her ability to rule. Charles Marriott claims in The New Royal English Dictionary that Edward III was “one of the greatest kings of England” and then describes the king’s strengths. Conversely, a morally corrupt ruler could be a danger to England. Marriott describes the shameful love affairs of Edward II and Pierce Gaveston, and of Edward’s Queen and Mortimer, which all ended horribly and compromised peace in England. Marriott describes all the ugly details: Edward’s ridiculous fondness for Gaveston occasioned innumerable disputes, till at length the barons had recourse to arms, and Gaveston was beheaded. In the mean time the Scots obtained three victories over the English, and made themselves masters of every place in Scotland.”

Marriott continues the history of Edward II, a “weak prince [who] raised the two Spencers, father and son, to the summit of power; who being banished by the parliament, the king levied an army, took some castles from the barons; and recalled his two favourites.” As for the queen, Marriott describes her failings: “The queen was entirely governed by Mortimer, earl of March, whom she took to her bed.” The dictionary entry warns that moral weaknesses come to an ugly conclusion: the late sovereign was treated with the greatest indignities, and at last inhumanly murdered; for some assassins having covered him with a feather-bed, held him down, while others conveyed a horn-pipe up his body through which they thurst a red-hot iron and thus burnt his bowels.

Through this cautionary tale, Marriott stresses the importance of correct patriarchal behavior. Marriott warns his male readers that much like Edward II, who lost control of his realm, they, too, can lose control of their households through ignoring their patriarchal responsibilities. Like Edward II, the public figure Richard I also had moral failings that teach the reader a lesson. Richard, “surnamed Cœur de Lion, or Lionhearted” had “prodigious strength of body, amazing courage and intrepidity, and was an illustrious warrior, but exceedingly ambitious, proud, and avaricious, and his love of glory made him neglect the happiness of his people.” Richard III, “surnamed Crook-backed Richard, was the brother of Edward IV. and raised himself to the throne by a series of inhuman murders.” For his moral failings, “Richard’s body was taken

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up entirely naked, and covered with blood and dirt, in which condition it was thrown across a horse, carried to Leicester, and interred without the least ceremony.” As a word of warning, the dictionary entry states, Thus Richard III, if any regard is to be paid to the generality of our historians, was, through the whole course of his life, restrained by no principles of justice or humanity; and it appears that he endeavoured to maintain the crown by the same fraud and violence by which he obtained it.

These historical accounts teach lessons about the public display of greed, lust, ambition, deception, and murder. Third, besides reflecting cultural attitudes about social etiquette and public behavior, early modern dictionaries often include stories or narratives that would bring about the desired moral behavior. A children’s lexicon, Johann Amos Comenius’ Orbis sensualium pictus (1659) consists of drawings of life situations that teach moral principles. Comenius uses the pictorial method, sometimes referred to as a visible learning of language, to connect objects with the world. He argued in another work that “words should not be learned apart from the objects to which they refer; since the objects do not exist separately and cannot be apprehended without words, but both exist and perform their functions together” (1657/1896, 204). His drawings illustrate such concepts as justice, liberality, patience, and temperance and portray men in activities that model good conduct. He also presents model religious leaders, tradesmen, scholars, government leaders, and scientists. Children have the opportunity to learn both vocabulary and appropriate moral behavior. For example, in the picture for “Humanity” Comenius appeals to several emotions to promote his idea of divine knowledge (234–235). The picture elicits the positive emotions of kindness, love, friendship, and joy, and the negative ones of hate, anger, cruelty, and envy. He states, “Men are made for one anothers good; therefore let them be kind.” The two large female figures in the center of the drawing are hugging with “gentle and civil” “behaviour,” and they are “affable and true-spoken,” “affectionate and candid.” Two turtle-doves appear to their bottom left. Other words with positive connotations are used to persuade the reader to be humane. In addition to these figures, undesirable sets of figures are part of the scene. To the right, two men display anger and cruelty. To the left of the two large female icons are two smaller male figures in a duel. Next, Comenius uses negative words in describing people who are abusive to others: “Froward men, are hateful, teasty, unpleasant, contentious, angry, cruel, and implacable (rather Wolves and Lyons, than Men) and such as fall out among themselves.” The final line of the text refers to another figure, “Envy”; she

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is watching the duel and “wishing ill to others” while she “pineth away herself.” Comenius’ motto was “Omnia sponte fluant absit violentia rebus” (Hüllen 1999/2006, 392; “All things flow spontaneously in the absence of violence”) and he tries to achieve this end by bringing together faith and reason. Besides instructing young children, dictionaries also offer advice to young ladies on how to maintain good moral behavior. In the encyclopedic Ladies Dictionary (1694), Dunton warns his young female readers to avoid evil people who will cause them harm. He advises young women that a female is judged by the company she keeps. Young ladies should appear with a chaperon and should never be seen with men of bad character. Because young ladies also place themselves under public scrutiny when they write letters, they should be circumspect. Dunton advises young women that when they write letters they should “be counselled also that they neither give nor receive any thing that afterwards may procure their shame, nor write any thing to any that profess Love unto them, that may afterwards be a Witness against them, nor give the least advantage to any, that under th’ pretence of love endeavour to ensnare them” (73). Another warning is that “they are not to entertain any Parly with any that are despicable in their Conditions, such as are Servants to their own Parents or Kindred[,] or any other of such a sordid Relation. it is dangerous to admit of any such Persons of inferiour Rank into a Parly with them” (ibid.). They receive a final warning about guarding their reputations: “Virginity is an inclosed Garden, it should not admit of any such Violation, the very Report may cast a blemish on it” (ibid). Dunton also addresses “Adultery and uncleanness; The dangerous consequences that attend it, and the dishonour it puts on the Fair Sex, and Revenge it stirs them up to” (21). Dunton paints an ugly picture of adultery when he states that “raging Lusts have occasion’d a World of Miseries to fall upon Men and Women, ending generally in Blood and Disgrace” (ibid.). For six pages he describes how adultery can cause people to murder or go to war. He quotes the assertion that lust is “a bewitching evil, being an unbridled appetite, in whomsoever it reigneth, it killeth all good motions of the mind” (23). Even though young girls most likely would not have participated in such daring moral dilemmas, they would have still received a didactic lesson about making wise decisions. Dictionary entries extend moral behavior to include self-discipline. One must practice self-discipline to avoid harmful food and drink. In The Complete English Dictionary (1772–1773), Barlow defines abstinence as a desirable quality of “refraining from anything to which we have a propensity.” He states that abstinence is “certainly of great service to

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people of a sedentary life, to keep them from a multitude of diseases.” For support Barlow cites the “noble Venetian, Cornaro, [who] after having tried all means that could be thought of for his recovery, was given over at forty, but was cured, and lived to an hundred, as himself assures us, by the mere dint of abstinence.” Barlow adds an example of another man in Britain who “preserved himself to one hundred and forty; and Kentigern, afterwards called St. Mungo, according to Spotswood, lived to one hundred and eighty-five, by the same means.” He concludes that these examples are credible, “since most chronical diseases, the infirmities of old age, and the short lives of Englishmen, are according to Cheyne, in his Essay on Health, owing to repletion, and may be cured by abstinence.” These authors show the perceived connection between abstinence and moral behavior, which leads to a divine gift in the form of a longer life. In The Dictionary of the English Language (1755) Samuel Johnson cites Biblical quotations in definitions to reinforce correct moral behaviors. Johnson claims that he “was desirous that every quotation should be useful to some other end than the illustration of a word” (sig. B2v). In the entry to instruct, he makes a connection between religion and moral behavior (cf. DeMaria 1986, 150–152). He first defines the word with a pedagogical concept: “To teach; to form by precept; to inform authoritatively; to educate; to institute; to direct.” As examples he cites “Out of heaven he made thee to hear his voice, that he might instruct thee. Deut. iv. 36” and “His God doth instruct him to discretion, and doth teach him. Isa. xxviii. 26.” Although lexicographers were not specifically preaching from the pulpit, they cited parables and scripture to make their points about appropriate moral behavior. Seventeenth- and eighteenth-century dictionaries helped shape the values, beliefs, and attitudes of the rising middle classes. Entries guided social etiquette, provided directives for public behaviors, and acted as a moral compass for readers, especially young women. These lexicons were found in most households, and people relied on them for information and advice. Dictionaries were similar to conduct books in that they included instructions on correct behavior. Such rules about social behavior were a comfort for the rising classes who wanted to improve their class standing. The upper classes had already achieved their status and money and were not particularly concerned about breaking social rules. However, people rising in social status wanted definitive rules on how to conduct themselves in all situations. Dictionaries, especially those of an encyclopedic nature, addressed topics such as proper dress, cleanliness, speech, gestures, good character, and table manners. Dictionaries are often overlooked as a means of examining the cultural and social expectations of the period. Part

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of the reason for this oversight is that we think of dictionaries as sanitized lexicons devoid of subjective content. This thinking is misleading because dictionaries were evolving and had not yet reached a standardized paradigm, and thus they act as social and cultural commentaries of the period.

CHAPTER SEVEN WORDS BY WOMEN, WORDS ON WOMEN IN SAMUEL JOHNSON’S DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE GIOVANNI IAMARTINO

1. Methodological and cultural framework Towards the end of Jane Austen’s Persuasion, Captain Harville says to Anne Elliot: But let me observe that all histories are against youʊall stories, prose and verse. If I had such a memory as Benwick, I could bring you fifty quotations in a moment on my side of the argument, and I do not think I ever opened a book in my life which had not something to say upon woman’s inconstancy. Songs and proverbs, all talk of woman’s fickleness. But, perhaps, you will say, these were all written by men.

To which Anne replies: Perhaps I shall. Yes, yes, if you please, no reference to examples in books. Men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story. Education has been theirs in so much higher a degree; the pen has been in their hands. I will not allow books to prove any thing (1818/1985, 237).

In the early nineteenth centuryʊPersuasion was published in 1818ʊ Jane Austen was still voicing her protest against gender stereotypes and inequity, which was not only material but also cultural and linguistic. Among the different kinds of books whose authority is denied here, dictionaries might be said to be very much in the foreground as they were usually compiled by men, were largely traditional in form and content, and basically educational in character.

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As a matter of fact, since the beginnings of dictionary-making in early modern Europe and until quite recently, dictionaries have always been full of entries, words, definitions, examples, and comments that display the contemporary attitudeʊat best patronizing, at worst derogatoryʊof the cultural and social elite, of course a male one, towards women. One single example will suffice. Renaissance scholarship has long been ready to acknowledge the active, important role played by John Florio in disseminating the new ideals of the Italian Renaissance in England. In his A worlde of wordes, or, most copious, and exact dictionarie in Italian and English of 1598, he simply defined the expression Menar moglie as “to marrie or bring home a wife.” In the revised enlarged edition of his dictionary, published in 1611 as Queen Anna’s new world of words, the same entry had a sting in its tail: Menar moglie: to marrie, to bring home a wife, to take a ceaseless trouble in hand.

Despite the noble, female dedicatee of his 1611 dictionary, and although “Florio worked throughout his career to associate himself with the interests of women, and to link those interests with the status and practice of the European vernaculars” (Fleming 1993, 188), the Italian lexicographer could not refrain from perpetuating the gender stereotype of the shrewish, nagging wifeʊnot so much from personal experience, perhaps, but only (or, at least, especially) in order to establish links between himself as a dictionary-maker, on the one side, and his male readership and the lexicographic tradition on the other. Hundreds of similar examples from early modern dictionariesʊ published in Britain and elsewhere in Europeʊcould substantiate my claim here, and helped me to set my present research in a wider perspective and found it on more general assumptions. Firstly, the issue of gender (and, more specifically, men’s consideration for and judgement on women) is not unlike other touchy subjects in a given culture and historical period: sex, age, race, religious faith, political and social ideals, etc. Gender, of course, is not a synonym for sex: it implies that dissimilarities between the sexes, though based on biological differences, are socially, culturally, and politically constructed.1

1

The sex versus gender dichotomy is often discussed in feminist writings, most interestingly in those books dealing with the relationship between language and gender, e.g. Lakoff 2004 and Talbot 1998, 7–13 and passim. A historical perspective on gender issues in early modern Britain and their impact on society and

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Secondly, any given culture and historical period will consider some of the above issues as taboos, while other issues pose no problem at all: e.g., apart from his politically incorrect definition of to marry, John Florio is credited with having first introduced in European lexicography both the Italian word cazzoʊdefined in his dictionary of 1598 as “a mans priuie member” with the additional note that, like cazzica, it might also be an interjection like “what?” or “gods me”ʊand the most popular of the English four-letter words, which is listed as one of the translation equivalents of the Italian entry-word fottere.2 Evidently, insulting women and talking about sex did not carry any social stigma in early seventeenthcentury Englandʊunlike, for example, Victorian England.3 Thirdly, any language in a given culture and historical period cannot but mirror its speech community’s ideologyʊits values and dominant attitudes, its stereotypes and taboos; languages are distorting mirrors, though, since they give voice to their speakers’ thoughts and feelings but can also disguise and stifle them. Fourthly and finally, just as (or insofar as) every language reflects its speakers’ worldview, the lexicographer working on that language will reflect language usage. Things are not that simple, of course, as the history of lexicography will clearly tell us: I am referring (a) to the descriptive versus the prescriptive approach to dictionary-making; (b) to the fact that in most cases dictionaries were (and perhaps still are) produced by and for the cultural and social establishment; (c) to the influence exerted by traditionʊpreceding dictionaries, in particularʊon the art and craft of lexicography, and finally (d) to the lexicographer’s individual (more recently, lexicographers’ collective) intention of becoming part of the cultural and ideological mainstream or steering away from it. These and similar reflections and tenets laid the foundations of my ongoing research on dictionaries as cultural objects and on lexicographers ʊSamuel Johnson, in the present essayʊas the interpreters of their own culture. language can be found, among others, in Fletcher 1995, Sommerville 1995, and Shoemaker 1998. 2 As a matter of fact, the first English lexicographer who dared to include the entry-word fuck in his wordlist was Nathan Bailey in his Dictionarium Britannicum of 1730: he did not dare too much, though, as he defined this dangerous word as “a term used of a goat”. 3 One might argue that Florio would never have shown a similar, cavalier attitude to religion or monarchy in his dictionaries, two topics that an unconventional lexicographer nowadays, unlike Florio, might deal with without risking ... being hanged, drawn, and quartered.

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2. Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary of the English Language The historians of dictionary-making in Britain have long made clear that the development of English monolingual lexicography reached a turning point at the beginning of the eighteenth century: the earlier tradition of the so-called hard-words dictionaries gave way to the slow introduction into monolingual English dictionaries of the bulk of the language; correspondingly, while most seventeenth-century dictionaries had been compiled for specific categories of users, later works were meant to do service to all types of users (see e.g. Starnes & Noyes 1946 passim). Women had figured prominently among the perspective readers of early English dictionaries since the title-page of Robert Cawdrey’s A Table Alphabeticall of 1604 mentioned “Ladies, Gentlewomen, or any other unskilfull persons” as its prime target (see Brown 2001); but as soon as English dictionaries tended to become “general” and “universal” in the early and mid-eighteenth centuryʊas John Kersey’s, Nathan Bailey’s and Samuel Johnson’s wereʊwomen were no longer mentioned as target audience, nor was their linguistic usage deemed particularly worthy of attention and registration.4 As a matter of fact, Johnson neither anticipated nor followed Lord Chesterfield’s advice in the last issue of The World for November 1754 and the first for December of that year. No reference is being made here to the well-known gratuitous puff that infuriated Johnson, but to what followed it, i.e. Chesterfield’s discussion of “the genteeler part of our language, which owes both it’s rise and progress to my fair countrywomen, whose natural turn is more to the copiousness, than to the correctness of diction” (Chesterfield 1754a, 603). Language, argued the Lord, “is indisputably the more immediate province of the fair sex” (1754b, 606), and he went on to comment on “many very expressive words coined in that fair mint”ʊthe verb to fuzz, the peculiar, polite usage of the adjective vast and the adverb vastly, and the noun flirtation: I assisted at the birth of that most insignificant word, FLIRTATION, which dropped from the most beautiful mouth in the world, and which has since received the sanction of our most accurate Laureat in one of his comedies. 4 Fleming (1993, 203) mentions the fact that in his preface to A new English dictionary of 1702 the compiler J.K. (i.e. John Kersey) includes “the more ingenious Practitioners of the Female Sex” among the prospective users of his dictionary: unlike earlier lexicography, however, his dictionary was meant to help women spell correctly, rather than to understand hard words.

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Finally, Chesterfield advised Johnson “to publish, by way of appendix to his great work, a genteel neological dictionary, containing those polite, though perhaps not strictly grammatical words and phrases, commonly used, and sometimes understood, by the BEAU MONDE” (610). Nothing came of this, of course, and of the four words mentioned by Chesterfield, Johnson only comments on flirtation as a woman-related word (see section 3 below).5 This was partly because Johnson would never have taken the Lord’s unsolicited advice, but especially because he based his dictionary on the best writers of the previous centuries, on the tenets formulated in his “Short scheme” and Plan of a dictionary, and on his own Sprachgefühl: as he made clear in his “Preface” to the Dictionary, he was aware of the “fugitive cant” (sig. C1v) of the working classes as well as the tendency to euphemism and linguistic innovation by the polite ones, both usages being for the most part beyond the scope of his dictionary. As a consequence, the way women’s language and women themselves are dealt with in Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary can safely be assumed to be basically representative of the contemporary attitude to women and to their role in English society and in the speech community. The historical context in which Johnson compiled his Dictionary was a changing one, as far as social and personal consideration of women is concerned: some doubted whether women could be said to be rational and thought that their minds were as different from men’s as their bodies were, while others insisted that women were intellectually equal to men and should receive a similar education. Other issues addressed the weak legal and economic position of women or called into question the double standard of morality and sexual behaviour.6 In this context, Johnson’s personality, temperament, and opinions come in as further elements to be considered. Anecdotes and quotations 5

On Chesterfield and women’s language see Fleming 1993, 178–181. For a general introduction to the period see R. Porter 1990; on the relationship between the sexes and men’s view of women see LeGates 1976, Nussbaum 1984, V. Jones 1990, Fletcher 1995, Gowing 1996, Shoemaker 1998, and Barker and Chalus 2005; the double standard is specifically dealt with in Thomas 1959, Spacks 1974, L. Stone 1977 (501–507), Sommerville 1995 (141–173), and Hitchcock and Cohen 1999.

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gleaned from Boswell’s Life may be said to have projected an image of Samuel Johnson as a rude misogynist who neither valued women nor appreciated their abilities at all. A well-known, though possibly spurious, episode in Boswell’s Life for 1763 is a case in point: Next day, Sunday, July 31, I told him I had been that morning at a meeting of the people called Quakers, where I had heard a woman preach. JOHNSON. “Sir, a woman’s preaching is like a dog’s walking on his hinder legs. It is not done well; but you are surprized to find it done at all.” (Boswell 1791/1934–1964, 1:463)

Johnsonian scholarship has long made it clear, however, that Johnson’s persona in Boswell’s Life is not the same as Johnson the author. Therefore, Kathleen Nulton Kemmerer, who recently wrote a book that deals specifically with Johnson’s opinions about marriage and women, is probably right in reclaiming a different “image of Johnson that is in keeping with the new emphasis on women in the eighteenth century” (Kemmerer 1998, 9). Not only has Kemmerer found that many eighteenthand early nineteenth-century women intellectuals considered him a champion of women, but her critical survey of Johnson’s Irene, The Rambler, and Rasselas has revealed him as a passionate advocate of women’s education and their active participation in intellectual life, and a challenger of gender stereotypes and widely held prejudices against women. Despite the critical relevance of Kemmerer’s book and of previous literature on Johnson and gender,7 there seems to be no specific study on the treatment of women in the Dictionary. Kemmerer herself states that “The intent of the Dictionary precludes any such discussion”ʊshe means discussion of Johnson’s sexual politics, as she defines the subject of her bookʊ”although it gives interesting insight into Johnson’s opinions and his use of words” (Kemmerer 1998, 21). It is exactly such insight, opinions, and usage that, in order to address the issue of gender in Johnson’s Dictionary, are investigated in this essay. By using Anne McDermott’s CD-ROM edition of the Dictionary (Johnson 1755/1996), and woman, women, wife, lady, and female as main search words in both definitions and quotations, some 450 entries were selected in order to study (a) those words that Johnson described as typically used 7 See, among others, Basker 1990, Cafarelli 1992, and the 1992 special issue of South Central Review devoted to “Johnson and Gender”, which includes Greene 1992. The topic of Johnson as patron of women and advocate of their education is especially dealt with in Grundy 1987 and Wellington 1977 as well as in the eulogistic Craig 1895.

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by women, (b) the words used to refer to women in the English language, and (c) the way Johnson commented on them. This essay is therefore meant to contribute to a deeper knowledge of the Dictionary itself and, on a methodological level, to a sociolinguistic analysis of the interplay between language data, lexicographic technique, and ideology in an epoch-making dictionary.

3. Women’s words The first, most interesting and least represented category includes only four words, one of the meanings or usages of each of which is said by Johnson to be typically feminine: EARTHLY. adj. [from earth.] 1. Not heavenly; vile; mean; sordid. ... 2. Belonging only to our present state; not spiritual. ... 3. Corporeal; not mental. ... 4. Any thing in the world; a female hyperbole. Oh! if to dance all night, and dress all day, Charm’d the small-pox, or chas’d old age away, Who would not scorn what housewife’s cares produce? Or who would learn one earthly thing of use? Pope. FLIRTATION. n.s. [from flirt.] A quick sprightly motion. A cant word among women. A muslin flounce, made very full, would give a very agreeable flirtation air. Pope. FRIGHTFUL. adj. [from fright.] 1. Terrible; dreadful; full of terrour. ... 2. A cant word among women for any thing unpleasing. FRIGHTFULLY. adv. [from frightful.] 1. Dreadfully; horribly. ... 2. Disagreeably; not beautifully. A woman’s word. Then to her glass; and Betty, pray, Don’t I look frightfully to-day? Swift.

What is first to be remarked on is the paucity of women’s words in Johnson’s Dictionary. This is not at all surprising, though, if one remembers that Johnson’s is to be regarded as a dictionary of the written, not the spoken language, and of the written language as it is to be found in the pages of polite

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authors, though as far as possible purged of the barbarisms that from time to time even the politest have admitted (Barrell 1983, 155).

Secondly, exaggeration, or rhetorical amplification, seems to be the only typical feature of women’s usage that Johnson can pinpoint exactly. Thirdly, it should be noted that Johnson employs the word cant to label women’s peculiar usage of flirtation and frightful: this agrees with the second or fourth sensesʊor bothʊof his own definition of the entry-word cant in the Dictionary, respectively “A particular form of speaking peculiar to some certain class or body of men” and “Barbarous jargon.” Fourthly, although Johnson labels the word flirtation as a women’s word, its meaning in the Dictionary is different from what Lord Chesterfield had identified as having recently developed in polite society (see section 2 above). Fifthly and finally, it should also be noted that the feminine sense of the word frightful is not exemplified by any quotation, so that its inclusion in the Dictionary must have been the result of the lexicographer’s Sprachgefühl. Although no mention of this peculiar usage is made in the dictionaries compiled by Bailey (1727 and 1730), Dyche and Pardon (3rd ed. 1740), Martin (1749), and Bailey and Scott (1755), the investigation of a small sample of literature published in the decade preceding the publication of the Dictionary shows that Johnson was right.8

4. Words on women I: daily life, body and clothing, jobs In order to discuss the large number of words on women in Johnson’s Dictionary a well-organized taxonomy is required. Therefore, the relevant entries will be grouped thematically and the different groups arranged on a continuum from the lowest to the highest level of assumptions, values, and behavioural models involved.

8

By using the ECCO collection of eighteenth-century texts many pertinent examples were easily found, the following among them: (1) Samuel Richardson, Pamela (1746) 136: “See, Sister, said she, here’s a charming Creature! Would she not tempt the best Lord in the Land to run away with her? O frightful! thought I; here’s an Avowal of the Matter at once: I am now gone, that’s certain.” (2) Anon., The history of Charlotte Summers, the fortunate parish girl (1750) 60: “Lord have Mercy upon us, Sir Thomas, says Margery, don’t be in such a frightful Hurry; I’ll tell you as fast as I can.” (3) Mary Collier, Letters from Felicita to Charlotte, 3rd ed. (1755) 237: “I looked at her person:ʊI was struck at the disorder of her dressʊfrightful disorder! could I see it without redoubled confusion? I reflected on the indignities she had sufferedʊbrutal indignities!”

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4.1. Daily life First of all, then, although the lexicon of a language is never fully neutral, only a cursory glance can be cast at those entries where women are mentioned in the definitions as a matter of fact. Such entries are numerous and refer to many different aspects of women’s daily life, as a few representative examples will make clear: KNITTINGNEEDLE. n.s. ... A wire which women use in knitting. ... MILLINER. n.s. ... One who sells ribands and dresses for women. ...

PERSON. n.s. ... 1. Individual or particular man or woman. A person is a thinking intelligent being, that has reason and reflection, and can consider itself as itself, the same thinking thing, in different times and places. Locke. 2. Man or woman considered as opposed to things, or distinct from them. A zeal for persons is far more easy to be perverted, than a zeal for things. Sprat’s Sermons. ... 3. Human Being; considered with respect to mere corporal existence. ... 4. Man or woman considered as present, acting or suffering. ... 5. A general loose term for a human being; one; a man. ... 6. One’s self; not a representative. ... 7. Exteriour appearance. ... 8. Man or woman represented in a fictitious dialogue. ... THIMBLE. n.s. ... A metal cover by which women secure their fingers from the needle when they sew. ...

4.2. Women’s bodies Only a dozen entries describe the female body or physical condition: the definitions are certainly meant to be neutral and scientific in tone (and those for brunett and to dishevel certainly are), but one cannot help noticing that most of them deal with either childbirth and related problems (breast 2, breeder 3, caudle, childbed, to deliver 6, lentigo, menstruous) or with fits as typical female illness (fit 5, hystericks, mother 5), thus implicitly marking the sexual difference between man and woman and alluding to the latter as “the weaker vessel”:9

9

See e.g. Fletcher 1995 (60–82), Hitchcock 1997 (42–57), and Harvey 2005.

Words By And On Women In Johnson’s Dictionary BREAST. n.s. ... 2. The dugs or teats of women which contain the milk. The substance of the breasts is composed of a great number of glands, of an oval figure, which lie in a great quantity of fat. Their excretory ducts, as they approach the nipple, join and unite together, till at last they form seven, eight, or more, small pipes, called tubuli lactiferi, which have several cross canals, by which they communicate with one another, that if any of them be stopped, the milk, which was brought to it, might not stagnate, but pass through by the other pipes, which all terminate in the extremity of the nipple. They have arteries and veins from the subclavian and intercostal. They have nerves from the vertebral pairs, and from the sixth pair of the brain. Their use is to separate the milk for the nourishment of the foetus. The tubes, which compose the glands of the breast in maids, like a sphincter muscle, contract so closely, that no part of the blood can enter them; but when the womb grows big with a fœtus, and compresses the descending trunk of the great artery, the blood flows in a greater quantity, and with a greater force, through the arteries of the breasts, and forces a passage into their glands, which, being at first narrow, admits only of a thin water; but growing wider by degrees, as the womb grows bigger, the glands receive a thick serum, and, after birth, they run with a thick milk; because that blood, which before did flow to the foetus, and, for three or four days afterwards, by the uterus, beginning then to stop, does more dilate the mamillary glands. Quincy. They pluck the fatherless from the breast. Job, xxiv. 9. CAUDLE. n.s. ... A mixture of wine and other ingredients, given to women in childbed, and sick persons. ... FIT. n.s. ... 5. It is used, without an epithet of discrimination, for the hysterical disorders of women, and the convulsions of children; and by the vulgar for the epilepsy. Mrs. Bull was so much enraged, that she fell downright into a fit. Arbuthnot’s History of John Bull. MOTHER. n.s. ... 5. Hysterical passion; so called, as being imagined peculiar to women. This stopping of the stomach might be the mother; forasmuch as many were troubled with mother fits, although few returned to have died of them. Graunt’s Bills.

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4.3. Articles of clothing Only a brief mention can be made of the 33 entry-words defining as many female articles of clothing: bodice, bonelace, breastknot, busk, capuchin, caul, chioppine, clog 3, colbertine, commode, furbelow, hairlace, hoop 3, jump 3, kercheif, lace 3, mantelet 1, mob, necklace, patten, pin 1, plaid, ridinghood, shoetye, smock, staylace, stays, stomacher, tighter, topknot, tucker, vail 2, whittle 1. Although quite a few nouns in this list document the extravagances of contemporary female fashions in clothing,10 especially as far as the upper layers of English society were concerned, most of Johnson’s definitions here are simply descriptive, as a couple of examples will show: BREASTKNOT. n.s. ... A knot or bunch of ribbands worn by women on the breast. HOOP. n.s. ... 3. The whalebone with which women extend their petticoats; a farthingale. A petticoat without a hoop. Swift. At coming in you saw her stoop; The entry brush’d against her hoop. Swift. All that hoops are good for is to clean dirty shoes, and to keep fellows at distance. Clarissa.

Very rarely does the lexicographer specify that a particular article of clothing and the word for it are no longer fashionable or no longer used, as in the case of plaid and whittle. Just as rarely a comparison between the first and the fourth revised editions of the Dictionary will show that Johnson was able to correct and rewrite an entry (furbelow) or add a new one (smicket) belonging to this semantic area.11

10

Female fashion in clothing or, rather, female follies were often castigated in popular satire: a representative example is John Dunton’s Bumography: or, A Touch at the Ladies’ Tails of 1707. I mention Dunton because a dozen years before, in 1694, he had published (and very probably edited or co-edited) The Ladies Dictionary, an alphabetical manual of instruction for women on many different topics, fashion and clothing included (see Linda Mitchell’s chapter in this volume, and Dunton 1694/2010). On women’s clothes see Cunnington 1957 and Waugh 1968; on the relationship between fashion and economy see KowaleskiWallace 1997 and Berg and Clifford 1999. 11 See section 5.5.3 below for the transferred usage of the word smock, sense 1 of which is “The undergarment of a woman; a shift”.

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4.4. Jobs Quite a large number of entry-words in the Dictionary refer to women’s jobs, occupations, or living conditions.12 These words have to be divided into two groups, for both semantic and formal reasons. In the first group women are simply defined by their occupations, and their occupational names may be further subdivided according to what women produce (dairymaid, milkmaid, spinster 1, workwoman), sell (applewoman, butterwoman, herbwoman, milkwoman, oysterwench / oysterwoman) or do (alewife, basket-woman, bondmaid, bondswoman, chambermaid, char-woman, cinder-wench, drynurse, duenna, governante, housekeeper 4, housemaid, maiden 2, maidservant, market-maid, midwife, nun, nurse, queen, tirewoman, waiting woman, wife 2, woman 2). Three remarks are in order here: first, it is worth noticing the occupational meaning of otherwise more general terms, as maiden may mean “A woman servant” (sense 2), wife may be “used for a woman of low employment” (sense 2), and woman may mean “A female attendant on a person of rank” (sense 2); secondly, although in most cases the above words refer to low employments, Johnson’s definitions are neutral, simply reflecting the contemporary organization of the job market; thirdly, only one word in this groupʊoysterwomanʊcarries a social stigma with it, as it had long acquired a derogatory meaning in English, as Johnson’s gloss and quotations testify: OYSTERWENCH. } n.s. ... A woman whose business is to sell oysters. OYSTERWOMAN.} Proverbially, A low woman. Off goes his bonnet to an oysterwench. Shakesp. The oysterwomen lock’d their fish up, And trudg’d away to cry no bishop. Hudibras.

The second group of occupational terms is made up of a long list of 65 derived words formed with the -ess suffix to denote a wide range of female roles: abbess, actress, adulteress, ambassadress, archduchess, auditress, baroness, benefactress, canoness, cateress, chantress, citess, cloistress, coheiress, commandress, conductress, countess, deaconess, detractress, divineress, dutchess, embassadress, emperess, empress, enchantress, fautress, fornicatress, foundress, giantess, goddess, governess, heiress, hermitess, heroess, hostess, huntress, inheritress, inventress, laundress, marchioness, mayoress, mistress, murderess, patronness, 12

Women’s role in the British labour market is dealt with, among others, in Hill 1989, H. Barker 2005, Froide 2005, and Shoemaker 1998, 145–208.

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peeress, portress, priestess, princess, prophetess, proprietress, protectress, schoolmistress, seamstress, semstress, shepherdess, solicitress, songstress, sorceress, suitress, traitress, tutoress, tyranness, victress, viscountess, votaress. At first sight, one is tempted to consider many of these forms simply as dictionary words, perhaps invented by Johnson for the sake of analogy: as a matter of fact, for only nine out of 65ʊarchduchess, baroness, benefactress, coheiress, conductress, deaconess, hermitess, mayoress and viscountessʊJohnson does not provide any textual evidence to corroborate their present or past usage.13 And in one case only the usage of these -ess words does not seem to be widespread: citess, “A city woman” is said to be “A word peculiar to Dryden.” What is interesting to notice in the long list above is that the -ess suffix may convey various subtle nuances of meaning in relation to the different word bases it is attached to. (1) When the ranks of the nobility or important offices are referred to in the bases, the -ess suffix suggests that the female forms areʊsocially as well as linguisticallyʊdependent on and secondary to the corresponding male ones, as in countess “The lady of an earl or count”, marchioness “The wife of a marquis”, peeress “The lady of a peer; a woman ennobled”, or mayoress “The wife of the mayor” etc. (2) Sometimes, however, an important social status is conveyed with no reference to male power, as in commandress “A woman vested with supreme authority”, conductress “A woman that directs; directress”, or tyranness “A she tyrant.” Princess and emperess sit uneasily between this and the preceding category, as Johnson’s different senses make clear: a princess can be “1. A sovereign lady; a woman having sovereign command … 2. A sovereign lady of rank, next to that of a queen … 3. The daughter of a king” or “4. The wife of a prince: as, the princess of Wales”, whereas an emperess is either “1. A woman invested with imperial power” or “2. The queen of an emperour” (note that the variant form empress has obviously the same meaningsʊ”1. The queen of an emperour” and “2. A

13

Anyway, the online OED lists them all, and their first attestations largely precede the publication of Johnson’s Dictionary. This is perhaps the place to remark that in the revised edition of the Dictionary the word heroess is described as “Not in use”, i.e. totally replaced by heroine that, duly listed in both editions, is defined as “A female hero. Anciently, according to English analogy, heroess.” And probably for the sake of analogy and because it is attested in such a masterpiece as The Faerie Queene, Johnson includes avengeress in the revised edition only to define it as “A female avenger. Not in use.”

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female invested with imperial dignity; a female sovereign”ʊbut they are listed in reversed order!).14 (3) In religious language -ess forms may also denote important positions for women, as in abbess “The superiour or governess of a nunnery or monastery of women”, or canoness, deaconess etc. (4) Female jobs are also referred to in a straightforward, unbiased way, e.g. actress 2 “A woman that plays on the stage”, chantress “A woman singer”, cateress “A woman employed to cater, or provide victuals”, laundress “A woman whose employment is to wash cloaths”, portress, schoolmistress, shepherdess etc. (5) -ess forms may define women as they temporarily take on a specific role or duty: e.g., embassadress is “A woman sent on a publick message” and foundress is either “1. A woman that founds, builds, establishes, or begins any thing” or “2. A woman that establishes any charitable revenue.” (6) In quite a few words the -ess suffix denotes a condition a woman is in, which may be either positive (benefactress, coheiress, heiress, inheritress, proprietress, victress) or negative (adulteress, fornicatress, murderess, traitress). (7) Rarely, instead, -ess forms help define the main feature of a woman’s character, as in detractress “A censorious woman.” Most -ess words may easily fit in one of the above categories. A few of them, however, do not, as they have taken on different meanings with the passing of time: an enchantress is “1. A sorceress; a woman versed in magical arts” and by metaphor has also acquired a new, more positive meaning as “2. A woman whose beauty or excellencies give irresistible influence”; governess has both the general meaning “1. A female invested with authority” and the more specialized meanings “2. A tutoress; a woman that has the care of young ladies” and “3. A tutoress; an 14

Men’s uneasiness about women’s power is well documented in the Dictionary by the entry-word gynecocrasay (sc. gynecocrasy), which is defined as “Petticoat government; female power.” Although the online OED provides a few attestations from the early seventeenth to the late nineteenth century, Johnson must have taken this word from either Martin 1749ʊwhere gynaecocracy is defined as “feminine rule, or petticoat government”ʊor one of the few preceding dictionaries (Dyche and Pardon 1740, Bailey 1730, Glossographia 1707, or Cocker 1704) that included it in their wordlist. This learned word was first introduced into English monolingual lexicography in 1659 by Thomas Blount (“gynecocraty or gynocratie, feminine Rule or Authority, the Government of a woman”), who may have taken it from Cotgrave 1611, where French gynecocratie is likewise glossed “Feminine rule, or authoritie, the gouernment of a woman.”

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instructress; a directress.” But the widest range of general versus specialized denotations and positive versus negative connotations in -ess words is certainly exemplified by the word mistress: MISTRESS. n.s.... 1. A woman who governs: correlative to subject or to servant. ... 2. A woman who possesses faculties uninjured. ... 3. A woman skilled in any thing. ... 4. A woman teacher. ... 5. A woman beloved and courted. ... 6. A term of contemptuous address. ... 7. A whore; a concubine.

What is to be noted here is that the different senses show a cline from general and positive to specific and negative and that, unlike the preceding senses, the last one has no quotations to illustrate it: one might surmise that Johnson had felt compelled to list this meaning as well but had refused to give it any literary credit. As far as the usage of these -ess words is concerned, the only word worth commenting on is ambassadress, whose second meaning is the only example of a pragmatically-marked usage: AMBASSADRESS. n.s. ... 1. The lady of an ambassadour. 2. In ludicrous language, a woman sent on a message. Well, my ambassadress ———— Come you to menace war, and loud defiance? Or does the peaceful olive grace your brow? Rowe’s Penit.15

It is as if this -ess word had been socially acceptable only insofar as it showed a woman in the bright light of her successful husband; a different usage might only expose a woman to ridicule and criticism for attaching too much importance to the paltry issues of a woman’s life.

15

Note that embassadress, that is not so much a variant form of ambassadress as the female equivalent of embassador (“One sent on a publick message”), is simply used to mean “A woman sent on a publick message.” Note also that the online OED, s.v. ambassadress, provides quotations with both spelling variants but does not mention any distinction in their usage.

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5. Words on women II: relations between the sexes One may easily hypothesise that, when searching Johnson’s Dictionary for words and entries that more directly reflect the contemporary relations between men and women, the results will show an even stronger bias and prejudice towards women than the vocabulary analysed so far. Although it will be shown that Johnson’s attitude is, generally speaking, not condemnatory, and he is certainly not prejudiced against women, as a matter of fact most relevant words here paint a grim picture of womankind in eighteenthcentury Britain. The interplay among Johnson’s stance, English lexicographic tradition, and the biased widely held views on women can be seen at work in his entries defining men’s aversion to women: the word misogyny is defined in a simple and uncommitted way as “Hatred of women” and no illustrative quotation follows; womanhater is likewise simply explained as “One that has an aversion from the female sex”, but this is followed by a quotation from Swiftʊthe 1728 poem “The journal of a modern lady, in a letter to a person of quality”ʊthat, Swift’s irony apart, might be read as a positive statement on the lexicographer’s part: How could it come into your mind, To pitch on me of all mankind, Against the sex to write a satyr; And brand me for a womanhater. Swift.

Anyway, whatever Johnson’s and his readership’s attitude to women, the entry-words referring to the relations between the sexes can be divided into five different groups: words dealing with marriage; words describing “female nature”; words denoting and connoting women’s physical appearance and behaviour; words dealing with love and sexual relations; and, finally, pragmatically motivated meanings and changes of meaning in words referring to women.

5.1. Words dealing with marriage In Rambler 115, Samuel Johnson seems to agree with Hymenaeus when the latter says that marriage is “able to afford the highest happiness decreed to our present state.”16 However, when considering the 69 entry16

Quoted from Kemmerer 1998, 32; the whole chapter 1 of Kemmerer’s book (23– 37) deals with Johnson on women and marriage. For a general introduction to marriage in early modern England see L. Stone 1977 and 1992, Sommerville 1995

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words from the Dictionary that deal with marriageʊadvancement 5, affinity 1, age 7, alimony, bastard, bigamy, bride, to cohabit 2, coheiress, consort, contract 2, covert, coverture 2, couple, divorce, divorcement, divorcer, dotal, dowager, dowery, dowry, espousals, feme covert, feme sole, fortune 6, fortunehunter, fosterchild, honey-moon, housewife, housewifely adj., housewifely adv., housewifery, huswife, to huswife, huswifery, jointure, maiden 1, marriage, to marry, matrimony, monogamy, mother, to mother, motherhood, motherless, motherly, nubile, pinmoney, relict, to settle 10, settlement 3, spinster 2, spouse, spoused, spouseless, treason, unconjugal, unmarried, to wed, wedding, widow, to widow, widower, widowhood, widowhunter, widowmaker, wife, to wive, wively ʊthe overall picture that emerges from them is certainly not a rosy and a romantic one. What is first to be noted is the strikingly high number of entries dealing with legal terms. This is not surprising, for two different reasons. The first is “Johnson’s lifelong fascination with the law” (Scanlan 2006, 88; see also J. Stone 2005). The second is the chaotic nature of marriage settlements in early eighteenth-century Britain: in fact, “it was not until 1753”ʊthat is to say, a couple of years before the Dictionary was publishedʊ”that Lord Hardwicke’s Marriage Act was passed, which at last brought coherence and logic to the laws governing marriage” (L. Stone 1977, 35).17 Given the basically economic (rather than affective) nature of contemporary marriage (see Erickson 1993), very many words provide evidence of the strong link between marriage and property (advancement 5, alimony, coheiress, dotal, dowager, dowery, dowry, jointure, pinmoney, to settle 10, settlement 3, etc) or refer to marriage arrangements and contracts (age 7, contract 2, espousals, matrimony, etc) and the role of the law in married life (covert, coverture 2, feme covert, feme sole, spouse, etc) or beyond it (bastard, bigamy, divorce, divorcement, divorcer). Notice that bigamy is defined as “The crime of having two wives at once”, i.e. an illegal condition of which only men can be guilty. Correspondingly, monogamy is the “Marriage of one wife.” Among the everyday words in the list above, some are not only evocative of unbalanced relations between men and women, but allude to (114 ff.), and Evans 2005. Love, as distinct from marriage or not, is dealt with in Hagstrum 1980. 17 Notice that Lawrence Stone’s more recent book on marriage in England between the Restoration and the Marriage Act is aptly and revealingly entitled Uncertain unions (1992). Hogarth’s paintings and engravings are an artistic testimony to the problems that ensue from marriages made for purely financial reasons: the Marriage à la mode series is from the 1740s.

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the dangerous situation even an economically independent woman may get involved in (fortune 6, fortunehunter, widowhunter).

5.2. Words describing “female nature” Words describing traditional feminine roles and supposed female nature, though not very numerous, are particularly interesting in order to understand gender-based stereotypes at work in eighteenth-century Britain. What is to be emphasised here is not so much Johnson’s choice of these entry-words but his definitions and illustrative quotations. Female and related words are a case in point: the adjective female, “Not masculine; belonging to a she”, is defined by contrast first, rather than in itself; and Johnson’s definition of the noun female as “A she; one of the sex which brings young” underlines the reproductive nature of women, whereas his quotations for this entryʊmost authoritative as they are taken from the Bible and Shakespeare’s worksʊremind his readers that women are radically different from and intellectually subject to men: God created man in his own image, male and female created he them. Gen. i. 27. Man, more divine, Lord of the wide world, and wide wat’ry seas, Indu’d with intellectual sense and soul, Are masters to their females, and their lords. Shakespeare.

In a similar way, the noun feminine is defined as “A she; one of the sex that brings young; a female”, while the corresponding adjectival entry introduces a new element in the picture, as the first two “acceptable” senses of the word – “1. Of the sex that brings young; female … 2. Soft; tender; delicate”ʊare followed by one that can only be stigmatized by patriarchal ideology: 3. Effeminate; emasculated. Ninias was no man of war at all, but altogether feminine and subjected to ease and delicacy. Raleigh’s Hist. of the World.

No bias, instead, is found in the definition of feminality as “Female nature”, nor in those words that help convey, and perpetuate, the traditional notion of femininity: maidenhood “1. Virginity; virgin purity; freedom from contamination”; maidenly “Like a maid; gentle, modest, timorous, decent”; muliebrity “Womanhood; the contrary to virility; the manners and character of woman”; virgin adj. “Befitting a virgin; suitable

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to a virgin; maidenly”; virginal adj. “Maiden; maidenly; pertaining to a virgin”; to woman “To make pliant like a woman”; womanhood / womanhead “The character and collective qualities of a woman. Obsolete”; womanish “Suitable to a woman”; womankind “The female sex; the race of women”; womanly adj. “1. Becoming a woman; suiting a woman; feminine; not masculine … 2. Not childish; not girlish”; womanly adv. “In the manner of a woman; effeminately.” When women do not conform to the ideal and the examples set before them by society, condemnatory words are ready at hand. It is perhaps ironic that the best known word for a rebellious woman, shrew, was originally used with reference to men as well. Johnson is ready to acknowledge this in his etymological note, but both his definition with its long string of adjectives and his illustrative quotations clearly express strong popular feelings: SHREW. n.s. ... A peevish, malignant, clamorous, spiteful, vexatious, turbulent woman. [it appears in Robert of Gloucester, that this word signified anciently any one perverse or obstinate of either sex.] There dede of hem vor hunger a thousand and mo, And yat nolde the screwen to none pes go. Robert of Gloucester. Be merry, my wife has all; For women are shrews both short and tall. Shak. H. IV. By this reckoning he is more shrew than she. Shakespeare. A man had got a shrew to his wife, and there could be no quiet in the house for her. L’Estrange. Her sallow cheeks her envious mind did shew, And ev’ry feature spoke aloud the shrew. Dryden. Every one of them, who is a shrew in domestick life, is now become a scold in politicks. Addis. Freeholder.

Other examples of mildly derogatory words and definitions include prude “A woman over nice and scrupulous, and with false affectation”, to squall “To scream out as a child or woman frighted” and to trape “To run idly and sluttishly about. It is used only of women.” More interesting, however, are those words and definitions that indirectly allude to women’s stereotypical characteristics by censuring men that seem to make those same characteristics their own. A man, in fact, should be blamed for going beyond the boundaries set by society for his sex, as the entry cotquean shows: COTQUEAN. n.s. ... A man who busies himself with women’s affairs. Look to the bak’d meats, good Angelica; Spare not for cost. ʊʊ

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ʊʊ Go, go, you cotquean, go; Get you to bed. Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. A stateswoman is as ridiculous a creature as a cotquean: each of the sexes should keep within its particular bounds. Addison’s Freeholder, No. 38. You have given us a lively picture of husbands hen-peck’d; but you have never touched upon one of the quite different character, and who goes by the name of cotquean. Add. Spect.

A man may also reverse the established social order by loving his wife too much, which is described as an illness and a loss of understanding in uxorious “Submissively fond of a wife; infected with connubial dotage”, uxoriously “With fond submission to a wife”, and uxoriousness “Connubial dotage; fond submission to a wife.” The entry to womanise stresses this point further in both its definition, “To emasculate; to effeminate; to soften. Proper, but not used”, and quotation, “This effeminate love of a woman doth womanize a man. Sid.” More radically, the danger from man’s failure to conform to the traditional standards of male behaviour and way of thinking is highlighted in quite a few entries (on the ideology behind these words and their lexicographical treatment see Barker-Benfield 1992, 104–153 and Fletcher 1995, 83–98 and 322–346): (1) The noun effeminacy means both “1. Admission of the qualities of a woman; softness; unmanly delicacy; mean submission” and “2. Lasciviousness; loose pleasure.” Correspondingly, the adjective effeminate means “1. Having the qualities of a woman; womanish; soft to an unmanly degree; voluptuous; tender; luxurious.” The verb to effeminate v.a. is even stronger, in its definition “To make womanish; to weaken; to emasculate; to unman” as much as in its illustrative quotation, “When one is sure it will not corrupt or effeminate childrens minds, and make them fond of trifles, I think all things should be contrived to their satisfaction. Locke.” (2) In both the verb to emasculate and the adjective emasculation the primary, medical meaning is followed by the secondary, transferred one, i.e. “To effeminate; to weaken; to vitiate by unmanly softness” and “Effeminacy; womanish qualities; unmanly softness” respectively. (3) Finally, the most clear-cut distinction between the sexesʊdrawn by the language, the society and the lexicographer alikeʊcan be found in the definition of virile as “Belonging to man; not puerile; not feminine.”

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5.3. Words on women’s physical appearance and behaviour The ideological model of male dominance versus female subservience founded on gender-based distinctions also determined language usage as far as words describing women’s physical appearance and their behaviour were concerned. Before providing some examples from the Dictionary, two facts are to be emphasized: firstly, the very connection between appearance and behaviour in the denotative and connotative meanings of quite a few words is indicative of a gender-based, male notion of femininity; and secondly, the words that describe the negative outward and behavioural features of women largely outnumber the positive ones. Lady seems to be the only name or title available in eighteenth-century English to portray women in a fully positive social and/or personal light, as it may mean either “A woman of high rank” (with the note “the title of lady properly belongs to the wives of knights, of all degrees above them, and to the daughters of earls, and all of higher ranks”) or “An illustrious or eminent woman” or “A word of complaisance used of women.” Even gentlewoman, in fact, denotes “A woman of birth above the vulgar; a woman well descended” or “A woman who waits about the person of one of high rank” but may also be used ambiguously as “A word of civility or irony.” Dame, damsel and matron have all widened their meanings by diluting the social value attached to them: dame denotes “A lady; the title of honour to women” and “is still used in poetry for women of rank”, but it has come to mean “Mistress of a low family” and “Woman in general” as well; a damsel is “A young gentlewoman; a young woman of distinction: now only used in verse” and “An attendant of the better rank” but also “A wench; a country lass”; a matron is “An elderly lady” and, more humbly, “An old woman.” The most drastic semantic change for the worse registered by Johnson in this category of words is undergone by miss: MISS. n.s. ... 1. The term of honour to a young girl. Where there are little masters and misses in a house, they are great impediments to the diversions of the servants. Sw. 2. A strumpet; a concubine; a whore; a prostitute. All women would be of one piece, The virtuous matron and the miss. Hudibras, p. iii. This gentle cock, for solace of his life, Six misses had besides his lawful wife. Dryden.

It goes without saying that beauty and youth were appreciated and praised, by both the society and the lexicographer: a fair is defined as “A

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beauty; elliptically a fair woman” and the accompanying quotation hints at the fascination beauty may hold for men, since “Gentlemen who do not design to marry, yet pay their devoirs to one particular fair. Spectator, No. 288”; in its third sense, a toast is “A celebrated woman whose health is often drunk”; belle is “A young lady” and bellibone “A woman excelling both in beauty and goodness. A word now out of use”; a girl is simply defined as “A young woman, or female child”, whereas a coquette is “A gay, airy girl; a girl who endeavours to attract notice”, a minx is “A young, pert, wanton girl”, flirt may also mean “3. A pert young hussey” and tomboy is “A mean fellow; sometimes a wild coarse girl.” These latter entries may have reminded dictionary users that acceptable social and personal behaviour is as important as an engaging personal appearance: courtesy does not only mean “Elegance of manners; civility; complaisance” and “An act of civility or respect” but also “The reverence made by women”, and “to courtesy” is defined as “To perform an act of reverence” and “To make a reverence in the manner of ladies.”18 In a sense, this word epitomises how women were expected to behave in eighteenth-century society: be submissive and compliant, and defer to men and men’s wishes. This is of course what the conduct books had long been preaching to women, as far as good behaviour, manners, and morality were concerned.19 Naturally enough, then, the language was rich in words that could be used to define those women that did not conform to the idealized construction of femininity. The entry shrew has already been quoted in section 5.2 above, but similar entries can be found for scold “A clamourous, rude, mean, low, foul-mouthed woman”, termagant “A scold; a brawling turbulent woman” (with the note “it appears in Shakespeare to have been anciently used of men”), or romp “1. A rude, awkward, boisterous, untaught girl.” Although the larger number of lexical items that describe women as old, unattractive or untidy do not certainly express the same harsh criticism as that levelled at women for their misbehaviour or defiant attitude, still social stigma is palpable in many words, as Johnson’s definitions make clear. 18 In the revised 1773 edition of the Dictionary the first sense is modified as “To perform an act of reverence: it is now only used of women”, thus registering a change in social behaviour. 19 Among the very many books dealing with this topic, only two will be mentioned: Hull’s classic study (1982) covers the early modern period to 1640, whereas the collection of essays in Armstrong and Tennenhouse 1987 brings the analysis further on into the eighteenth century and later.

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First of all, old age in women is often held in contempt: beldam is “1. An old woman; generally a term of contempt, marking the last degree of old age, with all its faults and miseries”; crone means “1. An old ewe” but metaphorically also “2. In contempt, an old woman”; nurse, too, may also be used to refer to “4. An old woman in contempt”, and trot is “2. An old woman. In contempt. I know not whence derived.” Only grandam is simply and factually “2. An old withered woman” and the learned word anility neutrally defines “The state of being an old woman; the old age of women.” Secondly, a few words blame women for their lack of taste or cleanliness: a dowdy is “An aukward, ill-dressed, inelegant woman; a slattern is “A woman negligent, not elegant or nice”; trapes denotes “An idle slatternly woman” (cf. the verb to trape, discussed in section 5.2 above); a trollop is “A slatternly, loose woman”; and slut means “1. A dirty woman” but is also used as “2. A word of slight contempt to a woman.” Thirdly, a few words describe women’s unattractiveness; unlike lack of youth and cleanliness, lack of beauty does not seem to be stigmatized, as the matter-of-fact tone of Johnson’s definitions seems to imply: a woman may be ordinary in the fourth sense of this word, i.e. “Ugly, not handsome: as she is an ordinary woman”; a grimalkin is a “Grey little woman; the name of an old cat”, a pundle is “A short and fat woman. Ainsworth”, a ronion is “A fat bulky woman” and a trubtail is “A short squat woman. Ainsworth.”20

5.4 Words dealing with love and sexual relations Words dealing with love and sexual relations make up the largest group in the corpus of gender-related entries in Johnson’s Dictionary, totalling some eighty terms, most of them nouns. Various subgroups may be identified. 5.4.1 Courtship Words denoting legal and “respectable” forms of sexual relations before marriage stress the man’s role: courtship is the man’s job as the 20 Another word that might have been included in this group is fren, defined by Johnson as “A worthless woman. An old word wholly forgotten” and followed by a quotation from Spenser. This meaning, however, was corrected by Johnson in his revised edition where the same word is defined as “A stranger. An old word wholly forgotten here; but retained in Scotland. Beattie”.

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verb to court “1. To woo; to solicit a woman to marriage” and the noun courtship itself “2. The solicitation of a woman to marriage” testify; he has to be gallant “4. Inclined to courtship”21 and a wooer “One who courts a woman”, and perhaps ready for a serenade “Musick or songs with which ladies are entertained by their lovers in the night.” 5.4.2 Chastity and unchastity The entry chastity in its first sense is defined as “1. Purity of the body” and this is explained by the following illustrative quotation, among others: Chastity is either abstinence or continence: abstinence is that of virgins or widows; continence of married persons: chaste marriages are honourable and pleasing to God. Taylor’s Rule of Living Holy.

Although this quotation seems to imply that chastity is expected from both man and wife, the sexual senses of the word chaste can be said to refer to women only, as the example and the quotation provided show: CHASTE. adj. ... 1. Pure from all commerce of sexes; as a chaste virgin. ... 4. True to the marriage bed. Love your children, be discreet, chaste, keepers at home. Titus, ii.5.

This interpretation can be confirmed by the fact that the sex-related meaning of the word lightness is only referred to women: “3. Unchastity; want of conduct in women.” As a matter of fact, however, all the words denoting marital infidelity22 in the Dictionary put the blame more or less equally on either sex: an adulteress is “A woman that commits adultery” and a cuckold is “One that 21

In the 1773 edition the definition of this adjective is changed into “Courtly with respect to ladies”. As a noun, gallant means either “1. A gay, sprightly, airy, splendid man” or “2. A whoremaster, who caresses women to debauch them” or “3. A wooer; one who courts a woman for marriage”, thus displaying the same coexistence of different, or even contradictory meanings that is found in such words as mistress and miss (see sections 4.4. and 5.3 above). On courtship and marriage in eighteenth-century England see Shoemaker 1998, 87 ff., Hitchcock 1997, 24–41, and L. Stone 1977. 22 The contemporary term for intercourse outside of marriage was “criminal conversation”, which is unfortunately not included in Johnson’s wordlist. On this topic see Wagner 1988, 133–161. Different aspects of eighteenth-century sexuality are discussed in Boucé 1982 and L. Stone 1977.

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is married to an adultress; one whose wife is false to his bed”, but the corresponding verb to cuckold has two different senses, the first stressing the man’s role (“1. To corrupt a man’s wife; to bring upon a man the reproach of having an adulterous wife; to rob a man of his wife’s fidelity), and the second the woman’s (“2. To wrong a husband by unchastity). A man can either be a cuckoldmaker “One that makes a practice of corrupting wives” or a wittol “A man who knows the falsehood of his wife and seems contented; a tame cuckold.” 5.4.3 Licentiousness Licentious behaviour, instead, is lexically and lexicographically referred to men in particular: a man may be guilty of concubinage “The act of living with a woman not married”, fornication “1. Concubinage or commerce with an unmarried woman”, or whoring “fornication”; he may then be defined as a fornicator “One that has commerce with unmarried women” or a wencher “A fornicator”; and his actions may be described by the verbs to fornicate “to commit lewdness”, to cover “7. To copulate with a female”,23 and to whore in its transitive (“To corrupt with regard to chastity”) and intransitive (“To converse unlawfully with the other sex”) use. In this context, the only word related to women is fornicatress, “A woman who without marriage cohabits with a man.” 5.4.4 Prostitution As far as prostitution is concerned,24 a prostitute may be denoted by numerous specific terms, the most common ones being strumpet “A whore; a prostitute”, prostitute “2. A publick strumpet”, and whore, which may mean either “1. A woman who converses unlawfully with men; a fornicatress; an adultress; a strumpet” (apparently, no money being involved in her actions) or “2. A prostitute; a woman who receives men for money.” Although he defines prostitution as “2. The life of a publick strumpet”, Johnson does not seem to make a clear distinction between a kept mistress and a prostitute, as is shown by his definitions of concubine “A woman kept in fornication; a whore; a strumpet”, miss “2. A strumpet; a concubine; a whore; a prostitute”, mistress “A whore; a concubine”, and 23

Notice that Johnson modestly defines to copulate as “To come together as different sexes” and copulation as “The congress or embrace of the two sexes.” 24 On prostitution in eighteenth-century Britain see V. Jones 1990, 57 ff., and Henderson 1999. Gowing 1996, 59 ff., carries out an interesting analysis of words for sexual slander and insult.

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whoremaster / whoremonger “One who keeps whores, or converses with a fornicatress.” Courtezan, doxy, drab, hackney, and harlot are used more or less synonymously, whereas harridan denotes more specifically “A decayed strumpet” and trull “A low whore; a vagrant strumpet.” Crack is “8. A whore; in low language” whereas Laced mutton is “An old word for a whore.” More terms for a prostitute derive from particular senses of other words (baggage 3, quean, wench 3, etc). A prostitute’s behaviour is described by the adjective meretricious “Whorish; such as is practised by prostitutes; alluring by false show”, by the related adverb meretriciously “Whorishly; after the manner of whores”, and by the noun meretriciousness “False allurement like those of strumpets”; prostitute as an adjective means “Vicious for hire; sold to infamy or wickedness; sold to whoredom.” Also the exploitation of prostitution is referred to in the Dictionary: a seraglio is “A house of women kept for debauchery” and a stew “2. A brothel; a house of prostitution” (with the note “This signification is by some imputed to this, that there were licensed brothels near the stews or fishponds in Southwark; but probably stew, like bagnio, took a bad signification from bad use”); a bawd is “A procurer, or procuress; one that introduces men and women to each other, for the promotion of debauchery.” The pertinent verbs here are to hack “To hackney; to turn hackney or prostitute”, to prostitute “1. To sell to wickedness; to expose to crimes for a reward. It is commonly used of women sold to whoredom by others or themselves”, and to strumpet “To make a whore; to debauch.” 5.4.5 Rape and the pursuit of women A few entries in the Dictionary describe sexual violence against women.25 A rape is a “1. Violent defloration of chastity”, a crime that is also defined in violation 2 and violence 6; to ransack “3. To violate; to deflower” is a synonym of to ravish “1. To constuprate by force”; a ravisher “1. He that embraces a woman by violence” may also be termed a violator. Violence apart, men’s attitudes to women may have different aims, or no aims at all, as the definitions of intriguer as “One who busies himself in private transactions; one who forms plots; one who persues women” and dangler “A man that hangs about women only to waste time” testify; in the latter case, however, the social stigma attached to a kind of behaviour 25

Violence in sexual and marital relations is discussed in Fletcher 1995, 192–203, and in Gowing 1996, 180–231.

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felt to be unworthy of men is evident in the illustrative quotation chosen by the lexicographer: “A dangler is of neither sex. Ralph’s Miscel.” 5.4.6 Women’s revenge on men In some way, women can take their revenge on men, either before or after marriage. This is shown by Johnson’s inclusion in his Dictionary of such words as lasslorn “Forsaken by his mistress” (labelled “Not used” in the 1773 edition), jilt “1. A woman who gives her lover hopes, and deceives him” (hence, unsurprisingly, “2. A name of contempt for a woman”), to jilt “To trick a man by flattering his love with hopes, and then leaving him for another”, hen-pecked “Governed by the wife”, and curtain-lecture “A reproof given by a wife to her husband in bed.” 5.4.7 Words applicable to either sex It can finally be added that some words on different aspects of love and sex may be referred to both men and women: a leman is “A sweetheart, a gallant; or a mistress”; loyal means “2. Faithful in love; true to a lady, or lover”, the quotations (and the related entry Loyalty “2. Fidelity to a lady, or lover”) making it clear that this quality may be shown by both sexes alike; a sweetheart may be “A lover or mistress”; wanton, too, may refer to both men and women as it means “1. A lascivious person; a strumpet; a whoremonger” (and the same is true of the related words wanton adj., to wanton, wantonly, wantonness).

5.5. Meaning and change of meaning in women-related words Although a few passing comments on words displaying some sort of semantic change have already been made, it is finally worth noting all those women’s words whose principal and/or original meaning has been modified over timeʊeither amplified or specializedʊin order to denote and especially connote women. 5.5.1 Women as mythological beings Classical mythology is the source of a few words, whose more recent sense is negatively applied to women: Johnson’s encyclopaedic definition of Amazon as “The Amazons were a race of women famous for valour, who inhabited Caucasus; they are so called from their cutting off their

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breasts, to use their weapons better. A warlike woman; a virago”26 shows that the modern, transferred meaning of the word is included into the encyclopaedic definition, thus highlighting the close connection between the original and the more recent meaning. The same happens with siren “A goddess who enticed men by singing, and devoured them; any mischievous enticer” and fury sense 4 (this sense identified as “From furia, Latin”), “One of the deities of vengeance, and thence a stormy, turbulent, violent, raging woman.” In the latter case, the adverb thence in the definition makes the connection between the original meaning and the transferred one explicit. Nymph, whose original meaning is positive “1. A goddess of the woods, meadows, or waters”, has also a positive transferred meaning, which is however used as a poetical word only: “2. A lady. In poetry.” The 1773 edition of the Dictionary adds the adjective nymphish “Relating to nymphs; ladylike” to its wordlist. 5.5.2 Women as animals On a less learned note, animals may provide derogatory qualifications for some kinds of women. Bitch and carrion seem to be general terms of abuse, as the former is described as “2. A name of reproach for a woman” and the latter “2. A name of reproach for a worthless woman.” Vixen is not defined with precision either, but the illustrative quotations make its transferred meaning quite clear: VIXEN. n.s. Vixen or fixen is the name of a she-fox; otherwise applied to a woman whose nature and condition is thereby compared to a she fox. Verstegan. O! when she’s angry, she’s keen and shrewd; She was a vixen, when she went to school; And though she be but little, she is fierce. Shakesp. See a pack of spaniels, called lovers, in a hot pursuit of a two-legg’d vixen, who only flies the whole loud pack, to be singled out by one. Wycherly.

Crone means both “1. An old ewe” and “2. In contempt, an old woman.” Contempt can also be conveyed by referring to women as horses. A tit is “1. A small horse: generally in contempt” and, by extension, “2. A woman: in contempt.” The range of negative connotations of jade is wider: 26

The word virago itself is included in the Dictionary, with the following senses: “1. A female warriour; a woman with the qualities of a man” and “2. It is commonly used in detestation for an impudent turbulent woman.”

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apart from denoting “1. A horse of no spirit; a hired horse; a worthless nag”, it has two semantically and pragmatically ambiguous, contextdepending extra-meanings: “2. A sorry woman. A word of contempt noting sometimes age, but generally vice” and “3. A young woman: in irony and slight contempt.” The sexual connotation implied in the use of this word is evident in the corresponding adjectival entry: JADISH. adj. 1. Vitious; bad, as an horse. ... 2. Unchaste; incontinent. ’Tis to no boot to be jealous of a woman; for if the humour takes her to be jadish, not all the locks and spies in nature can keep her honest. L’Estrange.

In order to complete this short list of women-related animal names, it must be added that dragon may mean “2. A fierce violent man or woman” and that chicken and duck may be used as fond epithets as the former is defined by Johnson as “2. A word of tenderness” and the latter “ 2. A word of endearment, or fondness.” 5.5.3 Women as objects Women may also be seen as and identified with objects. A distaff is not only “1. The staff from which the flax is drawn in spinning” but also “2. It is used as an emblem of the female sex” (in the 1773 edition Johnson adds here, “So the French say, The crown of France never falls to the distaff”). In a similar, but more familiar way, the word smock can also be used: SMOCK. n.s. ... 1. The under garment of a woman; a shift. ... 2. Smock is used in a ludicrous kind of composition for any thing relating to women. At smock treason, matron, I believe you; And if I were your husband; but when I Trust to your cob-web bosoms any other, Let me there die a fly, and feast you, spider. Ben. Johnson. Plague on his smock-loyalty! I hate to see a brave bold fellow sotted, Made sour and senseless, turn’d to whey by love. Dryden.

As the above exemplification has amply shown, the connotative use of words is very often meant to qualify women as contemptible, blame-

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worthy, or ridiculous.27 Johnson’s completes his definition of huswife as “1. A bad manager, a sorry woman” with the following usage note: “It is common to use housewife in a good, and huswife or hussy in a bad sense.”28 However, spelling and pronunciation do not usually help to discriminate between the positive and negative usage of such words or among the different senses of a polysemous word. Much depends on the speaker’s intention and the context: according to Johnson’s explanations, in fact, the very same word may be uttered approvingly or disapprovingly, as for example in the case of gentlewoman that may be “A word of civility or irony”; likewise, only the context will make clear whether the word mother is used in its primary, obvious meaning or as “A familiar term of address to an old woman; or to a woman dedicated to religious austerities.”

6. Concluding remarks One final entry-word from Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary will introduce the concluding remarks on the present study. Johnson compiled the entry sex as follows: SEX. n.s. ... 1. The property by which any animal is male or female. These two great sexes animate the world. Milton. Under his forming hands a creature grew, Manlike, but different sex. Milton. 2. Womankind; by way of emphasis. Unhappy sex! whose beauty is your snare; Expos’d to trials; made too frail to bear. Dryd.

27

Many more examples might be added: for instance, contempt is implied in the use of the words bunter “A cant word for a woman who picks up rags about the street; and used, by way of contempt, for any low vulgar woman”, harlotry “2. A name of contempt for a woman” or stateswoman “A woman who meddles with publick affairs. In contempt”; reproach is meant when gipsy “3. A name of slight reproach to a woman” is used; gallimaufry “3. It is used by Shakespeare ludicrously of a woman”, gill “5. ... The appellation of a woman in ludicrous language” and kicksy-wicksey “A made word in ridicule and disdain of a wife” all connote ridicule. 28 Accordingly, housewife is defined as “1. The mistress of a family … 2. A female œconomist” and “3. One skilled in female business” in the Dictionary, while hussy is “A sorry or bad woman; a worthless wench. It is often used ludicrously in slight disapprobation.”

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Chapter Seven Shame is hard to be overcome; but if the sex once get the better of it, it gives them afterwards no more trouble. Garth.

As far as the first sense is concerned, the illustrative quotations from Milton stress both the difference and the similarity between the sexes; the second sense suggests, by implication at least, that menʊin eighteenthcentury English and Englandʊrepresented the standard, unmarked status of humanity, women the marked one; and the two quotations speak for themselves. It is probably not very easy to pinpoint exactly what Samuel Johnson ʊas a lexicographer, as a member of his speech community, as a thinker, and as a manʊhad to do with all that. The members of the speech community, be they great writers or common people, used words not only to label reality but also to express shared views, values and assumptionsʊ in short, an ideology; and contemporary ideology constructed women as essentiallyʊi.e. both biologically and culturallyʊother than and inferior to men. On the one hand, therefore, Johnson’s Dictionary could but respond to his society’s construction of gender, as the long lists of gender-related words and the comments on Johnson’s lexicographic treatment of them have shown. On the other hand, however, the cultural and educational tenets he relied on while compiling the Dictionary did influence him as well: for instance, it is well known that standardization, rather than comprehensiveness, was Johnson’s original goal as a lexicographer; it is also quite obvious that his quotations were meant to provide pleasure and instruction, more thanʊor at least as much asʊto illustrate usage; and research has clarified the importance of education, morality, and Christian faith for him. Therefore, he was able to deal with gender expectations and sexual prejudices in a balanced way: he was ready to condemn prostitution, for example, but the words he chose to include in the Dictionary are an eloquent testimony to men’s co-responsibility for a practice he stigmatized. As Kemmerer (1998, 61) reminds us, Johnson declares in Rambler 18 that he has “endeavoured to divest my heart of all partiality, and place myself as a kind of neutral being between the sexes.” He promoted his own image as an impartial judge, as an arbiter between men and women in the querelle des femmes. This did not mean denying gender differentiation, which was rooted in society and universally taken for granted, nor subverting the traditional social order. It meant instead trying to bring the sexes together while proposing the cultural, linguistic and lexicographic model of a naturally unified and stratified society. It can therefore be argued that Johnson’s treatment of words by women and words on women

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in his Dictionary endorses the idea that his masterpiece is both a mirror of his author’s personality, opinions, and ideals and a cultural construct, the reflex of the linguistic and social world he happened to live in.

CHAPTER EIGHT CONVERTING “THIS UNCERTAIN SCIENCE INTO AN ART”: INNOVATION AND TRADITION IN GEORGE MOTHERBY’S A NEW MEDICAL DICTIONARY, OR, GENERAL REPOSITORY OF PHYSIC, 1775 ROD MCCONCHIE

This subject, so perplexed, may gradually unfold, and a theory be formed which, so far as it extends, will happily convert this uncertain science into an art. (G. Motherby 1775, s.v. causa)

1. George Motherby George Motherby (1731–1793) was the author of A new medical dictionary, or, General repository of physic, 1775. His dictionary is apparently best remembered for incidental matters such as being the first to list the word placebo, and for being an illustrated dictionary, but its place in the English lexicographical tradition, especially in the generation following the advances of Benjamin Martin and Samuel Johnson, remains to be assessed. The present paper attempts to determine its contribution in both lexicographical and medical terms by looking in detail at the sources of some entries, especially the more recent ones. English medical lexicography begins with the anonymous A physical dictionary (1657; although sometimes described as a dictionary, this text is only questionably so, despite its title) and Stephen Blankaart (Blancard, Blancardus; 1684), proceeding via the work of John Quincy (1719), Robert James (1742–1745; French translation as early as 1746–1748), John Barrow (1749), and Motherby to Dunglison (1833) and to the New Sydenham

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Society’s lexicon (1879–1899) edited by Leonard Sedgwick and Henry Powell (see McConchie 2009, 124). Motherby’s remark that each article “will terminate with a reference to some of the most eminent writers on the subject” (iii) means that one must expect to find many indirect citations, and certainly not quotation in all cases. We also need to consider his stated objectives: the purpose of his dictionary is “speedily to assist the memory in practical researches” (iii). His references must thus be taken as indications of what he believes to be the most useful literature on the subject covered by the lemma in question. He also addresses his work to non-professionals: “It is hoped that this Work will be found of general benefit to those whose circumstances will not admit of an academic education, and who are nevertheless desirous of obtaining a competent share of medical knowledge” (v–vi). Presumably in deference to such readers, he appends an English–Latin index to the work, since the dictionary as it stands is essentially a Latin–English one. Motherby accorded a large place to the ancients among his sources. Hippocrates, he claims, “hath described, with elegance and accuracy, most of the diseases that are now known; the names by which he called them were the same as those now in use” (iii). 'While conceding that smallpox, measles, and syphilis were not known to Hippocrates, Motherby points out that Galen, Celsus, Paulus Ægineta, and others such as Alexander Trallian (Alexander of Tralles) and Rhazes (al-RƗzƯ) have retained their reputation despite more recent advances in physiology and anatomy (iv–v), and despite the recent knowledge of other newly recognized diseases such as puerperal fever, on which Motherby has a long entry. Through all of this his intention seems to be to turn this “uncertain science”, which is still finding its way theoretically, into a more certain art of curing, through the way in which a dictionary must inevitably systematize and present knowledge for use. Motherby apparently shares the view that the application of art (skill) to knowledge, rather than knowledge itself, is the basis of medicine.

2. Background considerations My previous research has shown little dependence between Motherby’s text and that of the preceding medical dictionaries, although more remains to be done on this (cf McConchie 2009, 125). The most urgent questions are how far the General repository preserves traditional knowledge or is prepared to accomodate new, and what Motherby is trying to convey to the user. While the bulk of the text is encyclopedic, Motherby is certainly not averse to entries which are almost entirely linguistic in the

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information they supply, as in “APONENOEMENOS, from apononeǀ, to be negligent or averse. An adverb importing an utter aversion to any thing” or to entries which simply cross-refer or provide synonyms, such as “HYDROPS MEDULLAE SPINALIS, i.e. Spinae bifidae.”

3. The data for this study The source data examined in this paper is derived from every tenth page of the Repository. Entries continuing from a previous page and those continuing on to the next have only been read on the relevant page. The research so far thus covers 10% of the available pages, which total 332, not counting the index and illustrations. It is summarized in Table 8.1. The raw list, 242 sources and 747 references in all, is clearly headed by the seventeenth-century naturalist John Ray with 49 references, but he yields first place to William Lewis (33) if Lewis’s translation and adaptation of Neumann (28; see Section 4 below) is counted as Lewis’s work, Lewis / Neumann totalling 61. John Ray’s Historia plantarum is the overwhelmingly most important single source in Motherby, although Lewis is the most frequently cited author. Another early eighteenthcentury scientist, the Dutchman Herman Boerhaave, has 33, followed by the first classical writers, Hippocrates (26) and Galen (21). Paulus Ægineta has 15, Thomas Sydenham, a leading figure of the late seventeenth century, yields 13, and Celsus 13. It is also worth noting that general references to “the Greeks”, “the Latins”, and “the ancients” produce 33 between them, which means a heavy preference for allusions to antiquity taken overall, especially given that there are only two references to “the moderns”. The keeper of the Chelsea physic garden and author of Gardener’s dictionary, Philip Miller, has 14 and the Surgery of Lorenz Heister 11. John Hunter has 10, and the first three volumes of Medical observations and inquiries, by a society of physicians in London has 8. The most obvious of those who might have been expected to appear but are only very slightly represented is Thomas Willis (1). So far no references have been found to John Berkenhout’s Clavis anglica linguae botanicae, or, A botanical lexicon (1764).

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Table 8.1: Numerical list, revised and expanded from McConchie 2009, 126–128, of Motherby’s sources as they appear on every tenth page of Motherby’s dictionary (lower limit three) Source

no.

life dates where known

Ray, John

49

1627–1705

Boerhaave, Herman Lewis, William (Mat. Med.) Neumann’s Chemical Works (var. Newmann’s Chem. Works) Hippocrates Galen London College Paulus Ægineta Miller, Philip Celsus Greeks, the Sydenham, Thomas

33 33

1688–1738 1708–1781

28

1683–1737

26 21 17 15 14 13 13 13

c. 460-–c. 370 BC AD 129-200

Heister, Lorenz (Heister’s Surgery)

11

Ancients, the Hunter, John Latins, the Aetius Amidenus Lon. Med. Obs. & Inq. vol. i, ii, & iii “some”

10 10 10 8

Hoffman, Friedrich

7

1660–1742

1750– 1760?

7

1718–1784

1771

7 7 6

1493–1541 1709–1778 c. 40–90

1750(?)

6

1740–1804

1772– 1773

5 5

c. 980–1037 1708–1777 1532–1602 or 1569– 1611 1656–1708 1685–1760

Macquer, Pierre Joseph (Dictionary of Chemistry) Paracelsus Sharp, Samuel Dioscorides Percival, Thomas Essays Medical and Exper. p. 172 Avicenna Haller, Albrecht von Rulandus (Rulandt), Martinus (the Elder or the Younger) Tournefort, Joseph Pitton de Alston, Charles

date of work 1686– 1704

1759

7th cent AD? 1691–1771 c. 25 BC–c. AD 50 bap. 1624, d. 1689 1683–1758

1743 (Eng?)

1728–1793 c. 530–560 1758– 1759

8 8

5 5 4

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Source

no.

Arabians, the Aretaeus Asclepiades Cheyne, Charles Coelius Aurelianus Edinburgh College Gooch, Benjamin ( Med. obs.) Haller, Albrecht von (Physiology of the veins) Le Dran’s Operations, edit. 2. p. 117, 118 Linnaeus London Dispensatory M. A. Severinus Oribasius “others” Pott, Percival Shebbeare, John Smellie, William Winslow, Jacques-Bénigne (Winslow’s Anatomy) Akenside, George Albinus, Bernhard Siegfried Bisset, Charles Dale, Samuel Fordyce’s Elements of agriculture and vegetation [ed. 2] Giffard, William Kirkland, Thomas Lommius, Jodocus Mead, Richard Mesue Pharm. Lond. Pitcairn, William Pliny (the elder) Sir John Pringle’s Observations on the diseases of the Army “some… others…” the natives the Portuguese Warner, Joseph

4 4 4 4 4 4 4

life dates where known

date of work

1st cent. AD? 1671/2–1743 2nd cent. AD? 1707/8–1776

1758(?)

4

1708–1777

4

1685–1770

4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4

1707–1778

1714–1788 1709–1788 1697–1763

1740(?)

4

1669–1760

1733(?)

3 3 3 3

1721–1770 1697–1770 1717–1791 bap. 1659, d. 1739

3

1736–1802

3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

d. 1731 1722–1798 16th cent. 1673–1754 777–857

3

1707–1782

1752

3 3 3 3

1717–1801

1754(?)

1749(?)

1580–1656 320–400

1766 1771

1712–1791 23–79

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4. Motherby’s references Motherby’s references come into various categories. Some are to authors, works, and page numbers, an example being “Lewis’s Mat. Med.”, but even here the reference is somewhat indirect (see Section 5.2 below). Others are merely to authors with no further specification in the text, such as “Dr. Nisbet says that in the blood … there is an ossifying juice”, or “See Kerckringius, Coiterus, Eyssonius, Ruysch, Nesbit, Albinus, and Monro” (s.v. ossificatio). Still others are quite indirect, such as “The London college directs a mel helleboratum” (s.v. helleborus albus), presumably a reference to one of the dispensatories of the Royal College of Physicians (e.g. Quincy 1721 or a related text), for which see the next paragraph. In many cases, where there is a translation, it may be impossible to determine whether a reference is to a Latin or English version of the work in question.1 Another factor is that Motherby’s references are not necessarily meant to direct the reader to further information but merely to assert that the claim being made is authoritative. Under amaurosis (loss of eye-sight), he cites de St. Yves, the London dispensatory, Heister, Pitcairn, Coward, and Riverius in the running text with no reference to a particular work, but at the end of the entry he cites works by Heister, Hoffman, and de St. Yves only. Some references involve considerable difficulty in attribution. Among the most problematic to sort out were those to William Lewis, who was responsible for A course of practical chemistry in 1746, and then an abridged version of the Edinburgh medical essays. He next translated the Edinburgh pharmacopoeia, publishing it in 1748, and rewrote Quincy’s Compleat English dispensatory (1721), which appeared as The new dispensatory in 1753. There were several series of dispensatories, appearing in London, Edinburgh, and Dublin under various titles, and their publishing history is complex. Lewis’s, claiming to update Quincy and to have combined the London and Edinburgh dispensatories, appeared in 1753 amid a welter of rival publications, and was reissued in 1765. His translation and adaption of Caspar Neumann’s writings on chemistry appeared in 1759. Neumann published in both Latin and German, including articles in the Royal Society’s Philosophical transactions. Some of his writings actually represent notes of his lectures, which were apparently rather digressive, and Lewis has edited a good deal of this material as well as translating it. Some of the abridged lectures consisted of “narrat1

There are, interestingly, a few references to translations of Latin works, such as Swan’s translation of the works of Sydenham (1742; cited s.v. dysenteria etc).

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ives and discussion often foreign to the subject and frequently frivolous in themselves” (W. Lewis 1759, sig. A3r). One sometimes senses Lewis’s exasperation: “An account of the apparatus of the tea-table, and the manner of making tea, fills a quarto page and a half of this abridgement” (ibid.). From our point of view it seems better to regard this work as Lewis’s, since, as he claims “The merit of this work … engaged me to revise and abridge an English translation, and to make such additions as appeared necessary for supplying the deficiencies of the Author … Accordingly I have ventured to new mould the whole fabrick” (sig. A4r). Finally, Lewis published An experimental history of the materia medica in 1761, of which Motherby used the second edition (London, 1768) or the so-called third (Dublin, 1769): see Section 5.2 below.

5. How up-to-date was Motherby? His use of Thomas Kirkland and William Lewis An important question for this paper was how up-to-date Motherby was. So far, the most recent reference found is to Thomas Kirkland’s A treatise on child-bed fevers (1774), published the year before the dictionary itself, then Benjamin Gooch’s Medical and chirurgical observations (1773) and Thomas Percival’s Essays medical and experimental (1772–1773). The next most recent include the second edition of George Fordyce’s Elements of agriculture and vegetation (1765?/1771), Alexander Hunter’s Georgical essays of 1770–1772, Alexander Blackrie’s 1766 work on the treatment of the stone, and George Baker’s Inquiry into the merits of a method of inoculating the smallpox (1766).2 There are undoubtedly others still to be identified.

5.1 Motherby’s use of Kirkland Motherby quotes Kirkland quite extensively in the second of the seven paragraphs of the entry for lactea febris (milk fever) (common passages underlined):3 2

The reference to Fordyce’s work as Elements of agriculture and vegetation s.v. agricultura demonstrates that Motherby used the second edition, since the title of the first is simply Elements of agriculture; the reference to vol. iii of Hunter’s Georgical Essays s.v. marga demonstrates that he used the four-volume edition of 1770–1772, not its single-volume predecessor of 1769. 3 It is not practical to show every last detail in common between the texts, or indeed useful in the present context. Repositioning of sentence elements has not been shown. The symbol [ ] has been used to show an omission by Motherby: with

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Motherby: The more immediate causes are a distention of the nerves in the breasts, which is readily distinguished by the swelling of the the glands; and [ ] an absorption of milk, which hath become acrid by stagnating in the breast, and is known by a rigor and looseness coming on after the breasts have been inflamed and painful.

Kirkland: Fevers occasioned by milk during the time of lying-in, are certainly puerperal fevers; and are of two kinds, one from a distension of the nerves in the breasts, which is readily distinguished by the swelling of the glands; the other from an absorption of milk, which has become acrid by stagnating, and is known by a rigor and looseness coming on after the breasts have been inflamed and painful. (86–87)

The nature of the additions is that “and” simply replaces a correlative construction (“one … the other”), and “in the breast” was hardly necessary in the context. Motherby’s first paragraph is more detailed on the matter of the lying-in period, but does not reflect Kirkland. Motherby omits the connexion between milk fever and puerperal fevers, which does not appear elsewhere in the entry either, and was contentious at the time in any case and so is significant (Loudon 2000, 18–19). Apart from the opening phrase, it is perhaps worth considering that this entry, being so close to the original, could have simply been marked up as corrected copy on a piece of the relevant page cut from a copy of Kirkland’s treatise. The accounts of the other symptoms of this complaint which follow in both Kirkland and Motherby differ, howeverʊindeed, to the extent that they disagree somewhat, Motherby stressing “pain and distension in the breasts” followed by thirst and headache, whereas Kirkland stresses the pain in the belly, sweating, and nausea common to all puerperal fevers (87–88). Motherby, then, was certainly up-to-date in this entry, given that his dictionary appeared in the following year, and he seems to have had the leisure to deal with Kirkland in a reasonably thorough way, at least in this entry, not merely to make a perfunctory general reference at the end. Kirkland is mentioned again at the end of the entry for puerperalis febris, Motherby again showing a considerable debt to him in this entry.

a space on either side it indicates his omission of one or more words; with no space on one side, it indicates his omission of punctuation or of one or more letters.

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Chapter Eight a fever comes on, being preceded by rigors, which are followed by a quick weak pulse, thirst, pain in the head, want of sleep, sighing, load at the praecordia, restlessness, great weakness, dejection of spirits, a wildness or else despair in the countenance, and oft an inflammation in the eyes; sometimes there is a difficulty of breathing, [ ] pain in the side[ ], the skin is dry, the tongue is of a glossy brown colour, and also very dry; sometimes in the advanced stage of the fever, if a hand is laid on the patient, one feels the same kind of prickling sensation [ ] in a less degree, as is felt[] after having the fingers in warm putrid blood. There is nothing to be learnt from the urine, as it is mixed with black putrid blood, which is constantly drained through the vagina. A diarrhoea soon follows the feverish symptoms, the stools are fetid, liquid, and [ ] blackish; the tongue is [] brownish, or of a reddish colour; the skin is very dry and hot; often there are aphthae in the mouth; the breasts are flaccid, and upon drawing them, blood, instead of milk, is frequently discharged. Milk may indeed appear in the breasts when the putrefaction is several days before it takes place, yet they soon become perfectly flaccid. Sometimes the belly swells during the course of the disease, but a soreness and tenderness of it is a never failing attendant[ ] soon after the fever begins; a delirium is common[ ] through a great part of the disorder [ ] .

Kirkland is the only source mentioned under lactea febris, so that the question of whether there might have been other sources for the entry arises. Barrow (1749)ʊ“LACTEA Febris, a milk fever. It is very common after delivery”ʊdoes not help us much, except perhaps with the opening of Motherby’s entry, “LACTEA FEBRIS. A milk fever. This frequently happens after delivery.” Quincy (1726) has neither milk fever nor lactea febris, so that it seems that Motherby places no reliance on the earlier medical dictionaries in this entry.

5.2 Motherby’s use of Lewis A work that Motherby relies on heavily is what he calls “Lewis’s Materia Medica” (in simple terms, materia medica means all substances used in medicine, whether natural or artificial, while a pharmacopeia lists all artifically prepared substances). This seems normally to mean the second edition (1768/1769) of An experimental history of the materia medica.4 4

The borrowings appear significantly closer to Lewis’s Experimental history of the materia medica than to any of his other treatments of the subject, and this is the work which would most naturally be referred to as “Lewis’s Materia Medica.” S.v. lithospermum, the phrase “scarcely longer than the cup” and the addition “and June” are to be found in the 1769 Dublin edition and not the 1761 London edition. The only question which remains is whether there are significant differences

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The varying degrees of closeness of Motherby’s dependence are demonstrated by the entries for alkekengi (winter cherries), ambergris, calaminaris lapis (calamine), caranna, lithospermum (gromwell), marrubium (white horehound), ocimum (basil), rhaponticum (greater centaury), scilla (urginea maritima, sea-onion), spermaceti, and tussilago (coltsfoot). 5.2.1 Alkakengi ALKAKENGI. Winter cherry: also called halicacabum, solanum vesicarium, vesicaria vulg. Miller takes notice of twelve species. It is a low [ ] plant[ ] with unbranched stalks, [ ] heart-shaped acuminated leaves[ ] standing in pairs on the joints, and whitish bellshaped flowers; [ ] the flower-cup changes into a pentagonal [ ] bladder, which[ ] bursting[ ] discovers [ ] a red fruit like a cherry, which contains a juicy pulp and many small seeds. It grows wild in France, Germany and Italy, and thrives well in our gardens. The fruit ripens in October, and [ ] continues to [ ] December, when the plant dies to the ground. These cherries have an acidulous and not unpleasant taste with a bitterishness, but their covering is very bitter. They are [ ] diuretic, but neither heat nor irritate; five or six [ ] cherries, or an ounce of their juice, is a dose, and if given in the strangury from cantharides, a speedy relief is obtained. [ё] ii. of the berries infused in a pint of water is extolled in the jaundice: but they are rarely called for in the English practice.

In this entry, Motherby makes no reference to Lewis at all, although it seems clear that he follows him (1769, 1:67–68) in some parts. He omits some minor details in the description as well as the allusion to Ray’s cure of a “gouty person” who was cured by these cherries, and departs from Lewis entirely towards the end of the entry. 5.2.2 Ambergris AMBRA-GRISEA, also named ambra-cineracea, succinum-griseum, succinum-cinereum, and in English ambergrise. Much of it is met with in the Indian ocean; pieces of a considerable weight have been found in the Northern seas. Sometimes it is seen floating on the surface of the seas, at others adhering to rocks, and not unfrequently found in the stomachs of [ ] fishes, and now and then it is between the 1768 London edition and the 1769 Dublin edition; it is possible that the latter was a piracy of the former rather than a revised edition, and in that case, it may be scarcely possible to tell which Motherby used.

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Chapter Eight thrown [ ] on the shore; but it is found most plentifully about the island of Madagascar and the Molucca islands. According to an account in the Philosophical Transactions, this drug is only the produce of the male sperma-caeti whale; it is there said to consist of balls from three to twelve inches diameter, lying loose in a large oval bag three or four feet deep or wide, nearly in the form of an ox’s bladder, with a pipe running into and through the penis, and another at the other end coming from about the kidnies; this bag lies just over the testicles, which are above one foot long; it is lengthways at the foot of the penis, four or five feet below the navel, and three or four feet above the anus. This bag is almost full of a deep orange coloured liquor, not quite so thick as oil, of the same scent as the ambergrise which swims in it. These balls of ambergrise seem to be in lamina like onions, and in the fluid, pieces of laminae are found. There are two, three or four balls in a bag. Where one whale hath these balls three or four hath only the liquor in the bag. Some fishermen observe that these balls are only in the old and well-grown whales. The rarity of catching a female whale renders it difficult to say that they do not produce any ambergrise. It may be observed that, as there is only one bag, it is probably the urinary bladder, and the balls, preternatural concretions formed there, as the bezoars are in their respective situations. Pure ambergrise is so light that it swims in rectified spirit of wine; it grows soft in a very gentle heat; it is opake, rugged, of a greyish [] ash colour, [ ]mingled with yellow [ ] and blackish [ ] veins, and speckled with greenish spots; it breaks like wax [ ]; it hath no particular taste; though softish, oily and somewhat aromatic; it affords but little to the smell, except it is heated, and then it is very fragrant; set on fire its odour is like that of burning amber: with a small degree of heat, it melts into an oil, and in a great heat it is volatile. The genuine is speckled with green; the more it is variegated the worse; the best is of an ash colour, the worst sorts approach to a deep black. It is soluble in boiling spirit of wine; from which, if the saturated solution be set in a very cold place, [ ] a part of the ambergrise concretes into a whitish unctuous substance. Distilled[ ] it yields an aqueous phlegm, a brown [ ] acidulous spirit, a deeper coloured oil, [ ] a thicker balsam, and sometimes a little concrete salt, The spirit, oil, balsam and salt, are similar to those obtained from amber, except that the oil is more agreeable to smell to. Rectified spirit of wine takes up near 1/12th of its weight of ambergrise. According to Neumann, if the spirit is impregnated with a little essential oil, the ambergrise will dissolve more readily in it. A deeper coloured tincture is made with alcohol, but not a stronger. Dulcified acids and alkaline spirits have no effect upon it; water and expressed oils have as little. It is one of the most agreeable [ ] perfumes, it heightens the natural odour of other bodies; but the great secret to this end is, to add it so sparingly that while it improves the smell of that to which it is added, its

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own may not be discovered. From two [ ] grains to a scruple it is a high cordial and powerful antispasmodic; though the common dose is from two to four grains, which may be given in an egg lightly poached. Riverius says that ambergrise is a specific against the fames canina. A counterfeit as well as adultered sort are too often to be met with; the first generally consists of musk, civet, storax, labdanum, and aloes wood mixed together; the latter of a large quantity of bullock’s blood duly flavoured with musk and civet. [The remainder of the entry omitted]

This entry in Motherby contains quite a lot of repositioning of elements from W. Lewis 1769, 1:84–86, from sentences to phrases and clauses, which has not been shown here; among other things, the news about adulteration has been shifted to the end of the entry and some details of the adulteration of this product (apparently from James 1747, 539) have been added. Much of the second paragraph is based on Dudley 1725, 267– 269. The antepenultimate and penultimate paragraphs are heavily reworked from Lewis. 5.2.3 Calaminaris lapis CALAMINARIS LAPIS. Calamine stone, also called cadmia lapidosa, cadmia fossilis, calamite, calamy, and calaminar stone. It is a metallic mineral, [ ] of a grey[], brown[ ], yellow[ ], or pale red [ ] colour, and sometimes of all these colours variously mixed; it is heavy and hard, but not [ ] so as to strike fire with steel. It is of a middle nature betwixt stone and earth, found in copper mines, and those of lead and iron; it is found [ ] in England, Germany, and other countries, either in distinct mines, or intermixed with the ores of lead or other metals. It is the ore of a metal known by the name of zinc, and contains a small portion of iron. It is generally [ ] calcined before it is brought into the shops, in order to separate some sulphurous and arsenical particles of which it is supposed to be possessed, and also to render it more easily reducible into [ ] powder. The quantity of zinc is variable in different parcels of this ore. In the Berlin Memoirs Marggraf says that from 2-16ths to 7-16ths of the weight of the ore is pure metal. The common sort in our shops in England frequently affords 9-16ths. If this ore is not already calcined, it must be heated to a strong red heat, then quenched in water; and this process must be repeated three times. Before calcination it is of a grey or of a red colour; but when calcined it is yellow. It is an error of some writers who say that the calamy is a recrement of melted copper, and that tutty is a recrement of melted brass; though it is true that the best calamy is what sticks to the iron rods used in stirring the matter in the furnaces while brass is making.

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Chapter Eight The name cadmia hath been applied to several different things. Dioscorides meant by it the recrement which arises from brass whilst melting: Galen applied it to the recrement of brass, and a stone found in some mines: the calamine stone is now called thus; and the Germans have given this name to cobalt; whence Agricola says that there are three sorts, viz. one metallic, one fossile, and one of the furnaces. Though the calamine stone is an ore of zinc, it is not the only one; for zinc is found in the ore of lead, and of other metals. The principal use of this mineral is for changing copper into brass, which it does by its metallic part mixing with the copper while it is in a state of fusion. See Æs. For medicinal uses the calamine, after being calcined, should be levigated to an impalpable powder; it is then called lap. calam. ppt. see COMMINUTIO. When thus prepared it is [ ] useful in collyria as an astringent and corroborant, and against defluxions of thin acrid humours upon the eyes; and in ointments for cutaneous exulcerations, &c. if it is exquisitely fine, it acts as an absorbent or dessiccative, but if not, it is escharotic. The London college directs the following cerate, in which this mineral is the principal ingredient. [This recipe and another follow.]

Motherby’s first paragraph depends quite closely on Lewis, and his second paraphrases Lewis’s material freely. He then adds a great deal about the nature, calcination, and name of calamine, returning to Lewis’s material (1769, 1:228–230) only at the very end of what is a greatly expanded entry. There is no relation between the text in Lewis’s Neumann (Lewis 1759, 123–125) and Motherby. Although there is no textual dependence, Motherby may have derived his comments on the word cadmia from the fact that calamine is dealt with under this term in Macquer 1771 (mentioned as “Dictionary of Chemistry 4to” at the end of the entry), as well as under ores of zinc. Barrow (1749) also lists cadmia, but only in a circular reference to Lapis calaminaris, both empty entries, thus omitting any actual data on this substance. 5.2.4 Caranna CARANNA, Also called Caragna. It is a concrete resinous juice [ ] brought from New Spain, and [ ] other parts of America, in little masses, rolled up in the leaves of flags outwardly of a dark brown[ ] colour, inwardly brown, with a cast of red, variegated with irregular white streaks, somewhat soft and tenacious as it first comes over, but in length of time growing dry and friable. The whiter the gum, the better it is, especially if of the consistence of a plaister. Its virtues are the same as those of Tacamahaca, but more efficacious. It hath an agreeable smell, with a bitter[ ] and slightly pungent taste. Rectified spirit dissolves [ ] threefourths of it, and water dissolves all the rest, except the impurities. By

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distillation it affords much essential oil, of an orange colour[ ]. It is fragrant, and, to the taste, moderately pungent. If the spiritous tincture is inspissated, it yields a tenacious [ ] resin, and an oily matter, which separates and floats on the surface: it is considerably aromatic, and moderately bitter. Etmuller says, that this gum is useful against pains in the stomach, and in the joints, if spread plaister-wise, and applied thereto. See Lewis’s Mat. Med.

Lewis’s entry (1769, 1:252–253) is here reworded and supplemented by Motherby’s reference to Etmuller (i.e. Bibliotheca anatomica 1711– 1714, a compilation containing work by Michael Ettmüller [1644–1683] among others) and his comments in the second and third sentences: all of this supplementary material appears to be from James’s dictionary (1742– 1745). Lewis and Motherby seem to disagree about the usefulness of caranna. 5.2.5 Lithospermum LITHOSPERMUM, called also milium solis, gromwell, gray mill. It is a rough plant, with stiff branched stalks, oblong acuminated leaves, set alternately without pedicles, and whitish monopetalous flowers, scarcely longer than the cup, [ ] followed by [ ] roundish, hard [ ] seeds [ ]. It is perennial, grows wild in [ ] fields, [ ] and flowers in May and June. The seeds are diuretic. They are rarely used. See Lewis’s Mat. Med.

Here Motherby essentially truncates the botanical reference and introduces a new native name, while his omissions shorten the description of the plant and its habitat a little, but the majority of the entry is taken over verbatim from W. Lewis 1769, 2:36–37. 5.2.6 Marrubium album MARRUBIUM also called prasium album. Common white horehound. It is a hoary plant, with square stalks[ ] and roundish [un]wrinkled [ ] leaves, set in pairs on long pedicles[,] in the bosoms of which come forth thick clusters of whitish labiated flowers, in striated cups, whose divisions terminate in sharp points or prickles. It is perennial, grows wild in uncultivated grounds, and flowers in June. The leaves [ ] have a kind of aromatic smell, but not [an] agreeable one; however, the disagreeable part is wholly dissipated after a few months keeping; their taste is [ ] bitter, penetrating, diffusive, and durable in the mouth. Taken in large doses, they prove laxative. This plant is deserving of more attention than is given to it, for it is a very useful aperient and corroborant; in humoural asthmas, cachexies, [ ] menstrual suppressions,

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Chapter Eight and several other chronical disorders, where it is not alone a cure, it is important in its assistance. A dram of the dried leaves in powder, [ ] two or three ounces of the expressed juice, or an infusion of half a handful [ ] of [ ] fresh leaves, are commonly directed as a dose. The dry herb gives out its virtue both to water[ ] and to spirit[ ]. The expressed juice, gently inspissated to an extract, is the best preparation; the dose is from gr. x. to ȡ fs.

In this instance, while Motherby makes no reference to Lewis, the dependence on him (W. Lewis 1769, 2:48–49) is still great. Motherby has erroneously copied “unwrinkled” for Lewis’s “wrinkled” in his entry, a mistake it is difficult to imagine anyone who is familiar with white horehound making, since the wrinkles are only too obvious. Since Lewis 1761 and 1769 have “wrinkled” (and W. Lewis 1753 etc omits the description altogether), it does seem to be entirely Motherby’s error. Motherby’s only substantial addition is the comment that the plant is more deserving of attention. By and large the omissions are in the interests of brevity, and there is some re-organisation of sentences to improve concision. 5.2.7 Basilicum / Ocimum BASILICUM. [ ] Basil. It is a plant with square stalks, oval leaves set in pairs, and long spikes of labiated flowers, whose upper-lip is divided into four parts, the lower entire, the cup hath also two lips, one cut into four sections, the other into two. BASILICUM. Also called ocimum vulgatius [ ] herba regia ocimum medium citratum. [ ] Common, or citron basil. Ocimum caryophyllatum, ocimum minimum [ ]. Small, or bush basil, with uncut leaves. Both these are natives of the Eastern countries, and sown annually in our gardens for culinary [ ] uses. The seeds, which rarely come to perfection in England, [ ] are brought from the South of France and Italy. They flower in June and July and seed in August. Infusions of the leaves are [ ] drank in catarrhous complaints and uterine diseases, and to promote expectoration. [ ] They are succulent, slightly aromatic, have a mucilaginous taste[ ] and [ ] strong smell, which last it loses partly in drying. [ ] The first sort resembles the scent of lemons; [ ] the second [ ] that of cloves. Distilled in water they yield [ ] much oil, of a penetrating fragrance, [ ] similar, but [ ] superior, to the oil of marjoram. Clinopodium majus, called also clinopodium acinos, and great wild basil. Boerhaave enumerates nine species. It grows in hedges. Is an astringent and emenagogue.

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Hath for has in the first paragraph is somewhat unexpectedly conservative, although Motherby frequently uses it elsewhere in entries whose source has not so far been identified (e.g. calaminaris). Some wordorders have been reversed from W. Lewis 1769, 2:102, as in “the cup hath also two lips” for “the cup also has two lips”, which may represent a general syntactic change affecting focussing adjuncts, and there are some obvious shortenings to achieve a more concise text: “those of the first sort approach to the lemon scent, those of the second to that of cloves” becomes “The first sort resembles the scent of lemons, [] the second [] that of cloves.” Finally, Motherby adds new material about Clinopodium majus at the end of the entry; this may be from James 1742–1745, s.v. clinopodium. 5.2.8 Rhaponticum RHAPONTICUM. The true rapontic. It is also called rheum; rheum ponticum; rhaverum antiquorum; rheum Dioscoridis; rhaponticum Alpini; rhabarbarum Dioscoridis; rhab. forte Dioscoridis, English rhubarb. It is as the true rhubarb, a species of dock, with smooth roundish leaves, [ ] somewhat channeled pedicles: it grows wild on the mountain[s] of Thrace, [ ] whence Alpinus brought it into Europe about the year 1610. It bears the hardest winters in our climate. The roots are often mixed with those of the true rhubarb, [ ] but are detected by their mucilaginous taste when chewed, and by their not tinging the saliva of so bright a yellow as the true rhubarb does; when the rhapontic is cut through, it appears regularly marbled in a radiated manner; it [ ] is dusky [ ] on its surface, and of a loose spongy texture, more astringent than the modern true rhubarb, and less purgative: as a purge, two or three drams are required, but it is a better stomachic than the true rhubarb. See Raii Hist. Tournefort’s Mat. Med.

The entries in Motherby and Lewis (1769, 2:184–185) here are of similar length, although less than half of Lewis’s entry has been used. Marbling and yellowed saliva are mentioned in Tournefort 1716–1730, 1:41 (though not in Tournefort 1708), but not Lewis, although there is no real question even of paraphrase of Tournefort. Motherby, while borrowing in this entry, does appear to be very selective about what he uses. 5.2.9 Scilla [Urginea maritima] SCILLA. The squill, or sea onion. It is a plant with a large bulbous root, like that of an onion, which is very acrid. The leaves are broad, the flowers are like those of the ornithogalus, and grow in a spike before the leaves

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Chapter Eight appear. There are two species which are used indifferently, viz. the red and the white. Boerhaave mentions a third sort. Epimenides taught Pythagoras the use of squills, and the vinegar prepared with them; and Pythagoras made the vinegar into an oxymel. This plant grows on sandy shores in Spain and the Levant, from whence we have them. Chuse such roots as are large, plump, fresh, and full of a clammy juice. To the taste they are nauseous, [ ] bitter, and acrid; if much handled[ ] they exulcerate the skin. Internally they are a powerful attenuant and aperient; in doses of a few grains they promote expectoration[ ] and urine; indeed when squills are given as a diuretic, the dose is a true one that will sit easy on the stomach, but small doses excite expectoration most effectually; in larger doses it is purgative or emetic. They powerfully dissolve tough phlegm, and promote its discharge, whence their singular usefulness in the the humoural asthma; but if the lungs are inflamed, the squills must be omitted until after bleeding and cooling antiphlogistics are used. In dropsies, begin with a small dose, and gradually increase it, but so as not to pass off by stool. On account of their offensive taste, the best form is pills; and to prevent the nausea which they excite, when not intended either as an emetic or an expectorant, a few grains of some agreeable aromatic may be added to each dose, or it may be made up with the fresh root of elecampane Water, wine, proof spirit, [ ] rectified spirit, and vinegar, extract the virtues both of the fresh and the dry squills; but none of them carry any thing with them by distillation, so that in the extract made from the decoction, the whole of the active parts are retained. Alcalies [ ] abate both their bitterness and acrimony, vegetable acids make very little alteration in either, but they improve their expectorating quality. The London college directs the two following preparations: Acetum Scilliticum, and the oxymel scilliticum. See Lewis’s Mat. Med.

In these two entries, the similarities between Motherby and Lewis (1769, 2:247–249) are even less apparent, except in the part of the description of the plant in paragraph three, although the entries follow a similar structure and contain similar matter; cf. “On account of their offensive taste, the best form is pills” (Motherby) and “The most commodious form for the taking of squills, unless when designed as an emetic, is that of a bolus or pill” (Lewis). Motherby also adds some new data about their use after antiphlogistics and in the case of the dropsy, although without adding another source at the end of the entry. 5.2.10 Spermaceti SPERMA CETI, Improperly [ ] called parma citty. Indeed the name sperma is not a just one, for this substance is a kind of fat, taken from the head of a species of [ ] whale, and which is artificially purified by long

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boiling with alkaline ley. This fat is found in other parts of of this kind of whale, but the best is in the head. It differs from other animal fats in not being dissoluble by alkalies, or combinable with them into a soap, and in rising almost totally in distillation, not in form of a fluid oil, but in that of a butyraceous matter, resembling the butter of wax. By long keeping it becomes yellow, or rancid; this rancid part, like other fats, dissolves in alkaline ley, and the remainder is left sweet and white. This concrete is without any remarkable smell, hath a butyraceous taste. It is much used in coughs, dysenteries, erosions of the bowels, and in such cases in general as require that the solids should be relaxed or softened, also in which acrid humours are to be obtunded. It readily dissolves in oils, and unites with wax by the assistance of heat, and thus it is used externally. For internal use, it may be dissolved with water, and so formed into [] an emulsion, by the intervention of the mucilage of gum[] arabic, or by the help of almonds, which are to be rubbed with it. Sperma ceti is an admirable substitute for oils, when they do not rest easy on the stomach. Sir Richard Maningham extols a mixture of sperma ceti with diaphoretics in the cure of internal inflammations; and he says that when bleeding cannot be prudently ventured on in anflammatory fevers, the sperm ceti mixed with contrayerva root, and the volatile salt of hartshorn may be depended upon, if means can be expected to produce any good effect. See Lewis’s Mat. Med. Neumann’s Chem. Works.

This entry shows structural and informational similarity, but the text is no more than a rather loose paraphrase of Lewis (1769, 2:265), and cannot be said to be closely dependent on this source. Motherby is more precise about the cetacean which is the source of this material, and adds the reference to Sir Richard Manningham and the mixtures he recommends, perhaps directly from Manningham 1746, 34. 5.2.11 Tussilago TUSSILAGO, also called bechium, farfara, [ ] farfarella. Colt’s-foot. It is a low plant, producing early in the spring single stalks, each of which bears a yellow flosculous flower, followed by several seeds winged with down; the leaves, which succeed the flowers, are short, broad, [ ] angular, slightly indented, green above, and hoary underneath. It is perennial, and grows wild in moist grounds. The leaves and flowers are mucilaginous, bitterish, and roughish; they have little or no [ ] smell; infusions of the leaves are sweetened with [ ] liquorice for a common drink, when a troublesome cough attends: but if any considerable advantage is expected, a strong decoction should be made, and used freely. See Lewis’s Mat. Med.

This entry for tussilago shows a fairly close similarity to Lewis’s (1769, 2:313), is of similar length, and additions and omissions are slight,

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but with English names added by Motherby at the beginning in place of Latin, and some new material added at the end. 5.2.12 Conclusion To attempt a summary of the entries discussed here, there seems to be a pattern in Motherby’s method of dealing with Lewis. To begin with he omits some of the Latin names and sometimes introduces extra English ones. He omits the usual references to Caspar Bauhin, a widely-cited botanical authority, without exception. He then follows Lewis fairly closely for a while, tending to shorten the description of the plant a little and often making the entry more concise. Towards the end, he departs from Lewis and often either leaves material out altogether or adds something new. The actual omission of material raises interesting questions—is this done because it is seen as not very useful, out-of-date, too technical, or as not fitting the structure of the composite entry? Answers to this will have to await further research.

6. Frequency analysis of references Some analysis of Motherby’s references was made in an attempt to answer the question of his up-to-dateness. First, the early modern and modern authors he refers to were listed by date of birth. Thus far, 125 dates of birth and death have been identified, the earliest inclusion being Fracastorius (born 1487).5 All earlier authors have been excluded. All NS/OS dates have been listed under the earlier date, and doubtful dates have been treated as firm. The only date of birth entirely missing is for John Quincy, who has thus unfortunately been omitted. It might be possible to read Figure 8.1 from left to right as a cline from “becoming a classic” to “up-to-date”. Next, the number of actual references per author was analysed in a similar way, and graphed against time expressed as years elapsed from the date of birth of Fracastorius (1487). The numbers along the x-axis thus represent authors in chronological order of date of birth from Fracastorius to Thomas Houlston and Sir John Blicke.6 Quincy was again omitted because of the lack of a date of birth.

5

Note that the list includes authors with less than 3 references (cf. Table 8.1), and that that Fracastorius is 0 in Figure 8.1, not 1. 6 Note that Fracastorius is again 0 in the chart, not 1.

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Figure 8.1: Numbers of authors cited by date of birth, in “generations” of 25 years from 1475 to 1749.

Figure 8.2 shows that while the number of authors referred to steadily increases (the date of birth line flattens off), the number of references to each declines slightly, if anything. This may reflect the rising reputation of

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older authorities and a tendency to cite recent authors for a paper or treatise on a particular subject, but not for more general works. However, the number of older authorities is sufficiently small at this stage for an argument to be made for special factors applying. In Ray’s case, this would probably be the relatively tardy acceptance of Linnaean botanical classification in England compared with elsewhere. There were only four allusions to Linnaeus, one of them not to a plant at all.

Figure 8.2: Time in years from birth of Fracastorius (1487–1745 = 0–267) against number of references (no. 33 = Ray; 71 = Neumann; 77 = Boerhaave; 79 = Miller; 94 = Lewis (without Neumann); 113 = Hunter).

Finally, works which can be identified were listed for the same period by date of publication. Sufficient research has not been done on this yet, and the data is problematical because of the difficulty of identifying many of the actual works mentioned, but it may at least prove diagnostic. Figure 8.3 is full of interest, but is potentially misleading, since major authors could not be included given the lack of details of publications and dates, including Boerhaave (33 references), Philip Miller (14), and John Hunter (10). It has been assumed in lieu of better knowledge that Motherby used the most recent editions where more than one was available ʊagain, not a very safe assumption. Dates were also regularised to a single figure. Nevertheless, my feeling is that the basic pattern which shows here would not be greatly altered by the inclusion of this data. The sharper rise on the left-hand side of this graph as compared with Figure 8.2 probably indicates the time required to establish a career and a series of publications in one’s speciality.

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Figure 8.3: Number of references plotted against date of publication in years from Thomas Hill (1587) = 0.

This seems to demonstrate two things. Firstly, Motherby tends to cite recent scholarly papers on individual topics, and secondly, he tends not to cite collections and digests of the works of others, such as William Salmon’s Medicina practica (1692) or Nicholas Jenty’s Course of anatomico-physiological lectures (1757). Neither does he use Colin Milne’s Botanical dictionary, or, Elements of systematic and philosophical botany (1770). This work includes an adumbration of Linnaean classification in the form of lists of Linnaean genera under the entries for various orders of plants alongside their English names. Milne, however, was not concerned to list plants exhaustively, his work being a listing of the terminology of botany rather than of plants, except in so far as they illustrate the characteristics of the various orders and genera. Milne gives more attention to exotic plants—rhubarb, for example, is dismissed as too familiar to require comment but, under the order Holeraceae, a couple of pages are devoted to the cashew nut and several to the various mangroves. To this point in the research, no reference has been found to the best of the illustrated herbals of the eighteenth century, Elizabeth Blackwell’s A curious herbal, containing five hundred cuts, of the most useful plants, which are now used in the practice of physick (1737). Blackwell was encouraged and assisted by Isaac Rand, also the Director of the Chelsea Physic Garden, as well as Philip Miller. Her botanical descriptions, she claims are largely from the work of another Miller: “from Mr Joseph Miller’s Botanicum officinale with his Consent” (Blackwell, “Introduction”).

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Joseph Miller’s work (1722) is a practical one, designed to make systems such as Ray’s more accessible to the user of the simples listed, and to prevent fraud in supplying what the physician prescribes. Miller says of his own sources that I have not only consulted Authors of the greatest name in Botany, but have had Recourse to most of the Simples themselves in their natural Productions. All the Materials are disposed in alphabetical Order, and under the same Names they Bear in the Catalogue of Simples in the last Edition of the College Dispensatory, together with those given them by Caspar Bauhin, Gerard, and Parkinson, Authors easiest to be met with; and for such as are Natives of England, I have referred to the Pages wherein they are mentioned by Mr. Ray, in the last edition of his Synopsis. (Miller 1722, sig. *4v)

Miller does not therefore rely on the Historia plantarum (Ray 1686–1688) but on Ray’s account of the flora of England, first published in 1690 as Synopsis methodica stirpium Britannicarum. By “the last edition”, Miller must have meant the second, of 1696. Thus Blackwell’s descriptions derive ultimately from Ray, and it is probably significant that Motherby does not bother citing these later works, preferring to rely on the original authority. Even Tournefort had been translated into English “with large additions from Ray” (Tournefort 1716–1730, title page) so that Ray’s influence is pervasive.

7. Conclusions To summarize, Motherby sometimes “plagiarizes” if text only is considered, but he does work in a much more independent way in structuring his entries. His referencing tends to be erratic, and not always accurate by modern standards in indicating what is in the entry itself. He is often up-to-date, sometimes very much so, and tends to eschew the more popularising works, relying on the more standard and scholarly references. In all, Motherby has to be seen as re-organising and prioritising medical knowledge for his own generation, and his dictionary must be assessed in that light rather than simply dismissed as either plagiarised or derivative.

CHAPTER NINE DESSINS ET DESSEINS: LE RÔLE FONDATEUR DES ORNEMENTS DE L’ENCYCLOPÉDIE DANS LA TRADITION DES DICTIONNAIRES FRANÇAIS ORNÉS

THORA VAN MALE

Depuis une dizaine d’années, mes recherches portent sur l’ornementation du dictionnaire français, en particulier la lettrine, le bandeau et le cul de lampe (van Male 2001, 2005). Comme ce domaine—qui se situe dans les interstices entre histoire de l’art, sémiotique et métalexicographie—n’avait jamais fait l’objet d’études, la totalité du terrain devait être défrichée, ce que je m’emploie à faire. Pour le présent article, je propose de remonter à ce qui constitue l’œuvre princeps dans le domaine de la lettre ornée en lexicographie française, l’Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers (1751–1776) de Diderot et d’Alembert.

1. Introduction Dans un premier temps, quelques définitions tirées du texte même de l’Encyclopédie permettront au lecteur de cerner trois vocables essentiels de son titre (SCIENCE, ART, MÉTIER), mais également d’apprécier l’approche qui fut celle des auteurs de ce monument. Tout d’abord, tirées du Discours préliminaire de l’ouvrage, quelques remarques introductives à propos des noms ART et SCIENCE : On peut en général donner le nom d’Art à tout système de connaissances qu’il est possible de réduire à des règles positives, invariables et indépendantes du caprice de l’opinion, et il serait permis de dire en ce sens que plusieurs de nos sciences sont des arts, étant envisagées par leur côté pratique. Mais comme il y a des règles pour les opérations de l’esprit ou de l’âme, il y en a aussi pour celles du corps, c’est-à-dire pour celles qui,

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Ensuite, des précisions tirées des définitions dans le texte de l’ouvrage : C’est l’industrie de l’homme appliquée aux productions de la nature qui a donné naissance aux sciences et aux arts ; et ces points de réunion de nos différentes réflexions ont reçu les dénominations de SCIENCE et d’ART, selon la nature de leurs objets formels. Si l’objet s’exécute, la collection et la disposition technique des règles selon lesquelles il s’exécute s’appellent Art. … Si l’objet est contemplé seulement sous différentes faces, la collection et la disposition technique des observations relatives à cet objet s’appellent Science.

Figure 9.1 : brodeuses

Figure 9.2 : Géométrie et Géographie

J’ajouterais pour ma part que c’est l’apprivoisement de ces objets par l’homme qui constitue le ressort des planches de l’Encyclopédie et, de façon emblématique, de ses lettrines et bandeaux ornementaux. Les auteurs affinent leur distinction (dans le Discours préliminaire) : « Toute la matière de l’Encyclopédie peut se réduire à trois chefs : les sciences, les arts libéraux et les arts mécaniques. ». Les arts libéraux requièrent des opérations de l’esprit ou de l’âme, les arts mécaniques des opérations du corps. Quant au mot MÉTIER, traité extensivement dans l’ouvrage, nous retiendrons : On donne ce nom à toute profession qui exige l’emploi des bras, et qui se borne à un certain nombre d’opérations mécaniques, qui ont pour but un

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même ouvrage, que l’ouvrier répète sans cesse. Je ne sais pourquoi on a attaché une idée vile à ce mot ; c’est des métiers que nous tenons toutes les choses nécessaires à la vie.

Figure 9.3 : Éloquence

Figure 9.4 : tapissiers

À retenir ici, la notion de l’usage des bras, celle des opérations répétitives, et la valorisation des métiers de la part des auteurs. Le refus du dédain dans lequel furent tenus les ouvriers et les artisans d’alors est une constante de l’Encyclopédie ; en témoignent les dernières lignes du texte de la définition de MÉTIER : Le poète, le philosophe, l’orateur, le ministre, le guerrier, le héros seraient tout nus et manqueraient de pain sans cet artisan, l’objet de son mépris cruel.

À mon tour d’apporter une définition, celle du mot ICONOPHORE, vocable que j’ai forgé pour nommer cette entité intersémiotique qu’est une lettre ornée sur le principe de l’abécédaire : « image dont le premier trait pertinent est constitué par la lettre initiale du nom de son référent ». Les iconophores remontent — cela est évident — aux enluminures médiévales, mais ils s’en distinguent également. Tout d’abord, l’enluminure n’est que très rarement (ou bien fortuitement) iconophorique. Pour les autres aspects, ce tableau permet de repérer zones de recouvrement et de distinction entre enluminure et iconophore :

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Table 9.1: Enluminure et iconophore

lieu fonction objective fonction subjective clef de structuration

enluminure manuscrit sacré médiéval guider le lecteur glorifier l’Écriture sainte pensée chrétienne

iconophore dictionnaire imprimé guider le lecteur sacraliser le savoir laïc alphabet

À ma connaissance, l’Encyclopédie de Diderot et d’Alembert est le premier ouvrage lexicographique français qui comporte une série complète d’ornements iconophoriques1.

Figure 9.5 : astronomes

1

Figure 9.6 : brodeuses

En réalité, la série des vingt-deux lettrines (I et J sont réunis en un seul ornement, comme le sont U et V ; W et X sont absents) ne voit le jour que dans le Supplément publié en 1776. La publication de l’œuvre elle-même, volume par volume, avait été interrompue en 1759, après la publication du volume VI : suite à une crise politico-religieuse impliquant le pape et le roi de France, l’ouvrage fut mis à l’index. On interdisait aux auteurs d’en poursuivre la publication, et les Catholiques qui en possédaient un exemplaire devaient le brûler, sous peine d’excommunication. La publication se poursuivit, néanmoins, clandestinement, mais les lettrines iconophoriques disparurent. Le Supplément rétablit la série dix-sept ans plus tard, avec un seul changement : là où les lettres I et J avaient été représentées par un I et des imprimeurs, c’est la lettre J et un juge qui prend la succession (toujours pour représenter les deux lettres). Si j’affirme ici que la série entière est iconophorique, il faut avouer qu’il subsiste quelques doutes, qui seront présentés en fin d’article.

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Figure 9.7 : chimistes

Figure 9.9 : Éloquence

Figure 9.8 : doreurs à la feuille

Figure 9.10 : forgerons

Figure 9.11 : Géométrie et Géographie Figure 9.12 : Hydrographie

Figure 9.13 : imprimeurs

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2. L’Encyclopédie innovatrice en matière d’ornementation Il y a donc plus de 250 ans, l’Encyclopédie jetait les bases de ce qui allait devenir une tradition française en matière d’ornementation lexicographique. Examinons ces bases, sous l’angle du choix des iconophores, de la technologie, de la scénographie et du paratexte. Pour chacun des aspects sera offerte une mise en perspective, en amont et en aval, le situant dans l’histoire du livre et du dictionnaire.

2.1 Choix des iconophores L’ensemble des lettrines iconophoriques de l’Encyclopédie renvoie à des activités professionnelles : soit par un individu représenté dans son lieu de travail, soit par une allégorie qui symbolise une science ou un art. La représentation des métiers était déjà, du temps des Encyclopédistes une tradition ancienne, en particulier dans les « Cris de Paris » dont les premières séries remontent au Moyen Âge. Cette tradition de la mise en valeur des métiers se poursuivra dans les ornements iconophoriques de plusieurs dictionnaires du XIXe et XXe siècles2. Dans l’Encyclopédie, ces individus — saisis en plein exercice de leur métier, accomplissant leurs gestes emblématiques — sont élevés au rang d’êtres tutélaires, hiératiques, régnant sur l’ouvrage.

Figure 9.14 : rubanier

2

Certains dictionnaires déclineront le seul thème des métiers, tel le Nouveau Larousse en 2 volumes de 1949. Par ailleurs, on remarquera une très forte prépondérance de métiers militaires dans les ornements des dictionnaires français de la seconde moitié du XIXe siècle et les premières décennies du XXe.

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Figure 9.15 : ramoneur, Cris de Paris, XVe s.

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Figure 9.16 : rémouleur, Petit Larousse, 1910

De même, la représentation d’allégories n’était pas une nouveauté au XVIIIe siècle : dès la fin du XVIe siècle, Ripa avait publié ses Iconologia, sorte de manuel destiné à servir aux illustrateurs d’emblèmes et d’allégories. La publication d’iconologies perdurera jusqu’à la fin du XIXe siècle. La présence de personnel allégorique dans les ornements des dictionnaires se poursuivra jusqu’au milieu du XXe.

Figure 9.17 : Éloquence

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Figure 9.18 : Éloquence, Ripa–Baudoin, Iconologie (1643).3

Figure 9.19 : Étude, Napoléon Landais, Dictionnaire général et grammatical, 1834

3 L’allégorie de l’Éloquence est reconnaissable par sa couronne, signe d’autorité, ses manches retroussées avec les avant-bras nus, signifiant la délicatesse de ses paroles. Elle empoigne des foudres : force de persuasion, capacité d’abattre l’obstination des ignorants. Le livre ouvert à proximité est considéré comme un instrument de l’éloquence, et le sablier représente l’ordre et la mesure du temps pour bien persuader. Éloquence porte le caducée de Mercure, dieu qui incarne également la capacité de parler avec conviction.

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2.2 Technologie En matière de reproduction d’images, la technologie disponible joue un rôle central par rapport aux illustrations dans un livre, et aux caractéristiques de celles-ci. Aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles, la gravure sur métal était largement favorisée, car elle permettait un excellent rendu, en particulier concernant la finesse des détails ; son désavantage résidait dans le fait qu’une image gravée ainsi nécessitait le passage de la page dans deux presses différentes, l’une pour le texte, l’autre pour l’image. D’où un surcoût (et des difficultés de positionnement de l’image par rapport au texte). Cet état de faits explique le faible nombre d’images dans les livres d’alors, et leur rare présence sous forme de pages « hors texte » imprimées recto seulement4. L’autre solution, moins onéreuse, consistait à graver les ornements sur bois5, ce qui permettait d’imprimer texte et image en un seul passage sous presse. Mais le rendu était assez grossier. Pour le ornements de l’Encyclopédie (mais non pour les planches), la gravure sur bois fut choisie : économie libératrice. La comparaison de deux lettrines, la première une gravure sur métal, la seconde, sur bois, provenant de l’Encyclopédie, révèle les qualités relatives de chaque option.

Figure 9.20 : Atlas, Moréri, Grand dictionnaire historique,1725

Figure 9.21 : astronomes

4 Voilà pourquoi, s’agissant de l’Encyclopédie elle-même, les planches, toutes gravées sur métal, sont réunies dans onze volumes à part. 5 Plus précisément, bois de fil. Par la suite, reviendrait la mode de la gravure sur bois de bout, laquelle permettait un rendu pouvant concurrencer celui de la gravure sur métal en matière de finesse, et éliminant le problème du positionnement relatif.

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Pour mettre en perspective cette question de technologie, ce bandeau de la lettre I du Petit Larousse 2005 (ornements du styliste Christian Lacroix) révèle les possibilités nouvelles offertes par l’imprimerie en couleur. Sans cette avancée technologique, il aurait été extrêmement difficile de rendre compréhensible la superposition des éléments. D’ailleurs, le fait que Christian Lacroix soit le premier illustrateur d’ornements lexicographiques à introduire des toiles de fond iconophoriques (dragon, Europe, herbes, quadrillage, toile, xylogravure) peut être attribué à la liberté nouvelle que lui procurait l’usage de la quadrichromie.

Figure 9.22 : doreurs à la feuille

Figure 9.23 : Petit Larousse 2005 (ornements de Christian Lacroix)

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2.3 Scénographie Cet ornement de la lettre H — Hydrographie, l’allégorie du voyage en mer — servira pour mettre en relief les principaux aspects de la scénographie des lettrines iconophoriques de l’Encyclopédie. Tout d’abord, remarquer la majesté de la lettre-icône, qui occupe la presque totalité de l’image. La lettre devient un objet dans la scène ; les éléments qui évoluent autour d’elle lui confèrent comme une troisième dimension. La main droite du personnage est posée de façon décontractée sur la barre horizontale de la lettre, comme sur le dossier d’une chaise. Les objets annexes (étoiles par-dessus sa tête, boussole, navire, carte de navigation) étoffent la mise en scène, à la fois recréant son cadre originel et aidant les lecteurs au déchiffrage6.

Figure 9.24 : Hydrographie

Figure 9.25 : Louis Henry, Aristide Bruant, L’Argot du XXe siècle, 1901

Les successeurs de l’Encyclopédie garderont la tradition. Pour ne prendre qu’un seul exemple, qui réunit en lui seul les lignes scénographiques principales établies dans l’ouvrage de Diderot et d’Alembert, ce H de L’Argot du XXe siècle d’Aristide Bruant (1901). Non seulement la lettre est majestueuse, mais la forme même qu’elle prend, celle d’une guillotine, permet d’identifier le personnage iconophorique, Émile Henry, poseur de bombes à Paris, condamné à la peine capitale en 1894. Le XIXe siècle verra l’avènement de grands ornements lexicographiques (principalement des bandeaux), réunissant plusieurs scènes et éléments iconophoriques (voir dans cet chapitre les figures 9.19, 23 et 27). 6

Sans ces objets, d’ailleurs, il ne serait pas possible d’identifier Hydrographie.

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2.4 Paratexte Parmi les éléments de paratexte susceptibles d’accompagner un ornement iconophorique — légende, crédits (s’agissant de photos), avatars de la lettre, signature du créateur —, c’est cette dernière qui va nous intéresser à présent. Toutes les lettrines de l’Encyclopédie sont signées du nom « Papillon ». Jean-Michel Baptiste Papillon (1698–1776) était graveur sur bois, de père (et même de grand-père) en fils. Cet homme, bien en vue à la Cour, fut un participant actif à deux titres dans l’entreprise encyclopédique : auteur de plusieurs textes à propos de la gravure sur bois, et créateur des bandeaux, lettrines et fleurons de tous les volumes de l’ouvrage. Par ailleurs, il est l’auteur d’un Traité historique et pratique de la gravure en bois (1766). Mutatis mutandis, sa signature équivaut à celle de Christian Lacroix : c’était une « star ». Malgré la faible taille des lettrines (environ 3 centimètres de côté), on remarque que la signature est grande et lisible : Papillon assurait sa propre renommée7.

Figure 9.26 : vitriers

Comme je l’ai annoncé plus haut, les lettrines de l’Encyclopédie furent gravées sur bois de fil, c’est-à-dire sur la planche. Papillon fut à la fois concepteur et graveur de ces ornements. 7 On se rend compte à quel point les ornements de l’Encyclopédie furent ignorés lorsqu’on sait que des spécialistes de l’ouvrage, dans un travail extrêmement minutieux (L’Univers de l’Encyclopédie, de Roland Barthes, Robert Mauzi et Jean Pierre Seguin), firent figurer le nom de Papillon sur la liste des artistes « manquants à l’appel », c’est-à-dire dont le nom paraît dans les documents de comptabilité de l’éditeur, mais dont la signature n’apparaît nulle part. Les ornements des dictionnaires furent, pendant des siècles, le point aveugle des méta-lexicographes.

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Avec l’évolution de la technologie au XIXe siècle, la gravure sur bois de bout prit le relais, permettant des images de meilleure qualité. Ce changement technologique conduisit à une division du travail entre concepteur, dont le nom figurait suivi des lettres del. (delineavit) ou inv. (invenit), et graveur, celui qui attaquait le bloc de bois, et dont le nom figurait suivi de sc. (sculpsit). Ainsi, la double signature traduit-elle ce changement technologique. Mais cette double signature allait changer de nature au cours du XIXe siècle, avec le développement de grands ateliers de gravure à Paris. Le nom du concepteur fut maintenu, mais à la place de celui du graveur—qui pouvait, à l’occasion, être une équipe de graveurs—on trouve le nom de l’atelier (principalement, celui de Andrew, Best et Leloir dont le nom figurait soit en toutes lettres, soit sous la forme de ABL). Finie la renommée d’un homme : on travaille au nom de son entreprise !

Figure 9.27 : Napoléon Landais, Dictionnaire général et grammatical, 1834. Signatures du concepteur et de l’atelier de gravure

Par la suite, toujours au XIXe siècle, les signatures commenceront à disparaître : par exemple dans le Grand dictionnaire universel de Pierre Larousse, publié entre 1865 et 1876, les signatures disparaissent entièrement des bandeaux à partir de la lettre N. On peut avancer l’hypothèse qu’à un certain moment les illustrateurs devinrent salariés de l’entreprise, perdant ainsi leur identité propre. Au cours du XXe siècle, les signatures auront tendance à disparaître entièrement. Il arrive qu’un illustrateur des ornements soit remercié dans la préface ou dans la liste des collaborateurs, mais c’est rare. Seules les vedettes (même à l’intérieur

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d’une entreprise telle que la Maison Larousse) semblent pouvoir garder leur signature. Avec les développements technologiques du livre à la fin du XXe et au début du XXIe, la reconnaissance donnée au créateur d’ornements évolue encore : ainsi Christian Lacroix signe-t-il un paragraphe personnel dans la préface du Petit Larousse 2005, en même temps qu’il signe la couverture de l’ouvrage, qu’il a également créée8.

Figure 9.28: signature de Christian Lacroix sur la couverture du Petit Larousse, 2005.

3. Conclusion Il me semble légitime d’affirmer, après cette flânerie dans les lettrines de l’Encyclopédie, que, comme le texte et les planches de cet ouvrage, son illustration ornementale constituait, elle aussi, une arme, un manifeste des Lumières tentant d’apprivoiser un monde laïcisé. Cette arme, ce manifeste établiront les fondements de ce qui deviendra une tradition dans l’ornementation des dictionnaires français.

4. Quatre lettrines … En guise de post-scriptum, quatre lettrines de l’Encyclopédie que je n’ai pas encore pu déchiffrer. A bon entendeur salut !

8 Le styliste ne signe pas les bandeaux eux-mêmes, mais qui connaît Christian Lacroix y reconnaît aisément son style, ses violons d’Ingres.

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CHAPTER TEN THE GROWTH OF THE ENGLISH ETYMOLOGICAL DICTIONARY ANATOLY LIBERMAN

Etymological dictionaries serve no practical purpose, and it is predominantly people’s interest in their language that keeps this branch of lexicography afloat. Presses churn out books on the derivation of words at top speed, though nowadays chiefly amateurs write them. The public wants to be entertained, and the market provides the entertainment. Some collections of word histories are excellent (Webster’s new explorer dictionary of word origins [2004], for example). Their success is due to a clever choice of material. Hundreds of words can be traced to their beginnings without referring to the minutiae of phonetic correspondences, semantic change, and the mechanisms of borrowing; in dealing with them, technicalities are dispensable. There is nothing wrong with popularization, except that it does not produce new knowledge and cannot replace research. We will see that etymological lexicography has been trivialized no less than historical lexicology, but it has survived, and good college libraries seldom resist the temptation of buying a new dictionary of word origins. The lack of practical uses to which etymological dictionaries can be put has resulted in the nearly total absence of discussion on making them. By contrast, the other branches of lexicography attracted the attention of many serious scholars. The only book on the genre and structure of etymological dictionaries (Malkiel 1976) is a loose overview of the literature with comments on the strong and weak points of each endeavor. Malkiel’s area of expertise was Romance philology, and his evaluation of Germanic and Slavic dictionaries should be taken with caution despite the facts that he was a native speaker of Russian and that his knowledge of English and German left nothing to be desired. Grant agencies love the rubric “methodology”. In most cases, methodology is a buzzword. Yet it need not be derided in approaching a

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first, still unwritten, work on the theory of etymological dictionaries. Such a work should touch on the following subjects (my list is, of course, not exhaustive): 1) The purpose of an etymological dictionary (this purpose is not as self-evident as it seems), 2) its prospective users, 3) the type and number of words to be included, 4) the length and depth of an entry, 5) the need for references to the scholarly literature in each entry, 6) the type of conclusions that an etymological dictionary is expected to contain, 7) the reception of etymological dictionaries, 8) their dependence on predecessors and relation to competitors, 9) the scope of a concise etymological dictionary; etymological dictionaries for lay readers. In recent years I have twice surveyed English etymological dictionaries (Liberman 1998 and 2009). I also said something on “methodology” in the introduction to my own dictionary (Liberman 2008). In this paper, I will try to repeat myself as little as possible, but some overlap is inevitable. Greek and Latin lexicons circulated widely in the Middle Ages, but West-European etymological lexicography begins with Kiliaen (Kilianus, 1599; Dutch). This was followed by Helvigius (1611; German; in my previous publications, I gave 1620 as the date for Helvigius because I did not realize that Helvigius 1620, of which I have a photocopy, is a reissue of the 1611 first edition), Minsheu (1617; English), S. Skinner (1671; English), and Ménage (1694; French). As far as I understand, Del Rosal’s Spanish etymological dictionary was not published when it was written; see Del Rosal a1610?/1992. The seventeenth century was an important time for the development of etymological concepts. Works like Clauberg’s Ars etymologica teutonum (1663/1717) are characteristic of that epoch (see Waterman 1973 and Papp 2001 on Clauberg; Teutonum should be understood as “of the Germans”). We are used to pitying or ignoring the etymologists of the pre-Rask–Grimm era, but there is no need to treat the past of historical linguistics as a mere string of errors. We too are far from infallible. A close look at the sixteenth and especially the seventeenth century shows that modern etymologists are often baffled by the same questions that seemed insoluble three and four hundred years ago and that we do not always have better answers. The literature on this subject is vast. See as particularly relevant Klare 1979, Papp 1985, and Harms 1993. Early language historians strove to reveal the true meaning of words (allegedly, obscured by later usage) and thus let etymology, philosophy, and theology merge. Some authors set out to prove the antiquity of their native languages by tracing them to Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, though they realized that numerous words sprang up late. The etymologists of Minsheu’s generation had an advantage over Varro and Isidore in that they knew several languages. It is not for nothing that Minsheu used the plural

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in the title of his Guide into the Tongues (he worked with eleven of them). Comparison has been a cornerstone of English etymological lexicography from the start; Minsheu, for example, wrote a dictionary of word origins and an international thesaurus (an experiment that has never been repeated). Paradoxical as it may sound, comparison, not based on what came to be called the comparative method, turned out to be a dangerous tool. Since the facts of many languages were juxtaposed chaotically, with look-alikes being the only “guide”, and as long as the predominant goal was to show the descent of English, German, etc. from Hebrew (or Greek, or Latin), a dissident, anti-comparative, consciously parochial view of derivation could have saved the author from indulging in multifarious fantasies. This view was advocated by Clauberg, who believed that the source of German words should in principle be looked for in German. Minsheu’s etymologies, as pointed out, were Hebrew-oriented, but Greek figured prominently in his discussion. For example, he considered Engl. dwell to be “a corruption of Gk ∀⇔80 ‘court, yard; enclosure; home, habitat; temple, palace’” (see Figure 10.1 below: Minsheu’s Latin glosses “stabulum, statio, habitatio” are followed by two more Greek words having the root of ∀⇔80).

Figure 10.1: The treatment of dwell in Minsheu 1617, 164 col. 2.

But he also admitted the derivation of dwell from “Gothic Duale, of the same meaning”. It is unclear what word of what language he meant. Old Danish had the verb dvale “delay”, akin to Old Icelandic and Old Swedish dvala. The Old Icelandic noun dvala means “a short stay”; Goth. dwals “foolish” is related. (Great confusion in citing Germanic forms continued

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into the nineteenth century, but Minsheu and his successors hardly ever mistranslated or misattributed words of Hebrew, Greek and Latin.) Minsheu had less trouble with such Romance words as Fr. demeurer, for Lat. morƗrƯ “to delay” and Gk :⎯Δ≅Ȣ “part, particle, piece” suggested themselves at once. His ideas on the origin of the Greek word are of no interest in this context. Part B of the entry on dwell is devoted to G wohnen “live”. Here we find Gk tk > kk, in AS. written cc), of AS. wƯtga, a syncopated form of wƯtiga, wƯtega, a seer, prophet, soothsayer, magician (cf. deȩful-wƯtga, “devil prophet,” wizard) (= OHG. wƯzago, wƯzzago, a prophet, soothsayer), < *wƯtig, seeing, a form parallel to witig (with short vowel), knowing, witan, know, *wƯtan, see: see wit1, and cf. witty. The notion that witch is a fem. form is usually accompanied by the notion that the corresponding masc. is wizard (the two words forming one of the pairs of masc. and fem. correlatives given in the grammars); but witch is historically masc., as well as fem. (being indeed orig., in the AS. form witga, only masc.), and wizard has no immediate relation to witch. Cf. wiseacre, ult. < OHG. wƯzago, and so a doublet of witch. Hence ult. (< AS. wicca) ME. wikke, wicke, evil, wicked, and wikked, wicked, wicked: see wick7 and wicked1. The change of form (AS. wicca < wƯtga) is paralleled by a similar change in orchard (AS. orceard < orcgeard < ortgeard), and the development of sense (“wicked”, “witched”) is in keeping with the history of other words which have become ultimately associated with popular superstitions—superstition, whether religious or etymological, tending to pervert or distort the forms and meanings of words.

Even Skeat does not give such an absorbing and detailed account of this word’s history. Earlier on, I promised to return to the semantic history of dwell. Here the Universal Dictionary is worth consulting. Scand. Cp. O.N. dvelja, “to dwell, delay, tarry, abide”; the corresponding native word is O.E. dwellan, “to lead astray, deceive”; also dwelian, “to lead astray, lead into error and wrong-doing; deceive, thwart, afflict; to lose right direction, go astray, wander”; M.E. dwellen, “to delay, dwell”. Other close cognates in O.E. are: dwolian, “to stray, err”; (ge)dwola, “error, heresy”, also “deceiver, heretic”; dwolung, “insanity”. So far as the earliest Engl. meaning is concerned it is clear fr. above that it was “to wander, to err; to go astray, go out of one’s way”, & thence “to go astray intellectually or morally”. Cp. also the related O.E. dol, “foolish” (see dull). The other Gmc. languages, apart fr. the Scand., appear to attach

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Chapter Ten closely allied meanings to this base: Goth. dwals, “foolish”, dwaliþa, “folly”; O.S. dwelan, “to err”; O.H.G. twaljan, “hinder, delay”. This last sense is the connecting link between that of “wandering” & “dwelling”; “to wander, having lost one’s way; to linger, delay, in doubt which way to go”, & finally, “to remain where one is”. It is possible to reach a yet more primitive meaning fr. the Gk. cognates tholós, “mud, dirt”; tholerós, “muddy, troubled” (of water &c.); hence, “disturbed in mind, mad, passionate”. The ideas of folly, error &c., so anciently & widely expressed by the base, may have come straight fr. a primitive sense “obscure, dark, lacking clearness”; or they may be a secondary development fr. the sense “wander; stray”. These last must have been orig. “to go astray in the dark”.

I believe that the sequence of events in the development of witch was somewhat different (see the corresponding entry in Liberman 2008) and that Lübben (Lübben 1871, 324–29, a work that Wyld could not possibly have read) reconstructed a more convincing original meaning with evidence only from Middle High German. His examples show that the words clustered round *dwellan (MHG twellen) once meant *“move in a circle”. A person moving in a circle gets nowhere (is delayed) and labors under the illusion of making progress (is led astray). But it is the lexicographical aspect of the problem rather than the solution that interests us here. What is the point of publishing more and more vapid dictionaries of etymology if such a wealth of information is available in non-etymological dictionaries? However, neither Charles P. G. Scott (Century Dictionary) nor Henry Cecil Wyld (Universal Dictionary) cited their sources, and both worked and died long ago. The only way for English etymological lexicography to stop running in place is to produce a comprehensive analytic dictionary like those written for Hittite (in progress), Latin, Gothic, Old High German (in progress), Russian, and some other IndoEuropean languages, and then abridge it for popular use. Recycling and repackaging the OED has no future. Even its past is uninspiring.

CHAPTER ELEVEN CAN YOU ADAM AND EVE IT? DICTIONARIES OF RHYMING SLANG JULIE COLEMAN

When it was first discussed in print, in the mid-nineteenth century, rhyming slang was presented as a secret code used by thieves.1 It came to be associated with London’s costermongers and later with residents of the East End of London in general. This paper will provide an overview of the history of rhyming slang lexicography. It will argue that the popularity of rhyming slang owes more to its stage and media representations than to its everyday use by genuine Cockneys, and also that in recent years it has become more broadly emblematic of traditional ideas of Englishness. The term Cockney is derived from the Middle English cocken-ey “a cock’s egg”. The OED records its first use with reference to small or misshapen eggs from 1362, and from c.1386 it referred to children who failed to flourish: who required or received excessive maternal attention. Townspeople in general were derided as Cockneys from 1594, but by 1600 the term was being used with particular reference to Londoners, specifically those born within the sound of the bells of Mary-le-Bow Church. The OED’s first citation for Cockney with reference to the accent or dialect of London is from 1890. Although Agha (2003, 244 n.92) describes “London Cockney” as “the speech of the professional middle classes”, most commentators use the term to refer to working-class London accents and dialects, particularly those of the East End of London. Rhyming slang is best explained by example. This verse was included in the earliest dictionary of rhyming slang to be published as a separate volume (discussed below): 1

Other possible origins are summarized by J. Green 2003, and some are discussed below. 2 I am grateful to Luanne von Schneidemesser for drawing my attention to this and other sociolinguistic studies.

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Chapter Eleven When pore old Jim got the “Tin tack” [sack] ’E went aht and got “Elephant’s trunk,” [drunk] And when ’e got ’ome to ’is “trouble and strife” [wife] She gives ’im a biff on the bunk. Nah when ’e woke up in the morning, ’Is pore “Uncle Ned” [head] was so sore ’E at once takes a walk to the “Rub-a-dub-dub,” [pub] After slammin’ the “Rory O’Moore.” [door] (Phillips 1931 and 1932, 16)

In rhyming slang, a word or phrase in standard or non-standard English is replaced by a phrase that rhymes with it (e.g. Uncle Ned “head”). Sometimes the rhyming slang term provides a comment on the concept it represents (e.g. trouble and strife “wife”), but most do not. Some rhyming slang terms can be abbreviated so that the rhyming word is omitted (e.g. elephant’s trunk “drunk” can be shortened to elephants). Henry Mayhew did not make any mention of rhyming slang in his detailed study of London labour and the London poor (1851), though he did describe costermongers’ use of back slang in some detail.3 The earliest lexicographer of rhyming slang was Ducange Anglicus in The vulgar tongue (1857). He presented rhyming slang as a secret code used by thieves, and this list provided John Camden Hotten with rhyming slang for a separate glossary in his Dictionary of modern slang (1859), but Hotten does not emphasize the criminal associations of rhyming slang, attributing it instead to London’s itinerant singers and hawkers. Hotten’s dictionary went through five editions until 1874 and many reprints right into the twentieth century. In 1910, Henry Bradley commented that: What is called “riming slang” … is a jocular invention which does not seem to have had any considerable currency except in the columns of the sporting newspapers. (Bradley 1910/1928, 153)

In 1933, George Orwell wrote that rhyming slang was “all the rage in London” at about the time that Bradley was writing, but that “now it is almost extinct” (195–196). There is certainly evidence of the use of at least some rhyming slang terms during the First World War. For instance, Fraser and Gibbons include 3

In back slang, words are pronounced more or less backwards, with allowances made for the rules of English phonology. The OED is rightly reluctant to rely on back-slang etymologies, and sometimes offers then merely to discredit or cast doubt upon them (e.g. moniker, nerd), but it does approve the back-slang origins of neves “seven”, pennif (for finnip “five pound note”), rouf “four”, slop “police”, and yob “boy”.

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ADAM AND EVE: Believe. E.g., “Could you Adam and Eve it”. (Rhyming slang). FRYING PANS: Hands. (Rhyming Slang). UNCLE NED: Bed. (Rhyming slang).

Partridge, who dates the origins of rhyming slang to the seventeenth century on slender evidence (1970, 273), confirms that it ‘had its apotheosis in the G[reat] W[ar]” (1937, s.v. rhyming slang).4 The trenches were its ideal habitat: tightly-knit groups united by fear, discomfort, and boredom could use rhyming slang as an in-joke to relieve tension and enhance solidarity. Some pleasure could be derived from newcomers’ and outsiders’ failure to understand mundane conversations. Given Orwell’s experience of the poorer areas of London, however, it seems unlikely that he would have been unaware of the continued use of rhyming slang in the 1930s had that use been extensive. It was perhaps because of this decline in use that rhyming slang began to receive its second wave of lexicographic attention. During 1931 and 1932, a London publican issued his customers with a short dictionary of rhyming slang (Phillips 1931 and 1932), to be used in composing comic verses for a competition. The pub appears to have been in the West End of London, offering some support to the argument “that dialect songs and literature are merely a form of recreation for the middle classes” (Beal 2000, 3535), and the dictionary is written from the perspective of an outsider. A modified version of the glossary was published as Dictionary of rhyming slang in 1945 without acknowledgement.6 The association between rhyming slang and criminality is mentioned by Partridge (1970, 273), and was strengthened by Frank Norman’s inclusion of a few terms in the glossary to his autobiographical novel Stand on me (1959). Norman used asterisks to mark rhyming slang terms in his glossary, for example *BARNET *BOAT-RACE *TEALEAF 4

Barnet Fair

Hair Face Thief

J. Green (2003, 222) considers the first two decades of the nineteenth century a more likely date for the origin of rhyming slang. 5 Note that Beal actually disagrees with this position, arguing that local speech forms are also important to their users. The anonymous A book of rhyming slang (1973) is another example of a rhyming slang dictionary with a predominantly middle-class audience: it was published as a promotional Christmas gift by a London design company. 6 For a detailed account of differences between the lists, see Coleman 2009, 91–96; 410–411.

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Norman’s independent documentation of these terms confirms that some rhyming slang did continue in use, although perhaps not at the rate seen earlier in the century. A West End production (1960–1961) of the musical comedy Fings ain’t wot they used t’be, with a score by Lionel Bart and script by Norman, also helped to maintain a general familiarity with rhyming slang. The programme provided theatre-goers with a brief glossary based on the one found in Norman’s Stand on me. Julian Franklyn’s Dictionary of rhyming slang (1960) provided the first thorough and historical account of rhyming slang, listing almost a thousand terms. He argued that it originated not with London Cockneys but with Irish navvies, and that members of the London underworld adopted it from the Irish. A second and third edition added hundreds more terms to the original list. Less dependable rhyming slang dictionaries continued to appear in a fairly steady stream during the next three decades.7 The use of rhyming slang in Australia and in the American underworld was also documented and discussed (Maurer 1944,8 Meredith 1984), as were some unlikely examples of British upper class usage, such as Rolls Royce “choice” and parquet (floor) “bore” (Wheeler and Broadhead 1985). During the 1990s and particularly the first decade of the present century, rhyming slang dictionaries began to appear at an unprecedented rate. Most make no claim to comprehensiveness or reliability and many are cheaply produced booklets aimed squarely at the lowest common denominator.9 John Ayto (2002, vii) explains their appeal to tourists: These little books are more souvenirs than practical dictionaries. Rhyming slang serves as a saleable icon of London life and culture. It has become a commodity, to an extent unparalleled in any other area of language and usage.

There is no Academy of Rhyming Slang to confirm terms’ authenticity and currency. Is rhyming slang only authentic if it is created and used by Cockneys? If birth within the sound of Bow Bells is a required qualifi7

These include Kendall, Up the frog: The road to Cockney rhyming slang (1969); J. Jones, Rhyming Cockney slang (1971); Dodson and Saczek, A dictionary of Cockney slang and rhyming slang (1972); Aylwin, A Load of Cockney Cobblers (1973); Lawrence, Rabbit and pork, rhyming talk (1975). 8 Maurer addresses particularly the early tendency to treat rhyming slang as a result of Australian influence on American English. 9 For example, Kirkpatrick, Wicked Cockney rhyming slang (1991); Nind, Rude rhyming slang (2003).

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cation, demographic change, and traffic noise ensure that the number of genuine Cockneys today is extremely small. However, the rules governing the production of rhyming slang are sufficiently straightforward that anyone, including the compilers of rhyming slang dictionaries, can create new examples. That is, of course, the point: rhyming slang is a form of word-play that gives scope to the speaker’s creativity and humour. Without any evidence of their ever having been used, terms are copied from one dictionary to another and some are picked up by the media. Because they have so many dictionaries of rhyming slang to consult, lexicographers of broader British slang tend to over-represent it in their dictionaries. For example, Dalzell and Victor’s The new Partridge dictionary of slang and unconventional English (2006) covers the slang of the English-speaking world since the Second World War.10 In a sample of 1478 entries, representing the first 50 entries for each letter of the alphabet, 358 (29 per cent of non-phrasal entries) are labelled as British. Of these 358 entries, it was possible to assign an etymology to all but 28, and the distribution of origins is shown in Table 11.1. Table 11.1: The origins of slang terms labelled as British in Dalzell and Victor 200611 origin of term semantic change rhyming slang compounding eponymy abbreviation derivation grammatical shift respelling blending borrowing other total

10

number of instances 100 54 41 32 27 21 21 9 5 5 15 330

% of total 30 16 12 10 8 6 6 3 2 2 5 100

Another general dictionary that over-represents rhyming slang is Puxley 2003, Britslang: An uncensored A–Z of the people’s language including rhyming slang. 11 These figures were presented at the second HEL-LEX conference in 2008.

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As might be expected, semantic change (often figurative use of standard English terms) is the largest single category, accounting for 30 per cent of terms in this group. Less convincing is the figure of 16 per cent of British slang terms derived from rhyming slang. This is testament to the thorough documentation and productivity of rhyming slang rather than its frequency of use: even the most stereotyped music-hall Cockney would have trouble fitting such a high proportion of rhyming slang terms into his act. There are, of course, examples of rhyming slang that are widely known and others that are widely used, but the two groups are by no means identical. Terms and phrases whose origins in rhyming slang are unsuspected by many users include Berk(eley Hunt) “cunt”, butcher’s (hook) “look”, loaf (of bread) “head”, not on your nelly (duff) “puff: life”, porky (pie) “lie”, raspberry (tart) “fart or (more usually) a fart-like noise made with the tongue”, and on one’s Tod (Sloan) “alone”. Recent coinages that have received some usage are Australian (Noah(‘s Ark) “shark”) or even Scottish (Scooby (Doo)) “clue”). Occasionally rhyming slang terms will catch the attention of the media, and enjoy a short period of notoriety (e.g. Damian (Hirst) “a first class degree”, Desmond (Tutu) “a 2:2”, Dicky (Bird) “a third”). The survival of a small number of rhyming slang terms or even the productivity of the processes involved, does not demonstrate the vitality of “Cockney rhyming slang”. Given that the heyday of Cockney rhyming slang appears to have been during the period from the late 1850s to the early 1920s, one has to ask why it is so well represented in modern dictionaries. Why are there more dictionaries of rhyming slang from the twentieth century than of general British slang?12 Who compiles them? Who buys them? Why do they buy them? It is certainly not to decode the rhyming slang heard in everyday life in the East End of London. In order to answer these questions, it is necessary to track the development of the idea of “the Cockney”13 from the nineteenth century onwards. The music-halls provided working-class audiences and adventurous men of higher status with jingoistic popular entertainment that addressed everyday concerns and provided a commentary on social and political issues. Various stock characters appeared on a regular basis, including drunken Irishmen and Cockney costermongers, and Derek Scott writes that the earliest performers inhabited these characters only for the 12 J. Green (2003, 220) comments that if rhyming slang had originated outside London it would inevitably have received less attention, which is certainly part of the answer to this question. 13 The quotation marks are used to emphasize that reference is to stereotypical figures rather than to real people, either as individuals or collectively.

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duration of individual songs. He argues that by the end of the nineteenth century, “Cockney” music-hall performers were imitating earlier stage Cockneys rather than basing their performance on the observation of actual Cockneys (Scott 2002). Thus a number of Cockney stereotypes arose and were repeatedly confirmed on stage without any reference to changes in and among the inhabitants of inner-city London. The representation of the speech of working-class Londoners in novels and plays also contributed to the enregisterment of the dialect: through its fictional and dramatic representations, Cockney became a socially recognized form of English “linked to a specific scheme of cultural values” (Agha 2003, 23114). Its enregisterment is tied in with that of Received Pronunciation, in that Cockneys were frequently cited to provide examples of stigmatized use in guides to good English. In response, Cockney developed its own defiant covert prestige. The use of Cockney rhyming slang is, of course, an important element in the stereotype of “the Cockney”.15 “The Cockney” stereotype survived the decline of the music-hall, particularly in the character of “Tommy”: the archetypal British soldier of the Boer and First World Wars.16 “Tommy” was a working-class man who was accustomed to hard physical labour, but eager to avoid it whenever possible. Although not highly educated, his common sense sometimes took him beyond the conclusions reached by those in authority over him. Not unduly overawed by his social superiors, he displayed a strong but selective sense of loyalty. His dour humour and readiness to forget everything in a drink and a sing-song helped him to cope with the hardships of military service. Although these qualities are strongly associated with “the Cockney”, they are by no means restricted to this stereotype. The stereotypical Cockney bears a marked resemblance to the Australian Ocker stereotype, and his simple-hearted happiness in the face of hardship, particularly with the help of alcoholic beverages, is also attributed to residents of Newfoundland (King and Clarke 2002). Many of Tommy’s qualities were transferred to “the Cockney” during the Second World War, when home-bound Cockneys suffered under the Blitz. The phenomenally successful pre-war musical Me and my girl, which became emblematic of Cockney resilience, reinforced Londoners’ image of themselves as plucky underdogs who would not be cowed, regardless of the odds against them. With their irreverence directed 14

Agha’s paper deals with the enregisterment of Received Pronunciation. Technically known as a “third-order indexical” in preference to Labov’s “stereotype” (Johnstone et al. 2006, 81, following Silverstein 2003). 16 Tommy (or Thomas) Atkins was a generic name for the common soldier from the 1880s. Its use was popularized by Kipling’s poem Tommy. 15

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towards British rather than German authorities, similar “Cockney” characters inhabited Ealing comedies and Carry On films through to the 1970s. Like “Tommy”, these Cockney stereotypes were irreverent and cheerful in the face of adversity. They were not given to unnecessary exertion, but their resourcefulness and application flourished when applied to matters of dubious legality. They had their own version of honour, often drifting into sentimentality, and were mutually supportive in times of need. Short-term hedonism frequently frustrated their dreams of better things, and they remained suspicious of pretension and of outsiders. The stereotype of the cheeky chirpy Cockney chappy skirting the edges of the law had numerous incarnations in later British situation comedies, including Steptoe senior (Steptoe and son), Private Walker (Dad’s army), Fletcher (Porridge), Smithie (Citizen Smith), and Arthur Daley (Minder). At least two rhyming slang glossaries were produced as by-products of these programmes.17 During the period from the 1980s onward, the balance of the various elements making up “the Cockney” changed. Cockney accents are more recognizable internationally than any other English regional accent, so “Cockney” characters are often used to represent the English white working classes as whole in films and television programmes made in the United States. This broadening in meaning of “the Cockney” can also be traced on the covers of rhyming slang dictionaries. There is a movement away from stock images of London identity, such as red double-decker buses, pearly kings and queens, Tower Bridge, and St Paul’s Cathedral, towards broader symbols of Englishness, and sometimes even of Britishness. For example, Ed West’s Coarse Cockney rhyming slang (2006) shows the flag of St George on its cover. The cover of Geoff Tibball’s The ultimate Cockney geezer’s guide to rhyming slang (2008) has the union flag as a backdrop. Criminality and violence has become more central to media representations of “Cockneys”, who inhabit either a British (Vinnie Jones as Big Chris in Lock, stock, and two smoking barrels; Ray Winstone as Gary Dove and Ben Kingsley as Don Logan in Sexy beast) or American (Don Cheadle as Basher Tarr in Ocean’s eleven; Tim Roth as Pumpkin in Pulp fiction) underworld. Indeed, Lock, stock, and two smoking barrels includes a sub-titled scene in rhyming slang. This resurgent association between “the Cockney” and crime is also represented in the marketing of rhyming slang dictionaries. For example, the cover of Bodmin Dark’s Dirty Cockney rhyming slang (2003) shows a suited gangster with the bye17

R. Barker, Fletcher’s book of rhyming slang (1979) and Griffiths, Arthur Daley’s guide to doing it right (1986), which includes a rhyming slang glossary among its various contents.

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line “Buy it, you slag”. Real criminals associated themselves with the happy-go-lucky Cockney stereotype both for financial gain and to manipulate their public image: Reg Kray’s book of slang (Manning 1989) includes a rhyming slang glossary among its contents. The use of rhyming slang in films and on television has undoubtedly helped the continuing and developing home market for rhyming slang dictionaries. Even without a specific association with popular culture, rhyming slang dictionaries represent light-hearted amusement. They also represent a particular type of nostalgia: for a world in which the working classes were largely white and respected traditional masculine values. In this light, the purchase of a rhyming slang dictionary can be seen as a rejection of “political correctness” and as an expression of affiliation with the white working classes. Rhyming slang performs a similar function for its lexicographers. It allows them to identify themselves with reference to “the Cockney”. Julian Franklyn, for example, is described in his obituary as having been born “within the sound of Bow Bells” (The Times 1970) in London at the turn of the century. He was indeed born in St Saviour, Southwark, and his birth was registered in the first quarter of 1900 under the name Julian E. Frankenberg. His father, Mark or Marks (apparently born Moses), a glass merchant, was also born in Southwark, but his grandfather, Solomon, had moved there from Germany. Like many of their contemporaries, the Frankenbergs anglicized their surname, and Julian’s older brother enlisted in the army as Lawrence Franklyn in 1915, confirming the connection between the two family names.18 Although Franklyn claims first-hand knowledge of rhyming slang, he presents himself as an observer rather than a user: presumably rhyming slang was one of the things that marked him and his family as outsiders. Ray Puxley, on the other hand, not only claims first-hand knowledge of rhyming (and general London) slang, but also traces this connection back through two additional generations (2003, viii).19 For both Franklyn and Puxley, an individual’s claim to be a 18

The Times obituary, quoted above, is remarkably uninformative about Franklyn’s personal life. It records that he enlisted when he was sixteen, but there are no records of military service for a Julian Franklyn, Franklin, or Frankenberg. Sixteen was underage, so Franklyn may have used a false date of birth as well as a different name. Further circumstantial evidence for this identification is offered by Franklyn’s use of the middle initial ‘E’ in some of his early publications. A Julian E. Franklyn married Beryl Levin in St. Pancras in 1922, and a Julian Franklyn is listed as living at 16 Knollys Rd, Streatham, in telephone directories between 1944 and 1956. 19 In Cockney rabbit (1992) v–viii, Puxley emphasizes experience above heritage.

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Cockney clearly depends not only on place of birth, but also on ancestry. Thus an individual who was not born in London and has never lived there might be seen as having a better claim to Cockney status than the child of an immigrant. For the Cockney Diaspora, rhyming slang is heritage. Milroy (2000, 63) emphasizes the significance of Received Pronunciation (RP) as “a particular socially marked linguistic model” in contrast with the spoken standard in the United States, which holds more ethnic and geographical than social meaning. Although many linguists still take RP as the spoken standard in Britain, for many British speakers it is the very social markedness of RP that places it outside their conception of the spoken standard. The popular conception of “standard spoken English” in Britain is considerably looser than that of many linguists. It is now at least as usual for RP-speakers, particularly those in politics or the media, to acquire less socially marked accents than for speakers of non-standard accents to aspire to speak RP. RP is thus no longer perceived by most speakers of British English as a neutral accent, if indeed it ever was. Estuary English has restructured the social meaning of accents within Britain.20 Speakers situated towards the ill-defined middle of a continuum between Cockney English and RP are now perceived by many, particularly the young, as having neutral accents. Rhyming slang gives a pedigree to Estuary English, among whose speakers there are wide variations in social class. For speakers of Estuary English, as well as for those with various claims to Cockneydom, claiming a heritage in rhyming slang is a way of representing oneself as a humorous individual who is lacking in pretension: as someone whose aspirations and material well-bring arise from merit and not social advantage. Even individuals with no personal investment in “the Cockney” value rhyming slang as something peculiarly English: and here the contrast is rather with the United States rather than Wales, Scotland, or Ireland. Rhyming slang clearly has, and has had, different meanings in different contexts. Where once it was associated with chirpy working-class Londoners, it has in recent years both narrowed and widened in application. The narrowing is seen in its association with criminality, while the widening treats it as emblematic of traditional Englishness. The production and purchase of rhyming slang dictionaries, while clearly subject to international conceptions of English and British identity, cannot be fully understood without additional reference to local concerns and questions of personal identity. 20

See Przedlacka 2001, in which she argues that Cockney rather than Estuary English remains the main source of innovation.

CHAPTER TWELVE THE LOST AND FOUND IN RICHARDSON’S A NEW DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE (1836–1837/1855): AN INSIGHT INTO THE STATE OF THE VOCABULARY LAURA PINNAVAIA

1. Premise In the history of English monolingual lexicography before the eighteenth century there was no theoretical basis for lexicographic practice: “dictionaries happened; they grew by a process of accretion, and without reflection on what it was all leading to” (Osselton 1983, 17). After about 1750 came the notion of what a dictionary should be: it came to be seen as a scholarly record of the whole language; in method it became inductiveʊthat is, based on or derived from a corpus; the emphasis came to lie far more than hithertoon the literary rather than the technical language; and the dictionary now assumed an authoritarian or normative function. (ibid.)

Besides a new wave of philological studies emerging from language analyses, it was undoubtedly the publication of Johnson’s Dictionary of the English language in two volumes folio in 1755 that incited scholars to reflect on the nature of lexicography and essentially on the principles and methods of word selection. Johnson’s lexicographic practice became exemplary for a more scientific selection of words, taken from a well defined corpus of literary works, the citation of parts of which could and would aid the native reader to better his command of the English language.

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As the decades passed, the standards set by “Johnsonian” lexicographic practice developed further, so that by 1850 another idea of what a dictionary should be emerged. In the wake of Noah Webster’s and Joseph Worcester’s dictionaries in America (1828; 1830 and 1846), and especially of Charles Richardson’s New dictionary of the English language first published in England in 1836–1837, the nineteenth-century dictionary was envisaged as “an inventory of the language” whose compiler had to “collect and arrange all words, whether good or bad” (Trench 1857, 3–4). Trench underlined the necessity for a more objective approach to dictionary-making, which he thought should rest upon an unconditioned selection of words, representative of the English language, arranged in such a way that the current definitions might transpire from the older ones. Richardson’s New dictionary seems to have inspired this sentiment, which in successive centuries was translated into the term “descriptive” by the few and illustrious scholars who have studied this work: Beal (2004b), Dolezal (1989b, 2000), Fowler (2004), Sacerdoti Mariani (1994), and Zgusta (1986, 1989). In the history of lexicography, Richardson’s work actually represents the “remoulding and reforming of the old” Dictionary of Dr. Johnson (Richardson 1836–1837, 1:39), and the honorable precursor of the greatest historical dictionary of the English language, the Oxford English Dictionary, acknowledged as such in the preface of the latter.1

2. Charles Richardson and his New Dictionary of the English Language (1836–1837) Unlike the great Dr. Johnson, not much has been written about Mr. Charles Richardson. According to the Dictionary of National Biography (Marchant 1896/2004), Richardson was born in 1775 in Tulse Hill and died at Feltham in 1865. Although he studied to become a lawyer, he became a teacher instead, in order to follow scholarly and literary pursuits. As a lexicographer, Richardson began his career in 1817 when he took charge of what was to be a “Philosophical and Etymological Lexicon of the English language”, a section of the Encyclopaedia metropolitana whose publication was to be superintended by Coleridge. The lexicon was initially published serially as part of the Encyclopaedia (Aarsleff 1967/1983, 250), but eventually issued with revisions as two separately bound volumes in 1836 and 1837. From then the two-volume set went into 1 Richardson is in fact the only lexicographer mentioned in the preface to the Oxford English Dictionary.

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multiple editions with both British and North American printings. The last edition seems to have been a London quarto of 1875 (Dolezal 2000, 126). In historical terms Richardson has thus been identified as an Augustan lexicographer. In actual fact, though, Richardson offers much of what is Victorian too. If it is true that in defining lexemes according to their etymological senses, without the intervention of personal judgments, and in illustrating them more fully owing to the inclusion of quotations taken from a vast period of English literary usage, Richardson has gained the title of descriptive lexicographer; it is also true that Richardson discloses his conservatism when, for example, his quotations, like Johnson’s, reflect the English used by and determined by a set of writers that Richardson himself selects and reputes to be the “best authorities”; or when the discrepancy between the order of meanings in the definition and their order in the examples of use, emphasises the fully pre-determined ontological structure of his work.2 In reality, it would seem that Richardson’s New dictionary stands astride two major lexicographic traditions: the prescriptive, symbolized by Johnson’s Dictionary, on the one hand, and the descriptive, represented by the OED, on the other. While the New dictionary embraces the descriptive features of historicism, etymology, and the flux of meaning through time, it is also compiled with a prescriptive plan in mindʊan attitude still too deeply rooted in the mentality of lexicographers to be consciously abandoned in the early years of the nineteenth century (Pinnavaia 2008).

3. Objectives and method of research Aware of Richardson’s ambivalent position as a lexicographerʊpartly dependent upon his predecessor’s Dictionary, as he himself states in the front matter of his dictionary and as was customary lexicographic practice, after all, and partly looking forwards towards the OEDʊthe aim of this research is to discover Richardson’s lexicographic attitude as far as the lexicon is concerned. If one considers that there is a gap of fifty years between the fourth edition of Johnson’s Dictionary (1773) and the first edition of Richardson’s New dictionary (1836–1837), and a one hundred year gap between Johnson’s first edition (1755) and the 1855 edition of Richardson’s work, 2 The definitions of the lemmas, which extend from the literal to the metaphorical, can thus either be evaluated as an untrue reflection of their natural evolution or as an incomplete statement of their record in literary history. In either case, the discrepancy points to Richardson’s will to reorder the state of the English language rather than simply describe it (Pinnavaia 2008, 158–159).

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it is plausible to imagine that the lexicon recorded in Richardson’s dictionary should vary somewhat from that recorded in Johnson’s. To test this hypothesis three main procedures were carried out. The first was to verify the actual extent of the changes in the lexicon in the fifty-year gap between the compilation of the two dictionaries. This was done by examining the OED (online) and by recording all the words with first citations dated between the years 1770 and 1820. This information would provide us with an idea of the number and quality of the neologisms which arose in the fifty-year gap. Secondly, lemmas with initials LA, NE, and PI were looked up in the first and fourth editions of Johnson’s Dictionary (using the CD-ROM edition of 1996) and in the 1855 edition of Richardson’s New dictionary.3 The lemmas were thirdly and finally compared in the two dictionaries, taking into account the differences and similarities between the inclusion of discrete and multiword units, lexical fields, and word families.4

4. The growth of the English lexicon In the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries the English lexicon started to grow significantly. In these centuries the need for the English language to take over a “higher” function (Beal 2004b, 17) that had previously been the domain of Latin stimulated a great deal of lexical innovation, which since then, despite moments of deceleration, has shown overall growth. The search carried out in the OED in fact shows that the number of words with first citations dated between 1700 and 1750 is 10 920. Two centuries later that number quadruples to 40 848. Between 1800 and 1850 the number of words grows especially fast, reaching the total of 30 136 words, in contrast with the 12 826 registered between 1750 and 1800. Narrowing the temporal gap to the period from 1770 to 1820, which, as already said, corresponds to the fifty years between Johnson’s fourth 3 It was decided to employ this later edition of Richardson’s New dictionary because, compared to the first edition (1836–1837), it is characterized by an extra 59 pages of supplementary material in the first volume, and an additional 64-page supplement in the second. Moreover, the eighty-year gap between Johnson’s fourth edition and this one was envisaged as allowing more scope for lexical differences. The preface of the first edition is, however, quoted from that edition, since it was replaced by different preliminary matter in 1855. 4 It is clear that this analysis, based on the lemmas starting LA, NE, and PI, is suggestive rather than exhaustive. Further time would be required to carry out a thorough examination of the two dictionaries.

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edition of his Dictionary (1773) and Richardson’s first edition of his New dictionary (1836–1837), it is possible to gauge (as seen in Table 12.1) that after an initial decline between the years 1775 and 1785, the number of new words grows steadily up until 1805. A short five-year decrease is then followed by a sharp increase in the last ten years. Table 12.1: The growth of the lexicon from 1770 to 1820 3000

2500

2000

1500

1000

500

16 -2 0 18

11 -1 5 18

06 -1 0 18

01 -0 5 18

618 00 17 9

91 -9 5 17

86 -9 0 17

81 -8 5 17

76 -8 0 17

17

70 -7 5

0

There is no denying that, apart from a general growth in the lexicon from 1770 onwards, in the fifty years between Johnson’s work and Richardson’s work, the English language acquired a significant number of new words. About 16 000 are reported in the OED. This is clearly a number that can only be considered as indicative for many reasons, including current and traditional lexicographic practices. Firstly, one must remember that the OED is still undergoing revision: the continuous retrieval of antedatings and new sources by the OED lexicographers makes this figure vulnerable to frequent alteration. Secondly, and more traditionally, the OED has always based its word selection on sources of a prevalently literary nature that has not necessarily allowed it to take the whole of the English language situation fully into account. It is worthy of note in fact that the increase in neologisms in this fiftyyear period seems to coincide with the publication of important works. In 1798 the Lyrical ballads were published, and it is in this period that the writers Scott, Southey, and Coleridge, the most quoted in the OED after

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Shakespeare (see Brewer 2000, 43), were particularly productive. It is also in this period that significant scientific works appeared such as Richard Kirwan’s Elements of mineralogy (1784), Charles Hutton’s Mathematical and philosophical dictionary (1795–1796), Robert Hooper’s Compendious medical dictionary (1798), Robert Jameson’s System of mineralogy (1804– 1808), and John Children’s An essay on chemical analysis (1819), along with numerous other encyclopaedic works containing animal, plant, mineral, chemical, and medical nomenclatures. Surely the recurrence of such writers and their works in the OED must have determined an increase in the number of words regarding certain topics over others. Notwithstanding this, it may be hypothesised that the increase in new words from 1770 to 1820 is a mirror of the changes that were occurring in eighteenthcentury English society. It is no novelty, after all, that by the end of the eighteenth century enormous social and economic changes had started to take place in Britain and abroad (Trevelyan 1942/1986, 345–430). In England, in particular, advances in agriculture, medicine, science and technology, begun at the end of the seventeenth century, were making an impact upon the English language. On a more social and cultural note, new political ideas started to feature in pamphlets and books that since the invention of the circulating libraries, around about the year 1726, had started to inform and educate the ever increasingly curious public. The data in the OED seems in actual fact to confirm this. According to the data presented by the OED, many are the semantic fields affected by new words in the 1770–1820 time gap. In the field of the arts, there are neologisms related to sculpture, e.g. Mater Dolorosa (1800); architecture, e.g. sedile (1794), fenestella (1797), and sacellum (1806); music, e.g. neuma (1776), superius (1776), and unisonous (1781); religion, e.g. sanctuarium (1796) and hagiolatry (1808); and rhetoric and philosophy, e.g. predicatorial (1772) and dissertative (1816). In the field of the natural sciences, the topics enriched by the majority of neologisms are botany, e.g. eucalyptus (1809), flabelliform (1777), and suffrutescent (1816); zoology, e.g. mactra (1777); ornithology, e.g. ornithorhynchus (1800); and entomology, e.g. hispa (1794). For the physical sciences, new words appear in the semantic areas of chemistry, e.g. fluorous (1790), citric (1800), and the noun hydrate (1802); biology, e.g. mucronate (1776) and osculant (1819); and geology and mineralogy, e.g. oolith (1788) and chlorite (as the name of a constituent of chlorite slate), barolite, and hyalite (all 1794). In these artistic and scientific domains it is evident that the neologisms originated principally from Latin and Greek. Latin in fact

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is without doubt the language that contributed the most to the formation of new English words in this period. The second most productive language was French, which in contrast to Latin and Greek introduced the highest number of new words related to daily social and cultural matters. One area of English social life in the 1770–1820 period that proliferated with new words from French was politics and warfare: new terms like democrat (1790) and moderantism and federalism (1793), along with military terminology such as legionnaire (1818), entered with the aftermath of the French Revolution and its influence on European thought. It was indeed French culture that largely dominated European lifestyles in this period of history, explaining the significant number of French-derived neologisms for the latest fashions in dress, e.g. paletot (a1796) and chemisette (1796); headwear, e.g. chignon (1783) and frisette (1818); cuisine, e.g. galette (1775) and bon-bon (1796); haberdashery, e.g. crêpe (1797) and tulle (c1818); furniture, e.g. chaise-longue (1800) and chiffonier (1806); and much more. The most productive language, however, according to the OED, still remained the English language. By means of internal word-formation processes, among which stand out the processes of derivation and composition, a multitude of indigenous words became the sources of new nouns, e.g. rolling-mill (1787), paper knife (1789), nationalization (1801), anti-democrat (1802), seductress (1803), beguilement (1805), and adorner (1818); new verbs, e.g. to carbonify (1792), to moistify (1786), and to opalize (1811); new adjectives, e.g. whity-brown (1777), black-headed (1774), unfixing (1810), and irreplaceable (1807); and so on. These English words, sometimes even made up of free and bound morphemes with once foreign origins, gave form to the many new ideas characterising the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

5. The state of the vocabulary in Richardson’s New Dictionary (1855) To compare the lexical contents of the OED (online) with Richardson’s New dictionary (1855) would expose many shortcomings in the latter owing to the advanced lexicographic practices of the former. It is for this reason that Richardson’s lexicon has not been compared to that contained in the OED online, as the discrepancies between the two would not

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necessarily be realistic.5 The decision to search the OED online was, nonetheless, taken in order to obtain, and quite rapidly, an idea of the number and type of neologisms around the time Richardson was compiling his dictionary and after Johnson had compiled his. It has just been observed that the data retrieved from the OED points to a significant number of neologisms introduced into the English language after Johnson’s work, but which, as might have been expected, do not really characterize Richardson’s work. Richardson’s New dictionary is, as has already been stated, based upon Johnson’s Dictionary. It is thus against Johnson’s Dictionary that the selection and treatment of lexemes has been analysed and Richardson’s sensitivity to the new world and its labels around him ascertained.

5.1 The selection of lemmas In the preface to the first edition of his New dictionary (1836–1837, 56), Richardson writes: In my endeavours to collect and settle the vocabulary, I have enjoyed and availed myself of the large store of materials accumulated by Johnson and his editor Mr. Todd, the various supplements and provincial vocabularies, and the notes of commentators upon our older poets.

Richardson clearly states that his wordlist is based upon Johnson’s wordlist. A general glance at the wordlists of the two dictionaries certainly leaves this impression: a closer look at the wordlists starting LA, NE, and PI seems to confirm it. Under the lemmas NE both lexicographers start with the particle ne and end with the lemma next; under PI they both start with the rather odd noun piacle and end with the verb pizzle.6 Under LA, instead, Richardson chooses to exclude the interjection la with which Johnson heads his wordlist and instead starts with the noun and verb label which represents Johnson’s fourth word down, after labdanum and labefy, duly excluded by Richardson too. What is striking right from the start is that, while basing his dictionary on the words present in Johnson’s Dictionary, Richardson also picks and chooses his own words from these in an unlikely descriptive fashion. What 5 It is clear that a comparison between Richardson’s New dictionary and the first edition of the OED would have been preferable. This could certainly be the focus of a new more detailed research. 6 Even if it is not physically the last lemma in Richardson’s New dictionary, because it is listed under the verb piss.

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Richardson excludes from Johnson’s Dictionary are essentially technical words related to those fields that were paradoxically growing in the years he was compiling his New dictionary. Richardson clears Johnson’s wordlist of the lexemes that refer in particular to anatomy (lamdoidal, laryngotomy, neurology, neurotomy, Pia-mater); botany (labdanum, labiated, lac, laciniated, lady-bedstraw, lady-mantle, lady-slipper, lamdoidal, larch, laudanum, lazarwort, nenupher, pilewort, pipetree, pistachio); zoology, as in the names of insects (labra, pilser, pisemire), the names of fish (lamentine, lampron, needlefish), ornithological names (lanneret, lanner, pianet), and the names and features of animals (lampas, lapdog); and mineralogy, such as (lapis) lazuli.7 In this manner Richardson seems to undermine further an encyclopaedic approach that had set himself, and Johnson before him, apart from earlier, sixteenth- and seventeenth-century, lexicographers. The will to “supply a comparatively unknowing readership with as much advanced and scholarly information as it was looking for” (McIntosh 1998, 8) was a new lexicographic attitude in the eighteenth century. It must have been an attitude that was reserved for the information imparted under the lemmas only and not for the selection of words, though. In fact, Johnson too has been criticized for not having included as many technical words as he might have (Landau 1984, 50). Richardson includes even fewer, and is certainly not ashamed of it. In the preface to the first edition he reminds his readers that his dictionary is “of Words merely and not of Arts and Sciences” (57). It is for this reason, he writes, that he will abstain from including technical words, advocating the making of a specialized dictionary to cater for such terms (57–58). If, on the one hand, Richardson discards a number of technical words that appear in Johnson’s Dictionary, he does, on the other, add many new words that do not appear in his predecessor’s work. Besides some completely new lemmas, like lab, labile, laburnum, lache, lainer, lateen, nedder, numerous, neology, neomeny, piccadel, and pindarick, that belong to a literary register of English, the majority of additions consist of lexical derivations of the lemmas already present in Johnson’s Dictionary. For example under the lemma labour Richardson includes the derived adjectives labourless and laborous, as well as the adverb laboriously. Under necromancy he adds the noun necromantick, the adjective necromantick, and the adverb necromantickly. New compounds absent in Johnson readily 7

Since Johnson’s Dictionary (1755, 1773) some of these lexemes have become obsolete. According to OED, however, they were still in use at the time Richardson was compiling his New dictionary, although possibly not very widespread.

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appear too, such as the nouns lack-beard, neck verse, neck-bone, and piping office and the adjectives large-hearted and piping hot. Richardson is thus not impermeable to the growing word-stock of his language. While retaining the majority of the terms Johnson has in his Dictionary, he also makes room for new literary elements of the vocabulary at the expense of others that belong to specialized registers of rare usage. Why Richardson behaves in this lexicographic way might be determined by his treatment of the lemmas.

5.2 The treatment of lemmas Two important tenets guide Richardson in the way he defines his lemmas. Firstly, the definitions of each lemma must derive from one principal etymological sense. Secondly, every definition must be supported by an example of real language use as represented by a corpus of literary writers. This has consequences on the way the lemmas are treated and ultimately on the criterion of selection. Starting from the corpus, Richardson bases his New dictionary essentially on the language of a series of literary writers that covers four distinct periods of English language history: from the “Rhyming chronicles” to the end of the sixteenth century; from Elizabeth I to Charles II; from the Restoration to the House of Hanover; and from George II to the nineteenth century. Just a glance at the New dictionary is enough to perceive that every lemma is accompanied not by one or two quotations, as is often the case in Johnson’s Dictionary, but by three or four at least. It would seem possible to posit then that where Richardson does not possess any or enough illustrative material for the lemmas in Johnson’s Dictionary, he does without. Looking closely at the lemmas Richardson discards, the majority in fact appear in Johnson’s Dictionary with few if no literary supports at all. Terms like labiated, lachrymation, ladybedstraw, lady-bird, lady-cow, lamina, landfall, lanneret, languet, lanigerous, lansquenet, lanuginous, neckbeef, pict, pignoration, and pilewort are among the lemmas excluded by Richardson that are not supported by quotations in Johnson’s Dictionary; others might instead have one quotation such as labdanum, lac, lady-fly, lady-slipper, lamentine, lampas, lampron, and lancepessade. It becomes evident that in the absence of literary material to illustrate the usage of a given term, Richardson tends to leave it out. In light of this it becomes easier to understand why Richardson discards the fully encyclopaedic approach of recording every single word ever to have appeared in the English language, in favour of a more discriminatory approach bent on recording the

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words that his readership would be likely to run into or need when reading, writing, or possibly even speaking. So it is also the literary corpus that establishes what Richardson adds to Johnson’s wordlist. The numerous new derivatives and compounds found in the New dictionary are generated by the quotations that Richardson finds and includes to illustrate the basic and derived senses of one or more headword(s). Through these derived and composed words Richardson can demonstrate the first tenet mentioned above: that for every word there is one principal etymological meaning from which all others might derive. The way in which the lemmas in the New dictionary are presented offers a clear insight into this rather reductive vision of language. Unlike Johnson, Richardson limits his entries essentially to two parts of speech: the noun and the verb. Possibly accepting Horne Tooke’s argument that nouns are “signs of the impressions that sensation makes on the mind, the names of ideas” and verbs are the necessary tools for communicating these ideas (Aarsleff 1967/1983, 47), Richardson makes nouns and/or verbs his lemmas, unless the lemma has no principal nominal or verbal form (see the adjectives lay and lax, for example), which he writes in bold, and under them lists the other parts of speech deriving from them. By not necessarily providing a definition for each and every one of these, he makes the dictionary-user aware of their existence as lexical derivatives of a higher-order semantic form. For the verb lay, for instance, unlike Johnson who lists twenty-eight different denotative and connotative meanings, followed by another eighteen explaining the figurative meanings of the phrasal verbs based on lay (such as lay apart, aside, away, before, by, down, for, forth, in, on, open, out, over, to, together, under, up, upon), Richardson defines lay as To put or place; lit[erally] and met[aphorically]; lit[erally] when a state of rest is intended. Used with prepositions it is equivalent to the L[atin] v[erb] Ponere, to put or place, and its compounds; thus,— To lay or put down; to deposit; to lay or put upon; to impose; to lay or put out, or before, to expose; to lay or put together; to compose; to lay, put, or place near to; (in apposition;) to put or place in their proper places, to dispose; to put or place up, in store, at rest; to repose.

Richardson condenses the articulated definitions Johnson provides into one main meaning. While admitting that the verb may have a figurative rendering, as well as “numerous consequential applications”, he refrains from specifying what these might be, writing that they “may be inferred from the context of the sentence in which they occur”.

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Despite his evident awareness of the polysemous nature of words and in spite of his plan, announced in the preface of his work, to attend “1st, To the etymology and literal meaning;ʊ2nd, To the metaphorical application of this meaningʊto the mind;ʊ3rd, To the application consequent or inferred from the literal meaning;ʊand 4th, To the application consequent or inferred from that which is metaphorical” (1836–1837, 44), Richardson is generally reluctant to spell out the diversity of such meanings. In fact, apart from the first and foremost etymological meaning of his headword, along with a secondary metaphorical meaning, Richardson leaves most other meanings undefined, and leaves it up to the good will of the reader to sort out the derived forms present in his citations. It is in fact in the quotations that Richardson includes many derivatives and compounds absent from Johnson’s work, whose meanings are left to the readers to unlock. For example, under the headword lady, Richardson lists the past participle ladied, the verbal derivative ladify, and the adverb ladily; in the citations he adds the abstract nouns ladyhood and ladyship, which are not overtly introduced or described. The covert introduction of so many new word-formations like these demonstrates his strong belief in the evolutionary nature of language, from which it follows that some meanings prevail over others and, going further, that some words are more important than others. If Richardson excludes some words otherwise present in Johnson’s Dictionary, it might in fact be because he considers them to be of a lesser significance. It has already been mentioned that Richardson excludes the interjection la, for instance. It is labelled by Johnson (1755, 1773) as a “corrupted form”, and it is likely that Richardson wished to avoid the inclusion of a linguistic element that was not only perverted by use, but was also not worthy of Locke’s first and upper category of words that represent thought, being only suitable for the second and lower category identified by the same philosopher as necessary for “quickness and dispatch of communication” (Aarsleff 1967/1983, 52). Locke’s views and their influence upon eighteenth-century taste and ideas seem to have influenced Richardson also as far as another linguistic category is concerned, that of idiomatic expressions. According to eighteenth-century thought, idiomatic expressions were regarded as vulgarisms, and as “offences against logic and human reason” (L. P. Smith 1925, 264), a view that Johnson had openly admitted to and abided by in his cautious and prudent selection, inclusion, and treatment of idiomatic expressions in his Dictionary (Pinnavaia 2006). Although Richardson does not openly declare a particular dislike for idiomatic expressions, one might

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perceive in his silent treatment of them a negativity that is stronger than Johnson’s. In fact, if Johnson’s lexicographical treatment of idioms is inconsistent ʊat times he includes them by chance, at times he provides a partial description based on the metaphoric sense of a single lexeme, at other times he consciously describes them and accompanies them with a negative judgment (see Pinnavaia 2010, 146–151)ʊRichardson’s handling of idioms is on the whole much more consistent. He introduces idioms quite by chance, according to whether they appear in the quotations he provides to illustrate the literal or metaphoric meanings of single lexemes. In the entries for the lemmas laced, pickle, and pie Richardson, in fact, includes the idiomatic expressions (to be) laced mutton, (to be) in a pickle, and (to) have a finger in every pie, (all of which appear in Johnson’s Dictionary too). In all three instances, the expressions occur in the quotations used by Richardson to illustrate the meaning of the headwords. In the case of (to) have a finger in every pie Richardson’s treatment coincides with Johnson’s so that the idiom appears in both dictionaries in the same quotation from Shakespeare’s Henry VIII. In the case of in a pickle the quotations documenting the expression differ in the two dictionaries: in Johnson’s the quotation comes from Shakespeare, from Dekker in Richardson’s. In the case of the idiom laced mutton, even when Johnson highlights the idiom and describes its meaning as “an old word for a whore” (Johnson 1755 and 1773, s.v. laced), Richardson fails to define it, simply allowing it to creep in through an expression taken from Ben Jonson’s masque Neptune’s triumph. Richardson’s indifference to idioms sounds strikingly more negative than Johnson’s explicit repudiation. In denying idioms an official lexicographic space, it is clear that Richardson considers them less important than single words, and considers their complex figurative meanings secondary to the metaphoric meaning of the single words composing them.

6. Conclusions “To posit an absolute divide between Victorian and Augustan in terms of lexicography is, in many ways, ... misjudged.” (Mugglestone 2004, 157), as it may be misjudged to describe Richardson as either an innovative or conservative lexicographer. While there is clearly much innovation in Richardson’s art, there is also much conservatism. The innovation lies in the way he allows the meanings of words to speak for themselves through the examples of use of writers and poets. In fact, what

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differentiates Richardson from Johnson is especially the objective approach he embraces when defining words. When Johnson (1755, 1773), for example, passes judgments upon the usage of words (see, for instance, the third sense of the adjective abominable which he refers to as belonging to “low and ludicrous language”, as well as being “a word of loose and indeterminate censure”), Richardson admits no advice or evaluation, his definitions always being strictly linguistic. The conservatism on the contrary emerges from the plan of his work. In the Preface to his New dictionary (1836–1837, 61) Richardson lays down the purpose of his work: It is a copious and careful record of the Language from its earliest state; it contains the choicest sentiments of English wisdom, poetry, and eloquence; it may be deemed a supplial of many books; and as such merely it may be estimated of higher worth in foreign climes than on its native shores.

As much as Richardson wished his dictionary to be “a copious and careful record of the Language from its earliest state” in an absolutely descriptive manner, by preferring to include the words representing “the choicest sentiments of English wisdom, poetry, and eloquence”, he was actually continuing the prescriptive tradition of creating a lexicographic work that might direct his readership—albeit covertly—into acquiring a lexicon of a certain order. The ambivalence of Richardson’s lexicographic position can be felt in his selection and treatment of the lexicon. On the one hand, Richardson’s inclusion of lexemes corresponds to a subjective idea of what the English language should be, dependent upon a well-defined literary corpus which, while being vast, cannot and does not represent the whole of the language. On the other hand, Richardson’s choice to cut out many technical terms from Johnson’s Dictionary, and not really to include that many of the technical neologisms which OED shows to have become current between 1773 and 1855, may alternatively point to an economising lexicographic attitude that was already envisaging the division between the all-purpose versus the specialised dictionary. This might be argued not just for the lexemes and the semantic areas covered, but also for the discrepancy in the treatment of discrete and multiword units. Richardson in fact not only economises by excluding lexemes and neologisms that, it would seem, he viewed as being too specialised for his readership, but also—unlike Johnson’s Dictionary— denies any overt treatment of idiomatic expressions which, it is likely, he

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saw as being too informal and too low for the same readership; and therefore not suitable for any explicit handling in his dictionary. This does not make Richardson’s New dictionary poorer than Johnson’s Dictionary, though. Richardson’s work does contain new lexemes too, but above all it hosts a series of lexical derivations that are not present in Johnson’s Dictionary. In this can be seen Richardson’s will to demonstrate the copiousness of the language and especially of the native English element of the language. If in fact Richardson dispenses with many technical words that are usually of foreign origin, the introduction of quite a number of derivatives and compounds dependent upon the nominal and/or verbal forms of English lemmas manifests his desire to impart a strong awareness of the internal word-formation processes of the English language. The heart and soul of Richardson’s lexicographic work does nonetheless remain his literary corpus; and it is upon this corpus that Richardson relies in order to select which lemmas to list and what definitions to offer. What lexemes are lost from Johnson’s Dictionary (1755, 1773) and what new lexemes are found in his New dictionary (1855) is on the whole determined by what Richardson has at his disposal in his corpus, which once again evinces the contrast between the two lexicographers. The selection and treatment of lexemes in the New dictionary, based upon an extended but selected literary corpus, on the one hand, exposes Richardson’s art and craft as being traditional because not truly representative of the English language; on the other hand, though, it heralds what would become a new approach in the selection and treatment of lexemes in lexicography developed upon the importance of frequency and employment in real language use. In conclusion, like all dictionaries, Richardson’s too is in Trench’s words no “new garment” (Trench 1857, 4). An insight into the state of the vocabulary seems to tell that in the compilation of his New dictionary Richardson looks backwards to Johnson’s Dictionary, where as a critic he selects and adjusts the wordlist, entries, and definitions Johnson has to offer. Contemporaneously, Richardson looks forward and, as a historian, creates one of the major lexicographic works to have provided inspiration and material for the elaboration of successive dictionaries, one of which has indeed been recognised as being the great OED.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN “NOT ALTOGETHER TREATED AS I SHOULD TREAT IT NOW”: JAMES MURRAY’S EARLY EDITORIAL DECISIONS FOR THE NEW ENGLISH DICTIONARY PETER GILLIVER

When the first fascicle of the New English Dictionary was published in January 1884 it included a detailed statement of the Dictionary’s editorial policy. There had been earlier policy documents, notably the Philological Society’s Proposal for the publication of a new English dictionary (dated 1859; issued in 1859 or late 1858); these had however been declarations of intent, whereas James Murray’s “General Explanations” (Murray 1884b) were a distillation of several years’ experience of actual compilation of dictionary entries, in the course of which he had consulted widely on matters of editorial policy and practice. From examination of the early pages of the dictionary, both as printed and in the surviving manuscript drafts, and other contemporary material, it is possible to trace how various aspects of policy came into being during this early period, including the limits of the Dictionary’s scope, the presentation of information in Dictionary entries, the interpretation of the evidence on which these entries were based, and the terminology used in the editorial text.

Sequence of events: 1879–1884 and after Murray’s formal connection with the Dictionary began on 1 March 1879 with the signing of agreements with the Philological Society and the Oxford University Press. These agreements specified many aspects of editorial policy, which had been discussed in detail during the nearly two years of negotiations that had taken place since the first approach to the Press had been made in April 1877. Many finer points of editorial style

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and policy were embodied in the three specimen entries, for the words arrow, castle, and persuade, which were attached to (and formed part of) the agreements. Three years elapsed between the signing of contracts and the first delivery of copy to the Oxford compositors in April 1882, during which time Murray continued to consult widely about particular points.1 Once entries had begun to appear in printed form, major changes of editorial style became impracticable, but numerous issues only began to emerge after there was a significant body of entries to examine. In December 1879 and June 1881 Murray arranged for further specimen entries to be prepared (for address [noun and verb] and alms respectively; the latter underwent further revision during 1881 and 1882), which formed the basis of more detailed discussion on particular points.2 Finally, in the late summer of 1883, when most of Part I of the Dictionary (A–Ant) had been passed for press, and work on Part II was well under way, Murray received a rather trying document entitled “Suggestions for guidance in preparing copy for the Press”, recording the views of some of the Delegates of the Press—the board of dons who governed, and still govern, the activities of the Press—after they had been examining some Dictionary proofs.3 To be told how to do his job after he had spent four years consulting and deliberating, and at a point when it was effectively too late to make changes to Part I anyway, did not go down at all well with Murray; but he was well aware of the importance of being seen to take note of the Delegates’ views, and did his best to take the “Suggestions” into account. Publication was further delayed by a bad-tempered argument with Jowett and the Delegates over the text of Murray’s Preface and introductory “General Explanations”, and it was not until December 1883 that the whole of Part I was ready for press. As will become apparent, some significant changes of editorial policy and style took place even after publication; discussion of 1

One matter which engendered a great deal of discussion was pronunciation; however, the development of the OED’s notation for representating pronunciation is not considered here, as the matter has been very fully dealt with in MacMahon 1985. 2 Versions of all the specimens are preserved in the archives of Oxford University Press (hereafter OUPA). All images of items from the archives are published here by permission of the Secretary to the Delegates of Oxford University Press. 3 The driving force behind the “Suggestions” is usually said to have been Benjamin Jowett, the University’s Vice-Chancellor, but Henry Liddell, the Dean of Christ Church and a noted lexicographer himself, was also closely involved. Copies of the “Suggestions” survive in OUPA, and also in the Murray Papers (held in the Bodleian Library, Oxford; hereafter MP), where related correspondence with both Jowett and Liddell is also preserved.

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such matters, usually occasioned by problems with particular entries, would continue for some years.

Inclusivity The idea that the OED should be absolutely comprehensive went back to its conception; indeed, the idea, or ideal, of a lexicon totius Anglicitatis went back before that. But it was of course a theoretical concept, and like many theoretical concepts did not survive first contact with reality. The principle that any word in the language for which evidence could be found should be included was all very well, but as Henry Hucks Gibbs wrote to James Murray in 1882, “you must be quite sure that it has entered the language, and is not a mere vagrant knocking at the door & who will be deservedly sent about his business.”4 The question for Murray, as he examined the materials that had been sent in by readers over the previous twenty-odd years, was: did everything which a reader had identified as a word meriting a quotation actually count as a word requiring inclusion in the Dictionary? In May 1880, giving his Presidential Address to the Philological Society after his first year’s work as Editor, he declared that “a limiting line of English speech, in foreign words, technical words, and compounds … could not be found or fixt in a Dictionary” (Philological Society 1880b, 34). Over the next few years he developed and refined his ideas about the boundaries of the language. In his 1884 “General explanations” he observed that while “the circle of the English language has a well-defined centre but no discernible circumference”, “practical utility has some bounds”, and the lexicographer “must … ‘draw the line somewhere’” (Murray 1884b, vii).5 Drawing such a line was generally not a case of setting up abstract criteria which a word must satisfy in order to be included, but rather of making an ad hoc and pragmatic assessment of the evidence available: “it has not always been possible to establish or follow precedents, or to avoid apparent inconsistencies” (Murray 1888, ix). He was sometimes encouraged to take a more restrictive approach, as in 1883 when the “Suggestions” mentioned several categories which the Delegates felt could be more sparingly included; and in October 1883 he informed the Press that he had been “trying to … draw the line more

4

20 July 1882, Henry Hucks Gibbs to James Murray (MP). Page references for quotations from the “General explanations” are those relating to their first publication as part of Part I of OED1; page numbers in the more generally available 1933 reissue are the same plus twenty.

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closely in the direction of technical, scientific, foreign, and other diverging classes of words”.6

“Foreign” words In the case of “foreign” words, or rather incompletely naturalized loanwords, there was also the question of how to indicate their non-naturalized status.7 One obvious option was to italicize the headword, as was done for example in Webster’s 1864 dictionary, which Murray was constantly consulting. There is no record of his reason for eventually opting for something different, namely a pair of parallel lines (or “tramlines”, ||) next to the headword. The original slips on which the Dictionary entries were written, which are preserved in the OUP archives, show that this was only decided after several hundred draft entries had been prepared. The first slip on which “tramlines” are used is that for the zoological term Acalepha (see Figure 13.1); there are 34 words preceding this which were eventually printed with “tramlines”, but in all cases this is not present on the original slip, and must have been added in proof later.

Figure 13.1: Detail of slip for Acalepha from OED1 copy, showing “tramlines”.

A proof-sheet dated 17 May 1882, including the entry for aardvark and adjacent words, shows that “tramlines” were certainly in use by this date.8 (In fact the decision whether to mark any given word in this way was to remain difficult: Murray’s characterization of non-naturalized or partially naturalized words was that either their form, their inflection, or their pronunciation was not fully naturalized, but assessment of any of these aspects of a word’s usage was vulnerable to change at any time through 6

18 Oct 1883 Murray to Bartholomew Price, Secretary to the Delegates of the Clarendon Press (OUPA: ref. OED/B/3/1/6). 7 For a recent discussion of the treatment of loanwords by Murray and his successors, see Ogilvie 2008. 8 Proof preserved in MP. The query “What do you mean about a black Italic letter for such words as Nisi Prius &c?” in a letter from Price to Murray dated 3 Feb 1882 (OUPA, Secretary’s letterbooks) suggests that italicization was still being considered at this date.

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the arrival of additional information. Nevertheless, some of the earliest such words which Murray had included did not meet with the approval of the Delegates. Printed alongside the notorious “Suggestions” that were sent to him in 1883 were a few specific recommendations, including the instruction “Aardvark, Aardwolf, Ab2, Aba, Abaca. Omit.” In fact in these five cases Murray ignored the suggestions, and retained the entries.) In a few early cases a word’s alien status was commented on at greater length. The architectural term abat-jour was given an entry with no quotations, and indeed a comment that the word is “not in Gwilt” (i.e. not to be found in Joseph Gwilt’s great Encyclopaedia of architecture); Murray probably felt obliged to include the word because it was given in Webster (1864), but he noted that the word was “Hardly in Eng[lish] use”. Similarly, agalma, listed in some earlier dictionaries, was included by Murray but with the observation that it was “never used in Eng[lish]”— and a comment that one of the earlier dictionaries to have included it had apparently done so on the basis of a document in Latin—and abaptiston, given in various dictionaries from the seventeenth century onwards as the name of a surgical instrument, was described as “having apparently no claim to be English”. Such comments do occur later on in the first edition of the OED, but after the letter A they are extremely rare: perhaps Murray realized that the status of such words was adequately conveyed simply by the “tramlines”, in combination with the absence of any non-glossarial quotations—and that further comment took up additional space which he could ill afford. The need to save space is a constant theme throughout the whole history of the first edition; indeed it is striking just how many stylistic minutiae of OED1, whatever their other merits, just happen to represent the most space-effective option (such as, to take a trivial example, the standard short-title for Shakespeare’s Hamlet, which in Part I is usually “Haml.” and thereafter “Ham.”).

Dictionary words Words like agalma, for which Murray’s only evidence was their inclusion in another dictionary, were another problematic category. The set of words whose existence was attested by an accepted dictionary authority like Johnson or Webster was an obvious point of departure for the OED’s headword list; and there was also the commercial point that the Dictionary’s claim to be unprecedentedly comprehensive might seem to be weakened if it failed to include items in Johnson or Webster. On the other hand, wholesale copying between dictionaries was a well-known practice (even Johnson would sometimes include a word with only a reference to

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“Dict.” as authority); and the whole exercise of collecting quotations was predicated on the idea that evidence was what mattered when establishing what were the words of the language. Accordingly, and notwithstanding the known incompleteness of his evidence, Murray was ready to be at least suspicious if a word listed in other dictionaries was not also attested in his files by a contextual example.

Figure 13.2: Slip for abannition from OED1 copy. The comment “Never used” was omitted from the published entry.

He felt strongly that the new Dictionary should explicitly indicate which words had achieved genuine currency, and which were “mere ‘dummies’ appropriated by each successive [dictionary] compiler to swell his apparent stock-in-trade”.9 He experimented with various ways of indicating the status of these words: for example, on the original slip for the word abannition (see Figure 13.2 above) Murray listed the previous dictionaries which had included it (Thomas Blount’s Glossographia of 1656, Nathan Bailey’s dictionary of 1721, and Johnson), together with the comment “Never used”. Similarly abjectate, given by Bailey in another of his dictionaries, is described as “Probably never used” (though on the original slip Murray had also described the word as “Illegitimately formed”); abditive (included 9

These words are taken from the pamphlet “The Philological Society’s Dictionary. Special quotations wanted. List I. Dec. 1879”, the first of a series of pamphlets in which Murray appealed for additional evidence for particular words (copies of which are preserved in OUPA).

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by Bailey and Johnson, and in the 1864 edition of Webster) was originally described as “Perh. only a ‘Dictionary word’”; and sense 2 of the verb abjudicate mentions that it is listed in “1775 Ash [i.e. John Ash’s New and complete dictionary] and subseq. Dicts.: n.q.”10 Eventually—probably, once again, for reasons of space—Murray opted for a very condensed status marker, namely the label “rare–0” or “Obs.–0”, the zero indicating no actual examples of usage. These “zeroes” were in use at least by June 1882, as one appears against the word absistence on an early proof.11 Explicit comments like “Never used” were soon abandoned (a late example which survived into the published text occurs in the entry for admurmuration). Although Murray continued to mention inclusion of such words in earlier dictionaries, he often chose to spare the blushes of his immediate predecessors—or perhaps to avoid charges of plagiarism?—with the vaguer comment “in mod. Dict(s).” Thus although the original slip for abaction is annotated “Hunter” (i.e. Robert Hunter’s Encyclopaedic dictionary of 1879–88), the published entry mentions only “mod. Dict.” Similarly a mention of Webster 1864 on the original slip for abdicative does not appear in the published entry; and in the case of absistence, even Webster’s own definition of the word, given in quotation marks on the copy slip in the same way as Johnson’s definitions are sometimes quoted in OED1, is in the printed text attributed merely to “Mod. Dicts.”

Scientific and technical terms When it came to the terminology of the sciences, and of specialist subjects generally, the situation was somewhat different. The lists of headwords to be found in many specialist subject dictionaries and glossaries which we know Murray was consulting regularly suggested a very large number of such terms that could be included; on the other hand, the relatively small amount of reading of scientific and technical texts that had been done meant that the actual quotation evidence was even thinner than for general vocabulary. There was also the consideration that, in the view of many, the Dictionary need not concern itself overmuch with such 10

In fact “Dict[ionary] word” was used in a slightly narrower sense, and only sparingly, in Part I of the Dictionary as eventually published: in the entries for accompanier, aeroscopy, affiancer, and affiancing it indicates that Johnson specifically cited “Dict.” as his authority. It was very occasionally used in the broader sense “word only attested in dictionaries” in the remainder of the first edition of the Dictionary. The abbreviation “n.q.” (for “no quotations”) was abandoned early in Part I. 11 In MP (stamped 15 June 1882).

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terminology. As long ago as 1857 Richard Chenevix Trench, having identified over-inclusiveness as one of the “Deficiencies” of English dictionaries, had described the inclusion of technical words as “the most mischievous shape which this error [of over-inclusiveness] assumes”; such words were “not for the most part, except by an abuse of language, words at all” (57). Not that Trench stated any criteria for identifying these wordswhich-were-not-words; but the idea persisted that specialist terminology was somehow in a class of its own, and one which did not warrant too much attention. And among the unused slips for the letter A there is evidence that from the start Murray took a fairly restrictive line, in respect even of words for which he had more than mere dictionary evidence. For the word adenoma, for example, he had five quotations from three different non-glossarial sources—the earliest from an 1872 source (see Figure 13.3 below)—and yet no entry for adenoma was included in Murray’s published text.

Figure 13.3: Quotation slip for adenoma from OED1 superfluous material, box 295 (detail).

The words adenomatous and adeno-sarcoma were similarly rejected, despite the availability of a contextual quotation for each word.12 Later, in the “General Explanations”, Murray made it clear that an important criterion for inclusion of a scientific or technical term was whether it was “English in form”, the intention being to include all such words “except those of which an explanation would be unintelligible to any but the specialist”. He seems never to have specified how one could establish whether a word was “English in form”, perhaps regarding it as too obvious to require stating; the adenoma group of words evidently failed the test, 12

There are now entries for all three of these words in OED; adenoma and adenomatous were added to the Dictionary in the 1933 Supplement, and adenosarcoma in the third volume (1997) of the OED Additions Series.

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and presumably also did not fall into the exceptional category of words which were to be included because, while they were not “English in form”, they were nevertheless “in general use” or “belong[ed] to the more familiar language of science” (Murray 1884b, viii). Some of the Delegates of the Press, like Trench before them, were keen to limit the OED’s coverage of scientific vocabulary. In their 1883 “Suggestions” they stipulated that “the scientific words admitted [should] be limited to such as have been found in literature ...: but TECHNICAL terms of Chemistry etc. may well be omitted.” Much the same view was taken by the members of the Philological Society whom Murray consulted. His response was to point out that this principle, simply enough stated by the Delegates, could in practice be difficult to implement. “Omission,” he wrote, is not always nor often a shorter process than admission: it means scanning every scientific or technical, [sic] & use reasonable diligence to ascertain that it is not “found in literature” with the proverbial difficulty of establishing a negative. And what is literature: “the Nineteenth Century”, the “Contemporary [Review]”, the Duke of Argyll’s “Reign of Law”, Max Muller’s “Science of Language”, the Fortnightly on “Aniline Dyes.” In an age when every thing written is expected to have a literary form, and every department of the known & unknown is ransacked to afford material for “articles”, I confess to inability to say what is literature, and utter inability to say whether any given “scientific” word has or has not been used in literature. I could at most omit those as to which I have a strong subjective feeling that they are not likely to be used at present in literature as anisoic, anisamide: running the risk that any day they may burst on the world as famous poisons, disinfectants, anaesthesiants, or cholera prophylacts, & so be in every body’s mouths. All the doubtful ones would have to go in.13

When Part I of the Dictionary finally appeared, the widely varying comments of reviewers on the coverage of scientific words showed that there was no pleasing everybody, as Murray observed (1884c, 523): Many of the literary reviewers incline to think that the line has been drawn somewhat widely in reference to technical terms; although a very different opinion has been expressed by various men of science, each of whom would like rather more indulgence shown to the vocabulary of his own particular department.

13

Murray, MS notes [1883] on the “Suggestions” (in MP).

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Two years later Murray found himself defending his inclusion policy for technical vocabulary in the pages of Notes and Queries. In April 1886 William Sykes, a doctor who had already joined the ranks of those contributing quotations for the Dictionary, submitted a list of quotations to Notes and Queries, mainly for medical terms, for use in a possible supplement (Sykes 1886a): some of the quotations were antedatings (showing earlier use of a word than that recorded in the Dictionary), others were postdatings, and others illustrated words which had not been included. Murray’s distinctly grumpy response appeared three weeks later: I am obliged to DR. SYKES for his specimens of medical and other terms which are not, and ought not to be, in the “New English Dictionary,” being expressly or implicitly excluded by the explanation of the scope of the work given in the prefatory note and introduction to part i. ... [T]he claims of every word admitted have been considered by ten or twelve different persons, all anxious that our pages should not be cumbered with words neither English in form nor in general English use. Thus it is that DR. SYKES’s acholia, achroma, achromatopsia, acrodynia, actinomycosis, adenitis, adenodynia, adenoma, adiposis, and ten times as many similar terms, which I could supply from our rejected materials, have been excluded. If, in certain cases, terms have been admitted which seem to have no better claim than some of these, I can only answer that we carefully exercised our judgment on the evidence before us, and in part i. generally gave a doubtful word the “benefit of the doubt” and admitted it. The demands of space and of time [and, he might have added, pressure from the Delegates] have since led us to hold the door more closely shut, and to treat doubtful words in the opposite way. In B the proportion of technical terms excluded is thus greater than in A. (Murray 1886, 370)

He went on to show how tightly the line had already been drawn in Part I, in that something like 90% of the words listed in a major contemporary medical dictionary, the New Sydenham Society’s lexicon (first volume 1879), had been omitted.14 His comment about “hold[ing] the door more closely shut” implies that an even higher proportion of such words was omitted in Part II. Perhaps even more surprising is that, in the course of his response to Sykes, Murray observed that 14

The public correspondence between the two men, some of it distinctly badtempered, went on for some months; Sykes, who at one point lamented that Murray was “difficult to help” (Sykes 1886b), published several more lists of additional words and quotations. Ironically he went on to become one of Murray’s most valued helpers on matters of medical vocabulary, and read proofs of the Dictionary for many years.

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As an example, he stated that for the word acajou, a name for the cashew nut, he had not used any of the nineteenth-century quotations he had to hand, leaving the reader to deduce that the word was still in use from the fact that it was not marked as obsolete. Similarly, among the unused slips for OED1 I have found earlier quotations for the words abranchiate and acaroid than those included in the published entries. I have not yet established how long Murray continued with this policy, which does after all place scientific terminology in a category for which the “historical” treatment given to other words is not considered quite appropriate. There are certainly many entries for scientific and technical terms throughout OED1 for which the only cited authority is a specialist glossary.

Derivatives of proper names and place names For another category of words Murray did try to draw a more rigorous boundary, only to find that even this could prove difficult to police. There was of course good precedent for not including proper names and place names in a dictionary, and Murray could reasonably describe them as “outside the province of lexicography” (1884b, viii); but words formed from these names by the addition of a suffix were more problematic: they were clearly English in form, and many of them were moreover included by Webster and other contemporary dictionaries, but they were of course just as unlimited in number as the names themselves. The existence of draft entries for words such as Aberdonian (Figure 13.4) shows that at least initially Murray considered a fairly inclusive approach; but perhaps the implications of such an approach caused him to hesitate, for in January 1880 he asked for guidance at a meeting of the Philological Society. Unfortunately the Society failed to arrive at any clear recommendation, on this as on other points which he raised at the meeting: the published proceedings record tellingly that “animated discussions took place … although the only conclusion on almost every point was summed up by Mr. H. WEDGWOOD in the remark that ‘the Society must leave to the Editor an enormous discretionary power, and trust to his doing his best with each point of difficulty as it arose’” (Philological Society 1880a, 19).

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Figure 13.4: Slip for Aberdonian from OED 1933 Supplement copy, box 635. The word’s pronunciation is given in a notation which was abandoned before the publication of Part I of OED1, showing that the slip was prepared for inclusion in Part I but then set aside at an early date.

Murray eventually arrived at a rationale for selective inclusion, which he set out in his Preface to Volume I of the Dictionary: “a proper noun, or adjective thence formed, is included, not for its own sake and as a proper noun, etc., but because it either has other uses, or has derivatives for the explanation of which it is of importance” (Murray 1888, ix). Thus, for example, Aeolian warranted inclusion because of the Aeolian harp and the Aeolian mode in church music; and, having decided to include it, Murray also included the definition of the simple sense “Of Æolis or Æolia, a district of Asia Minor anciently colonized by the Greeks” (though he included no quotations for this sense). Similarly, when he reached the word American, it was clear that Americanize and Americanism were so well established that they would have to be included; and in order to explain these words, and how they had reference to the United States specifically rather than America in general, it would be necessary to include an entry for American as well. Murray observes how the decision to include American had caused some to question the earlier decision to exclude African; this decision had been arrived at after “much careful consideration, and consultation with advisers”, on the basis that the word had “really no more claims to inclusion than Algerian, Austrian, or Bulgarian” (1888, ix). However, by the time American was up for

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consideration it was too late to reconsider African, because the relevant pages of the Dictionary were already in type. He admitted that the exclusion of African may have been the result of “a too rigid application of first principles” (ibid.), but maintained that it was not inconsistent to do so. Unfortunately, whatever slips he may have had for the word African seem not to have survived; but we can at least look at the other dictionaries to which he regularly turned for comparison—and when we do it is rather harder to avoid the conclusion of inconsistency. African was given in the 1864 edition of Webster as both adjective and noun; and under the latter it was noted that it could be used to denote the African marigold. Africanism is also listed, with an unimpeachable supporting reference in the shape of a quotation from Milton. Similarly expansive entries appear in Ogilvie’s Imperial dictionary and Robert Hunter’s Encyclopaedic dictionary, both of which we know Murray was also consulting. The omission of African in the face of this evidence does indeed look very much like “a too rigid application of first principles”. In fact his “first principles” may have been rather more rigorous: in a letter of 1906 Murray explained that “It was seen to be impracticable to include all [place-name derivatives] of this kind in -an, -ese, -ish, etc., and it was decided to omit them all. In accordance with this principle, African was omitted, being one of the earliest words to which the rule had to be applied.”15 Initially Murray does seem to have stuck fairly firmly to his stated policy on these derivatives, in relation to both geographical names and personal names. He certainly took account of personal names which had given rise to derivatives with allusive uses, starting with Aaronic—though at a later stage he would probably not have included the name Aaron itself, apparently accepted on the basis of a single allusive use by Edward Topsell in 1607 to denote a leader of the Church—but he omitted the more straightforward Aeschylean and Aesopic despite the fact that entries for both (with three and one quotations respectively) had been drafted by a sub-editor some years earlier. Similarly with place names: in addition to Aeolian and American, he included Accadian, Alsatian, Amazonian, Andean, Arabian, Arabic, and Armenian, all of which could be shown to have acquired some extension in meaning or given rise to a derivative; whereas he rejected the evidence he had for Aberdonian, and also Adriatic, Andalusian, and Annamese.16 One early exception which seems to have .

15

Draft of a letter by Murray dated 24 Dec 1906 (in MP), to an unnamed correspondent (who had apparently asked about the exclusion of the word Africander). 16 I have found slips for all the omitted words among the rejected material in the OED archives, except for Aberdonian and Abyssinian. Any slips Murray may have had for a number of other likely words in this category (Abelian, Addisonian,

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been given the benefit of the doubt is Acadian, from the region of North America known to the French as Acadie, perhaps because the name Acadia was thought to be unfamiliar; and Gaditanian (an inhabitant of Cadiz), which was included in 1898 by Henry Bradley, may perhaps have been justified on similar lines. After this there are occasional signs of “policy creep”, with the inclusion of Orcadian in 1903 despite there being nothing in the entry other than the straightforward adjective and noun relating to Orkney, and similarly Sidonian in 1910, Venezuelan in 1916, and Styrian in 1919.17

Condensed entries A valuable alternative to simply omitting a marginal item of vocabulary was finding a form of presentation that took up less space than a fully-fledged entry. The original specimen pages prepared for the 1879 contract already featured just such a condensed style as a way of dealing with one of the most productive aspects of English lexis, the combination of words to form compounds. The alms specimens of 1881–1882 were used by Murray specifically to refine this, so that by the time the Dictionary proper started to go to press, he had available a fully developed and flexible style in which the most significant compounds were given full entries, while the less important ones were nested under the first element, a treatment which saved space without omitting any significant information. Murray soon realized that this compact style could be adapted for use with other categories of vocabulary. In fact, given the pressure to minimize the space given over to scientific vocabulary, it is perhaps surprising that the idea of condensing the treatment of words formed from a prefix or Afghan, Alaskan, Albanian, Algerian, Anatolian) do not seem to have survived. Accadian, interestingly, was a late addition (now more usually spelt Akkadian, and now entered thus in OED): the slip bearing the original entry is not numbered, showing that it was added to the relevant bundle of slips after it had been numbered up for delivery to the compositors. The original entry as published in 1884 also shows signs of having been squeezed in at the last minute: indications of parts of speech (both the adjective and the noun are defined) have been left out, and there are no quotations. 17 The Editors of the 1933 Supplement, William Craigie and Charles Onions, were more inclusive of this category than OED1 had been—this was when Murray’s rejected slip for Aberdonian finally made it—but they still maintained in their Preface (Craigie and Onions 1933, v) that such words had not been admitted “unless they have some allusive interest or are important for some linguistic, literary, or historical reason”.

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combining form did not occur to him earlier. His entry for the combining form acantho-, for example, was followed by eight short entries for words beginning with this sequence of letters, most of which—acanthocephalous, acanthocladous, and so on—were modern formations whose etymology necessarily repeated the Greek etymon. This occurred mainly with groups of scientific words, though not exclusively: the short sequence of words beginning with agatho-, after the Greek for “good”, is an example of the more general phenomenon. In fact there were some, mainly scientific, prefixes which, while productive, had not given rise to any formations important enough to deserve an entry in their own right— indeed sometimes nothing important enough to need illustration. In some early entries for such forms (e.g. achroö-: see Figure 13.5 below) Murray adopted something close to the style he had developed for compounds, with embedded sublemmas; but for any combining form which had given rise to at least one word significant enough to require its own entry, then he would initially give all the other formations he included full treatment, irrespective of their significance.

Figure 13.5: OED1, entry for achroö-, with embedded sublemmas. The entries for acuto- and æolo- are similarly condensed; in the latter case no quotations are given for any of the sublemmas embedded in the entry (æolodicon, æolodion, æolomelodicon, and æolophone).

On reaching the immensely productive form Anglo-, however, Murray experimented with a mixture of main entries for words like Anglo-Catholic and Anglo-Saxon and nested sublemmas such as Anglo-Danish and AngloLatin. A modified version of the “nested” style, first used for the chemical forms anis- and aniso-, proved so effective (in terms of saving space) that it became Murray’s standard style for the more productive combining forms (e.g. anthra-: see Figure 13.6).

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Figure 13.6: Slip for anthra- from OED1 copy; note Murray’s instruction to the compositor to use the condensed style “As in aniso”.

A third category of words which offered opportunities for condensation was that of derivatives. In 1882 Murray had something of a runin with Frederick Furnivall, who felt that when a verb like abide had been analysed into its various subsenses, then the same kind of analysis into senses ought to be carried out for derivatives such as abider, whereas Murray had realized that space could be saved with a more general definition, of the form “One who abides; in various senses of the v[erb].” Furnivall even threatened to go public about his disagreement; but Murray quite reasonably pointed out that the accumulated quotation evidence for such derivatives did not provide an adequate basis for fuller treatment. In fact, in the specific case of abider, he did eventually take account of Furnivall’s comments, and divided it into three subsenses; but for many other derivatives he opted for a single definition and paragraph of quotations, covering all of the various senses of the parent word. However, even single-sense entries like absolver still gave a pronunciation and an etymology which could arguably have been deduced from their constituent elements. This must have seemed particularly wasteful of space in the case of sequences of essentially uninteresting derivatives such as administered,

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administering, administrable, and the like. It was only on reaching archbishop, and the host of extremely rare derivatives—archbishopess, archbishophood, archbishopship, archbishopling, archbishoply—that a treatment which nested sublemmas within the entry for the parent word was again adopted (see Figure 13.7); in this instance the space saved by the use of the condensed style amounted to rather more than half a column inch.

Figure 13.7: Slip for derivatives of archbishop from OED1 copy. The handwriting is that of Murray’s assistant Alfred Erlebach.

Here cross-references to the relevant suffixes are included by way of etymological information, but these were soon also omitted as being inferrable by the reader. Thereafter the condensed treatment for derivatives became increasingly common, especially from the second half of B.

Participles: when is a verb not a verb? We turn now from problems of inclusion and presentation to questions of interpretation: precisely what linguistic information could be extracted from the body of evidence collected by the Dictionary’s volunteer readers? The question of which word a given quotation could be said to illustrate might seem to be a simple one, but in certain cases the answer was not clear. For example, while this 1879 LUBBOCK Scient. Lect. v. 152 It is a great mistake to suppose that implements of stone were abandoned directly metal was discovered.

is clearly an instance of the verb abandon—and was used as such in the published entry for the word—and this

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1820 SHELLEY Prom. Unbd. i. i. 217 As rainy wind thro’ the abandoned gate Of a fallen palace.

equally clearly illustrates the adjective abandoned, it could be argued that this 1879 MISS BRADDON Vixen III. 215 I felt myself abandoned and alone in the world.

has elements of both the verb and the adjective. Editors working on the OED today are constantly having to make similar decisions about where to place such quotations, and rules have to be developed for dealing with difficult categories. In this case we would argue that, in the absence of an unambiguous adjectival marker such as a gradable modifier, because abandoned is here being used predicatively, the quotation should be assigned to the verb.18 Murray came to the same conclusion—the quotation appears in the entry for the verb—but his criteria, at least initially, seem to have differed from ours: for example, all six of the quotations printed to illustrate the second sense of abandoned (adjective), being likewise predicative uses, would today be assigned to the verb; and many other quotations used to illustrate similarly formed adjectives in Part I and beyond are likewise arguably no more than predicative examples of the passive verb, a particularly striking example being abbreviated, where the first quotation is one which is also used to illustrate a sense of the verb. Benjamin Jowett evidently remarked upon this difficulty in 1883, evoking an interesting response from Murray: The question of the treatment of p[artici]ples was a difficult one, and took a little time & experience to settle. Abandoned being the first, is not altogether treated as I should treat it now. We now take distinct participial uses with the vb., and distinct adjectival ones under the ppl. adj., avoiding as far as possible doubtful ones, which some would consider p[artici]pial, & some adjective, as in “I felt myself abandoned and alone in the world”. But sometimes the earliest instances are of this class & we have to take them as they are for the form-history.19

Although Murray continued to allow himself to use predicative quotations to illustrate these adjectives—as, for example, in his 1896 entry for dispersed, in which a predicative construction occurs in the earliest 18

I am grateful to my colleague Edmund Weiner for discussions of this and other grammatical issues. 19 Copy of a letter 24 Aug 1883 Murray to Jowett (in MP).

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quotations for both senses of the adjective—they did become increasingly uncommon. There were similar challenges in distinguishing the present participles of verbs from the corresponding nouns. It might be supposed that when a word ending in -ing was followed by the object of the verb, then the word in question must be a verb; but if the preceding word was the definite article, as in 1676 CLARENDON Surv. Leviathan 297 The abridging his universal jurisdiction.

—a construction not found in modern English—then did that make it a noun? Today we would assign it to the verb, on the basis that the presence of an object is more significant than the preceding the; but Murray interpreted it differently, and placed this example in the entry for the noun abridging. He also assigned a “noun” interpretation even with a weaker indication than the definite article, such as a preceding preposition (as in the entry for the verbal noun abstracting: see Figure 13.8 below).

Figure 13.8: OED1, entry for abstracting, with 1879 quotation illustrating “gerundial” use.

Here and in many similar entries he referred to the construction as “gerundial”. Indeed, in many entries in Part I, in the absence of any recent examples of a particular noun of this type, he would concoct a similar “gerundial” example to illustrate it, as in the entry for the verbal noun angering: “Mod. Nothing will be gained by angering him” (such “Mod[ern]” quotations having been established as an acceptable expedient when it was considered important to show that a word was still current even though no recent actual examples had been found). He was still interpreting such constructions as illustrating the noun as late as 1893 (e.g. in the entry for controlling, which includes the 1874 quotation “The right of granting and controlling subsidies”); but soon thereafter he seems to have changed his mind about the validity of such evidence, as may be seen

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in the entry for determining (see Figure 13.9), where the 1772 quotation showing this construction is enclosed in square brackets.20

Figure 13.9: OED1, entry for determining (verbal substantive).

Historical principles A rather different, in fact much more far-reaching question of interpretation of evidence relates to the principles according to which the different meanings of a word were arranged. In his Preface to Part I, Murray noted as one of the two most valuable features of the new dictionary “the application of the historical method to the life and use of words” (1884a, iii).21 The desire to document the history of words had indeed been a driving force behind the Dictionary since its inception; but the practical expression of this desire in the structure of dictionary entries had undergone significant change. The Philological Society’s original Proposal for the publication of a new English dictionary had stated the intention to “show ... the development of the sense or various senses of each word from its etymology and from each other”, and to use quotations to “fix ... the epoch of the appearance of each word in the language” (Philological Society 1859, 4). It might seem obvious, then, that the senses of a word were to be presented in the chronological order of their earliest known occurrence. That this was not quite what was envisaged is apparent from the “Canones lexicographici”, a set of more practical guidelines compiled for the use of the Dictionary’s first Editor a year or so after the 20

The practice of concocting “Mod.” quotations to illustrate this construction tailed off before this, a rare late example being the quotation “After brooking such an insult” (published 1888). 21 The other valuable feature was of course “the completeness of [the Dictionary’s] vocabulary” (ibid.).

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“Proposal”, which stipulated that a word’s meanings should be “deduced logically from the Etymology” (Philological Society 1860, 6); and when entries began to be compiled by sub-editors under Frederick Furnivall’s direction in the 1860s, he instructed them to present the senses in “logical succession … from the etymological meaning”.22 Murray found, however, that applying this principle could be problematic, particularly with words borrowed from Latin or French, where the source word might already have developed numerous senses in the parent language, any one of which might be the first to be borrowed into English—leading to a historical sequence which might not be at all “logical”. Indeed, it was often the case with such loanwords that a figurative or developed sense was the first to be borrowed, this being the one which filled a lexical gap in English, whereas for the “etymological” meaning—i.e. what was considered to be the original meaning in the source language—there might be no such gap. This had happened, for example, with advent, first borrowed into English around 1100 as a word for the period before Christmas, whereas Murray’s earliest evidence for the “etymological” sense, “an arrival”, dated from the eighteenth century; similarly agony derived ultimately from a Greek word originally denoting a struggle, but the earliest available English quotation dealt with Christ’s Agony in the garden of Gethsemane, examples of the “struggle” sense not being found until some centuries later. Murray gave both these examples when he raised the issue at a Philological Society meeting in January 1880, as well as discussing his new specimen entries for address, which also clearly illustrated the problem (Athenaeum 1880; cf. Philological Society 1880a). For the verb address he had been able to devise a structure that was both “logical”—in that the first of the three branches was closest in meaning to the Latin word directiare from which the English word was thought ultimately to derive—and “historical” in that the earliest-attested senses were all in branch I, and the ordering of senses within each branch was chronological (to within a few years). For the noun, however, while some “logic” (in terms of one definition following on from another) could be discerned in his proposed sequence of eight senses, this did not match the chronological order of their earliest quotation, according to which sense 6 (defined as “dutiful or courteous approach to any one”) would have come first, followed by sense 2, and so on. This disparity may have been partly due to the mixed origins of the noun, which was in some cases a borrowing from a corresponding French noun, in others a nominalization of the English verb. 22

The instructions are in a circular of September 1862 (OUPA); for a full discussion of Furnivall’s interpretation of the historical principle at an earlier stage in the history of the Dictionary see Gilliver 2008.

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In fact in several other entries early in Part I for words which have a similarly mixed origin, we can see Murray struggling with the same problem. The etymology for absolute observes that “The senses [of the English word] were largely taken … direct from L[atin], in which the development of meaning had already taken place, so that they do not form a historical series in Eng[lish]”. At absolution, another word with French and Latin origins, a general sense is placed before the specifically ecclesiastical use, although the latter is explicitly identified as “The earliest use”, and the etymology notes that in this sense the word was “in early popular use in Fr. and Eng.” At access, a word divided into four branches, the fourth branch (to do with sudden onset of illness), noted as being “the earliest in Eng.”, is said to have been adapted from French, while the “more general senses” are “app[arently] taken direct from L[atin] accƝssus chiefly after 1500”. A comment at accident seems to question the “logical” approach more generally: “As in many other adopted words, the historical order in which the senses appear in Eng. does not correspond to their logical development.” Murray was vindicated in his questioning of this approach a few months after the address specimen, when the linguist Henry Nicol, commenting on a paper Murray had given to the Philological Society, insisted that the relevant information as far as a historical dictionary of English was concerned was the sequence of senses of a word as they were believed to have occurred in English: the logical arrangement of advent, for instance, shows nothing as to English, but gives only its historical development in Latin, whose proper place is not in an Engl. dicty, but in a Latin one. In fact, for English, the “logical” arrangement in such a case is illogical.23

Murray nevertheless maintained the view that logic, of some sort, must dictate the way in which the various senses of a word had developed. The problem, he decided, was the incompleteness of the documentation from which such logic had to be deduced. This was not merely a consequence of the fact that so much reading was still going on (frequently generating new quotations, whose appearance could necessitate a rethink of the structure of an entry). As he wrote in the “General Explanations”: If the historical record were complete … the simple exhibition of these [i.e. senses in order of their first use] would display a rational or logical

23

6 June 1880 H. Nicol to Murray (in MP).

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For words like advent and agony, where a fully developed sequence of senses existed in the source language, he went further, observing that “The English order [of senses] is in fact accidental … every such word must be treated in the way which seems best suited to exhibit the facts of its own history and use” (Murray 1884b, xi). This was an important elaboration of the “historical principle”, and a significant departure from the “Canones lexicographici”. Throughout the letter A, however, a reluctance to abandon the idea of “logical” development altogether can be seen from time to time in the decision to include—as Murray had done in his specimen entry for the verb address—an introductory paragraph in an entry, in which what was believed to have been the original meaning of the word in the source language was referred to as the “primary signification”, and an account was given of how the other meanings developed from this. The last entry to include such a paragraph is that for attend (see Figure 13.10).

Figure 13.10: OED1, part of entry for attend (verb), showing discussion of “Prim[ary] sign[ification]”.

Occasional references to a particular sense being the “earliest recorded in English”, even when this is not the one presented first in the entry, persisted for considerably longer: the vast majority of these occur in the first half of the alphabet, but the last of them appeared in 1915, the year of Murray’s death, at sense 6 of the verb try. Such comments seem strangely at odds with the “historical principle” as it is understood today; but they are not inconsistent with the idea of a sequence of senses which is “inferred”, as opposed to one deduced entirely from the data. We can see an even clearer separation between history and “logic” in the discussion at the head of the OED1 entry for devotion, in which, after discussing the development of senses in Latin and other languages, Murray explains how the senses of the English word might be ordered in order to demonstrate “a logical arrangement”, but then distances himself from such an arrangement

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as being “without regard to history”. It may be worth pointing out that in the current programme of revising the Dictionary, editors are strictly observing the principle of ordering senses chronologically—and that in the vast majority of cases the additional quotation evidence that has come to light in the last century or so has confirmed rather than contradicted the “inferred” structures of the first edition.

Terminology During the early years of the Dictionary Murray was obliged to make numerous decisions about the terminology he would use to describe the linguistic features and processes he was documenting. I think it’s an indication of the pioneering nature of the work on which he was engaged, certainly as far as English philology was concerned, that for some aspects of the treatment of a word there was no generally accepted approach, and in some cases not even a suitable word to describe a particular linguistic phenomenon. For example, in 1880 Murray invited members of the Philological Society to suggest a name for the phenomenon whereby a word could lose its initial vowel, as for example the shortening of abashed to bashed; he had a suggestion of his own, namely aphesis (from the Greek for “letting go”). He commented that he would be “glad if any one can suggest anything better, as the terms are required on almost every page of the Dictionary”.24 Evidently nobody did, as he regularly used aphesis and related words from Part I onward.25

24 A request for “Terms Wanted” was printed in the Transactions of the Philological Society for 1880–1 as part of an appendix to the text of Murray’s 1880 Presidential Address, although he does not seem to have raised the question in the original Address, given 21 May 1880: Murray 1880, 175–176; cf. ibid. 120–139. Murray encountered opposition to his invented term from Henry Liddell, who suggested that “init. loss” or “loss of init.” would suffice (3 Dec 1881 Liddell to Murray, in MP). 25 Murray’s usage was noted in a review of Part I by Henry Bradley (later to be the Dictionary’s second Editor), who commented: “When Part II. of the Dictionary appears, we shall see whether Dr. Murray is able to quote any precedent for the (certainly very convenient) word aphetized, which he employs frequently in his etymological remarks” (Bradley 1884, 106). Entries for the whole group of related words did indeed appear in Part II, with a note that aphesis had been “Suggested by the Editor in 1880”, but quotations from the 1880 source were not given; these were only added in 1972, in the first volume of Robert Burchfield’s Supplement, together with later quotations showing that aphesis and aphetic had been taken up by other writers.

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Two other terms introduced by Murray were echoism and nonce-word. He proposed echoism, also in 1880, as preferable to onomatopoeia, on the basis that the latter had “neither associative nor etymological application to words imitating sounds” (Murray 1880, 136 n 1); he used it, and the adjective echoic, in Part I—and Henry Bradley duly included entries for these words in 1891 in the fascicle E–Every (the first to be published under his Editorship). Nonce-word took slightly longer to emerge. In 1880, at the same time as he asked for alternatives to aphesis, Murray also asked for “a good English word for the French mot d’occasion, indicating a word invented for the nonce”; in fact, notwithstanding his evident dislike of the French expression, for a while he did consider using it, as can be seen from the original slip for Robert Southey’s coinage agathokakological (Figure 13.11 below), one of several words which was originally labelled “mot d’occ.”

Figure 13.11: Detail of slip for agathokakological from OED1, showing the abandoned label “mot d’occ[asion]” struck out below “nonce-wd.”

He also experimented with “casual” and “occ. w.” (used on the original slips for Aladdinize and aleing respectively); but it was not until late 1883, when entries in aq- and ar- were being drafted, that “nonce-wd.” began to be regularly written on the slips from the first.

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Concluding remarks Given that the New English Dictionary was so different from any previous dictionary, in kind and in scale, it is not surprising that its editorial approach could not be completely determined in advance. In broad terms its aspirations were well established by the time James Murray became Editor, through documents such as the Philological Society’s Proposal and through the collective understanding of all the Society members and others who had contributed to the enterprise; but it was only through the process of working through the millions of quotations that had been collected, and compiling dictionary entries, that Murray could identify all the ways in which these aspirations were to be expressed as policy. Moreover, once policy decisions had taken the form of printed Dictionary entries they were to all intents and purposes irrevocable— something that is easy to forget in the word-processor age. No doubt there would have been much more by way of inconsistency in the early pages of the Dictionary if Murray had waited less than three years before beginning to send copy to press. As it turned out, even after three years he was still struggling with some substantial issues, of which the most significant was surely the practical implementation of the “historical principle” in terms of the ordering of senses; and further, mostly minor issues only came to light once the proofs had begun to appear. Nor does the story end with the appearance of the first fascicle of the Dictionary: as we have seen, some details continued to change during work on Part II and beyond. The developments in policy and style that I have been able to trace in the Dictionary’s first few hundred pages show that when making assessments of the First Edition it may be important to be aware of its inhomogeneities; and I anticipate that similar detailed examination of the work of Murray and his colleagues in the 1890s, perhaps particularly during the great crises of 1892–1893 and 1897, and in reaction to the appearance of the English dialect dictionary, will bring more of these to light.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN JOOST HALBERTSMA, LATIN, AND THE LEXICON FRISICUM ANNE DYKSTRA

Introduction Joost Hiddes Halbertsma (1789–1869) is the founding father of Frisian lexicography. He worked on the Lexicon Frisicum from around 1820 until his death. For many years this was limited to collecting and organizing the material. Halbertsma probably only began processing his material into a dictionary format around 1860. The Lexicon Frisicum only appeared in print up to the lemma FEER.1 Halbertsma did not live to see his work published; in 1872 his son Tjalling, himself a classicist, published his father’s dictionary posthumously, the title-page reading Lexicon Frisicum: A–Feer, Post auctoris mortem edidit et indices adiecit Tiallingius Halbertsma Justi filius. In the Lexicon Frisicum Halbertsma presents not only modern Frisian, but everything geographical and temporal which he considers to be Frisian. In doing so, he aims his dictionary at an international audience of linguists and other academics. With this in mind, the Lexicon Frisicum may be regarded as a so-called gesamtsprachbezogen dictionary. Such dictionaries, like the Woordenboek der Nederlandsche Taal (WNT), Oxford English Dictionary (OED) and the Deutsches Wörterbuch (DWB), 1

The Lexicon Frisicum is not in strict alphabetical order. The lemmas in capitals determine the alphabet. After such a lemma various other lemmas may be given in lower case letters, which bear some semantic, etymological or morphological relationship to it. Between BARNE and BARTE we find for example âf-barne, forbarne, yn-barne, barnde-man, báern-stien, brânje, brân, morth-brand and brander. The last lemma of the Lexicon Frisicum is therefore not FEER, but forfearje. In the case of lemmas in lower case the column number from the Lexicon Frisicum is shown here in brackets.

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are generally explanatory dictionaries. In such dictionaries the metalanguage, the explanatory language, is on the whole the same as the standard national language, i.e. Dutch in the case of the WNT, English in the OED, and German in the DWB. In this respect, the Lexicon Frisicum differs from the rest, as the explanations of the Frisian entries are not in Dutch (nor Frisian), but in Latin. Halbertsma’s choice of Latin generated a number of negative reactions. Latin was regarded as an anachronism; the reduced accessibility of the dictionary was regretted, and the inadequacies of (classical) Latin as an explanatory language for (more) modern languages were pointed out.2 This article sheds light on Halbertsma’s arguments for his choice of Latin. Firstly, I will discuss the position of Latin as the language of scholarship in the nineteenth century and will look at the use of Latin in contemporary dictionaries. Finally, I will discuss the lexicographical consequences of the choice of Latin as the metalanguage for the Lexicon Frisicum.

Latin as the language of scholarship As was the case across most of Europe, Latin was the language of scholarship in the Netherlands for centuries. Joke Roelevink points out, in her article on Latin in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Dutch university education, that as late as 1815 a Royal decree prescribed that professors, with a few exceptions, had to use Latin in the universities (Roelevink 1990, 38). Dissertations also had to be written in Latin. In practice, Roelevink argues (1990, 33–34), many students, and even professors, understood little of what was said in the orations, which too had to be delivered in Latin. Slowly but surely, the position of Latin in scholarship in the Netherlands, which had once been so strong, was beginning to erode. As early as the second half of the eighteenth century professors started corresponding with each other in Dutch, and this was probably also the case in their verbal communication (Roelevink 1990, 35). The seventeenth- and eighteenth-century international audience for Dutch academic publications apparently still had an adequate command of Latin, says Roelevink (ibid.), considering the fact that authors and publishers continued to make frequent use of the language. In the eighteenth century the active knowledge of Latin, according to Roelevink (1990, 36), eroded much quicker than its passive use. Enlightenment scholarship used predominantly the national languages, for the 2 Sybren Sybrandy and Bouke Slofstra have helped me with translating the Latin. I am extremely grateful to them for this.

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benefit of anyone who wanted to educate themselves. She comes to the conclusion that the use of Latin as the language of scholarship was also disappearing. Ultimately, the gap between new terminology and Latinity, the struggle for clarity combined with beauty, also became too great in university education. All in all, the role of Latin as an academic passport became increasingly restricted. Its final demise came with the Higher Education Act of 1876, in which the use of Latin as the compulsory language of instruction in the universities was formally abolished (Roelevink 1990, 39). In the first half of the nineteenth century Latin lost its international prestige as a means of communication. Across the world, scholarship was now being conducted in modern languages (Roelevink 1990, 40). It is therefore no surprise that Jacob van Leeuwen, whom Halbertsma knew well, wrote to him on 10 March 1838, “I see that your dictionary is entirely in Latin; this is rather risky in our Age of Steam.”3 Eekhoff, in his critical obituary of Halbertsma, is noticeably frustrated by the latter’s choice of Latin (1873, 60, note 11a).4 He thinks that many Frisians will join him in his complaint, that Halbertsma gives the word definitions only in Latin and has omitted the Dutch definition of the words in his dictionary, despite the fact that these were there in Halbertsma’s lexicographic manuscripts. It will sadden them, to once again see one of his whims, to which he was often prone, when he chose other methods for his work than those of his fellow academics. It is as though Halbertsma compiled his dictionary only for scholars and foreign libraries, instead of taking into account the considerable interest in the study of Frisian which, thanks to Halbertsma himself, was becoming increasingly apparent in Friesland among non-scholars. He should have met this demand, instead of exacerbating the situation. Eekhoff observes rather dispiritedly that the number of linguistic academics in Friesland is so small, that few Frisians would be able to benefit from a work about their own language. Subsequent critics of the Lexicon Frisicum, like Buma (1969, 103), also point to the dying habit of publishing academic works in Latin. Sybrandy (1969, 136) in his article about the Latin in the Lexicon Frisicum, correctly says that a dictionary in Dutch was already no longer anything special in Halbertsma’s time. In this context, he points to Weiland’s eleven-part Nederduitsch Taalkundig Woordenboek (17991811). Tjalling Halbertsma even writes in the foreword to his father’s dictionary, that Latin is as good as dead (T. Halbertsma 1872, vi; see 3

Original in Leeuwarden, Tresoar, 6158 Hs; translations from Dutch, Frisian, and German are my own. 4 This note belongs to page 26 of the obituary, but is not mentioned there.

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Dykstra 2005, 153). Muller (1910/1938, 110) is surprised by the rectorial address given in Latin in 1874 by his tutor Matthias de Vries, at a time when this had not been the fashion for many years. Van der Sijs (2004, 39) indicates that the use of Latin as the language for books printed in the Netherlands was already significantly decreasing in the first half of the eighteenth century. Yet for philologists at that time it was not uncommon to use Latin in their publications. Language textbooks still appeared in Latin, for example, Taco Roorda’s Hebrew (1831-1833) and Arabic (1835) grammars. In 1836–1837 the Belgian philologist Jan Hendrik Bormans (1801–1878) published a study on Mone’s edition of the Ysengrimus (Reinardus 1832) and, according to Leerssen (2006, 141), he did so in Latin because he wished to be included among the great strict tradition of old-fashioned philological scholarship. So Latin did still retain a certain status. Buma (1969, 103) points to Moritz Heyne, who, in 1864, still published his study on the Old Frisian alliterative poems in Latin.

Latin in dictionaries Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, contemporaries of Halbertsma, also used Latin in their Deutsches Wörterbuch. In his preface, Jacob Grimm is rather disparaging about earlier lexicographers who spent unnecessary energy writing boring definitions for familiar objects such as a table, where one Latin word, mensa, would have sufficed. For Grimm (1854, col. xl) Latin was “die bekannteste und sicherste aller sprachen”, pre-eminently suited for his definitions, but it should be added that he was not really looking to give the definitions of the lemmas logically and consistently (Reichmann 1991, 316–318).5 Grimm’s choice of Latin as the descriptive or explanatory language met with criticism from his compatriots, and the question of whether, in the nineteenth century, Latin was still the most suitable des5

Grimm defends the use of Latin in the foreword to volume two of the DWB by pointing to older German dictionaries, which “wörter und phrasen lateinisch wiedergeben” [“render words and phrases in Latin”] so that “es daran liegen musz ihre oft treffend gewählten ausdrücke zu behalten und anzuführen” [“it is therefore necessary to retain and quote their often felicitously selected expressions”] (Grimm 1860, iii; see Dückert 1987, 39). Grimm assumes that two thirds of the DWB’s German users understand Latin; the rest will be able to determine the meaning without any difficulty from the copious examples given. In a dictionary with many examples ordered by meaning, which the DWB is aiming for, meaning descriptions are not actually necessary at all (letter of 1860 to his publisher, Hirzel: see Kirkness 1980, 210).

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criptive language for a dictionary arose regularly as a result of the Deutsches Wörterbuch (Kirkness 1980, 186f; 210f). In 1864 the first edition of the WNT appeared. The editor-in-chief, Matthias de Vries, discussed the plan of his dictionary with the Grimm brothers, but did not follow their choice of Latin (De Vries 1882, lxii), opting for Dutch as the descriptive language for the WNT. On the contrary, De Vries regarded Latin as not suitable for use in a dictionary intended for the educated nation as a whole (De Vries 1882, lxiv). Latin explanations of the meanings of words, according to De Vries, will scare many people off, and will also disappoint others. Moreover, in his opinion, there was a double risk in using that particular foreign language: The author of the dictionary may underestimate the true force of a Latin expression and, in using an incorrect term, may inadvertently set the reader off on the wrong track. Or should he, being well able to undertake his task, succeed in always choosing the correct word, who then is able to assure him that the reader, perhaps a less learned Latinist, will interpret this in the same way? How many misunderstandings and errors could be caused by words such as cadaver, continuo, perpetuus and the like, which are often interpreted incorrectly! Why should one provoke such misconceptions, when one can be immediately understood by all in one’s own language? (De Vries 1882, lxiv) De Vries speaks out clearly in favour of a Dutch-speaking audience. The dictionary has to be able to be understood by everyone, including those without a classical education. De Vries states that in the DWB, in particular in the part edited by Jacob Grimm, one finds no definition of the meaning of words, simply a cursory designation here and there. Each word has merely the Latin equivalent, or a semantically related High German term. He stresses the fact that no one could assess the needs of his audience, the German nation, better than Grimm, and therefore does not criticize Grimm’s methodology. In his view, the more practically-minded Dutch needed a stricter instruction from the dictionary. They look to the author to enlighten them, oblige them with the fruits of his experience (De Vries 1882, lxii). De Vries has serious reservations about Grimm’s approach. On more than one occasion Grimm’s dictionary let him down, by failing to give the correct definition of a High German word (De Vries 1882, lxiii). Yet De Vries believed that there could be no objection to the use of Latin as the metalanguage, where the dictionary was intended solely for scholars (ibid. lxiv).

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The metalanguage and the audience Halbertsma seems to have chosen Latin as his dictionary’s metalanguage very early on in the process. In 1829 he already makes it clear that a Latijns Woordenboek van het Friesch awaits the insertion of a hundred or so words before it could be called complete. He thus makes it implicitly clear which audience he has in mind for his dictionary. He actually wants his dictionary to attempt to correct the alleged mistakes of the English, French and Dutch etymologists (J. Halbertsma 1829, iv). In other words, the Lexicon Frisicum was, from the outset, aimed at an expert audience outside Friesland, even outside the Netherlands. In 1840 Halbertsma explicitly mentions the most important audience for his scholarly publications: the people, he says in a dedication to the Italian philologist and student of Gothic Count Carlo Ottavio Castiglioni, “qui etudient les langues du Nord d’après la grande méthode de nos jours, entendent également le Latin et le Grec et tous les idiomes Germaniques, il suffit de dire, que c’est surtout pour eux que j’ai ecrit” (J. Halbertsma 1840–1845, 1:ix–x). The most important group he hopes to serve consists, therefore, of international Germanic linguists. There would seem to be an inconsistency in Halbertsma’s reasoning, because if the international linguists know all the Germanic languages, there is no reason why Halbertsma should not write in Frisian or Dutch, but these are precisely the two languages “peu connues en Allemagne même” (J. Halbertsma 1840–1845: 1, viii). Cnoop Koopmans (1841, 478) points out that this contradiction is repeated a page later, when Halbertsma says that anyone who wants to understand the Frisian of the seventeenth century poet Gysbert Japix, or the language of the Dutch Ferguut, could not do so without modern Dutch, and this is in part the reason why his comments on Japix and the Ferguut are written in Dutch. In the run-up to the DWB Jacob Grimm occasionally used the Vocabolario degli Academici della Crusca (1612) as an example. According to Haß (1991, 555, citing Dückert 1987, 12), the Vocabolario even had a significant influence on Grimm’s thoughts on the DWB, for example, regarding the use of equivalent terms in the other language. Grimm refers to an “übernational-europäische Wörterbuchtradition” when he announces the DWB in the Kasseler algemeinen Zeitung of 29 August and 1 September 1839. He says that the dictionary should be arranged in such a way that it “von Ausländern gebraucht werden könne” [“could be used by foreigners”], and he gives the Vocabolario as an example worth following. The result will be that “endlich mal einem von Deutschen wie von Fremden längst gefühlten Bedürfniß abgeholfen [wird]” [“at last, a

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need which has been felt by Germans and foreigners alike for a very long time will be filled”] (quoted ibid.). Around that time Grimm also personally informed linguists outside Germany that foreigners would also be able to use the DWB. He wrote, for example, to the Englishman, Kemble that the DWB, in line with the Vocabolario, will provide a “lateinischer, nöthigenfalls französischer übersetzung des wortes … so daß ausländer ohne mühe ... zurechtkommen werden” [“a Latin, or if necessary a French, translation of the word, so that foreigners can get along without difficulty”] (quoted ibid.). So Halbertsma was not the only nineteenthcentury lexicographer who considered Latin a suitable way of meeting the needs of an international, academic audience. As we have seen above, Matthias de Vries had no objection to Latin as the metalanguage, if a dictionary’s audience comprised only of scholars. In a manuscript on the Lexicon Frisicum (J. Halbertsma c1856), Halbertsma states that it is not easy to give the exact definition of the Frisian words in Latin. In the same manuscript he once again explains why he chose Latin in spite of such difficulties. It would appear that the choice of Latin in this document was also due to the audience he had in mind. The aim of his linguistic study was also to show the Frisian roots of the pure English words, insofar as these had not been traced back to their closest roots by English etymologists. He also included Old English in his study. In doing so, Halbertsma felt he was able to do something useful in finding the true foundations of the English language. Halbertsma’s audience is therefore considerably wider than, as he calls them, the few thorough linguists in the Netherlands. This is why Dutch cannot be used as the language to demonstrate the results of his research: the other nations ought also to be able to understand it. To use Dutch would be to admit “barbarus hic ego sum quia non intelliger ulli” [“I am a foreigner / barbarian, because I am understood by no-one”] vis-à-vis other countries. This may have been different in the past, but these days, even the most learned German scholars have little command of Dutch. And the English are not much better. And thus, Halbertsma is “forced” to explain Frisian in Latin, even though he expects this to cost him customers in the Netherlands. August Lübben, who reviewed the Lexicon Frisicum in 1875, felt that the dictionary’s language could well have been Dutch, because it was reasonable to expect that scholars who were studying Frisian would have a command of Dutch (Lübben 1875, 348). According to Sybrandy (1969, 135), a later critic of Halbertsma’s dictionary, the international audience does justify the choice of Latin as the metalanguage for the Lexicon Frisicum. Buma (1969, 103), although partly agreeing, ultimately regrets Halbertsma’s decision.

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The fact that some scholars specifically asked Halbertsma to publish in Latin on the Frisian language will no doubt have reinforced his conviction, that Latin should be the language for his dictionary. Around 1822, Barthold Hendrik Lulofs, for example, urges Halbertsma to write something on Frisian grammar. That would have to be written in Latin, so that it would gain much credit abroad (see Folkertsma 1973, 132–133). Bosworth not only told Halbertsma on several occasions to finish his dictionary soon, he also made it clear that it should be written in Latin (letter dated 19 December 1836, quoted Stanley 1990, 449). A few of the people who objected to Latin as the metalanguage for the Lexicon Frisicum were in fact objecting to Halbertsma’s choice of an international, scholarly audience. In Eekhoff’s opinion (1873, 60) Halbertsma was blind to the considerable interest in linguistics in his own province. Halbertsma’s choice of Latin meant that the Lexicon Frisicum would be of no use at all to non-scholars in Friesland.6 Sixty years after Eekhoff, Jongsma (1933, 91) believes that Halbertsma should have added a short translation in Dutch to the Latin translation or explanation, for the “ordinary” Frisian. Buma (1969, 103) is of the opinion that the Latin in the Lexicon Frisicum has put many people off. These “people”, according to Buma, are the Frisians themselves, as he believes that Halbertsma should have used the Frisian language for his dictionary. In Buma’s opinion (ibid.), Halbertsma should have modelled his choice of metalanguage on that of Jacob Grimm. However, he incorrectly assumes that Grimm initially chose German as the sole language for his dictionary. At the end of his life Halbertsma appears to be prepared to abandon Latin, albeit reluctantly. In 1866 he writes in a letter to Eelco Verwijs: There is no way that I will finish my Frisian dictionary; death will call me well before then ... As the machinery of the Frisian Society has ground to a halt, I have asked the Provincial Government to continue my Lexicon where I am forced to stop, which they are willing to do. However, what I do finish will go to print as it is, and what remains is a rudis indigestaque moles, both in the Latin and in the Dutch, the editing of which in Latin demands a specialist like myself. As such a person is unlikely to be found, 6

Eekhoff (1873, 79), in his summary of Halbertsma’s publications, comments on a piece by him in De Gids (J. Halbertsma 1856), in which he “handles important subjects with such rich literacy and taste, with the addition of articles from his Friesch Woordenboek, that we lament more than ever the fact that the latter is printed not in the same manner, but in Latin.” The articles in De Gids, however, differ to such an extent from the equivalents in the Lexicon Frisicum, that it is likely that they were written for the occasion and, therefore, do not originate from the Lexicon Frisicum.

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Perhaps Halbertsma, having become wiser through experience, was beginning to see the impossible task he had set himself with his choice of Latin.

Halbertsma’s Latinity Although Tjalling Halbertsma in his preface does not doubt that the unfinished dictionary will be appreciated by the intended audience, the viri docti, he does believe that the scholars, like himself, will regret that his father was not satisfied with including modern-day Frisian from the Dutch province of Friesland and explaining this in Dutch. Moreover, had his father done so, he probably would have finished his dictionary and there would have been fewer Latin mistakes (T. Halbertsma 1872, viii; see Dykstra 2005, 158–159). Halbertsma himself, incidentally, would hear no criticism of his Latin. This is apparent from a letter which his son Tjalling wrote to Jacobus van Loon, the chairman of the supervisory commission for the Friesch Woordenboek (1900–1911), which can be regarded as a continuation of the Lexicon Frisicum. Tjalling was also a member of the commission. It had initially been the intention to also use Latin in the Friesch Woordenboek. Tjalling mentions in his letter that he once pointed out some Latin mistakes to his father in his dictionary. He then offered to read and correct the Latin in the proofs, but nothing was to come of this. Far from graciously accepting the offer, his father was annoyed with him for having dared to comment on his Latinity, about which he and many of his contemporaries were used to boasting. Tjalling never saw a single proof again, as his father kept them carefully hidden from him. Later Tjalling Halbertsma is also not particularly positive regarding his father’s Latin in the Lexicon Frisicum. When on 28 September 1892 he returns a proof of the Friesch Woordenboek to Van Loon, with his comments on the Latin which, in his opinion, originated predominantly from the Lexicon Frisicum, he says that it needs revising. Buitenrust Hettema, one of the authors of the Friesch Woordenboek, would be well advised not simply to copy the Latin definitions from the Lexicon Frisicum (see Hoekema 1971, 155). From a letter from Buitenrust Hettema to Van Loon dated 6 October 1892 (Tresoar Hs. 45 III c2; see Faber 2003, 355) it would appear that he 7

Goffe Jensma kindly brought this letter to my attention.

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too had already noticed that Halbertsma’s Latin was not of the same level of reliability throughout. Sybrandy (1969, 137–138) noted much later that the Latin of the Lexicon Frisicum was no different to Halbertsma’s other Latin. According to Sybrandy, it does not, for example, take long to find the same kind of mistakes in a Latin piece by Halbertsma (1840–1845, 2:371ff) as those Halbertsma makes in the Lexicon Frisicum.8 Against all the criticism of Halbertsma’s Latin there is but one positive voice, namely that of Eekhoff (1873, 22), even if this is only hearsay. When Halbertsma received his honorary doctorate from Leiden University in 1836, Eekhoff recalls, he wrote a letter to the Senate there, thanking them for their support. According to Eekhoff, he himself heard at the time that the people in Leiden had highly praised the letter for its outstanding Latin style.

Metalanguage and meaning description Whether a dictionary which does not use the source language as the metalanguage should be regarded as a bilingual dictionary, depends on its aim. Van der Sijs (2007, 23), for example, says that Kiliaan’s Dictionarium Teutonico–Latinum of 1574, which does use Latin as the metalanguage, was the first explanatory dictionary for Dutch. Latinʊthe then language of scholarshipʊwas no longer there for translation purposes, as has been the case with his predecessors. Considering the audience, it seems unlikely that Halbertsma regarded, or intended the Lexicon Frisicum as a bilingual dictionary. According to his ideas regarding the impossibility of translating from one language to the other, the bilingual dictionary is very limited in scope (J. Halbertsma 1851, 21). A bilingual dictionary is, in any case, unable to give the (exact) meaning of the words from the source language. Grimm is also fully aware of this, but does not regard it as a risk with his dictionary. One should simply not expect that the Latin translations “dem deutschen nach jeder richtung hin entsprechen sollen, was bei dem abstand aller sprachen von einander unmöglich wäre” [“should conform with the German in every sense, which would be impossible, considering the distance of all 8 Sybrandy for example notes incorrect constructions in the Lexicon Frisicum, e.g., col. 7 s.v. ad: “id genus vasa” instead of “id genus vasae”; col. 106 s.v. antk: “Quaestio est num ... formavit” instead of the subjunctive formaverit; col. 607, s.v. daem: “Quaeritur an non ... transiit” instead of “transierit”; etc. And then there are the post-classical words, e.g., col. 121 s.v. as: molendinum “mill”; col. 236 s.v. biar: cerevisia “beer”; col. 289 s.v. biliede: campana “bell” (Halbertsma also uses the diminutive campanula, for example in col. 310, s.v. bingelje).

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languages from each other”]. With the Latin translations, only the “mittelpunct des worts”, the “hauptbedeutung” [“primary signification”] is given, and certainly no attempt is made to give the precise meaning of the words: “dies kann am besten in der nachfolgenden deutschen erläuterung geschehen” [“this can best be done in the German explanation which follows” (Grimm 1854, cols. xl–xli). In using Latin, Grimm is able to show the general picture “mit einem schlag” [“with one stroke”] (col. xlvi). In particular, in the case of the more well-known words he does not need to provide extensive German definitions. In the DWB, Grimm defends himself against criticism of the use of Latin in the dictionary by pointing out that the linguistic terminology, after all, was also already in Latin and daß der Gebrauch des Lateinischen zur früheren Tradition in der (deutschen) Lexikographie gehöre, nicht als pedantisch oder unpatriotisch gelten könne und die Erklärung anstößiger Wörter verdecke; insbesondere aber daß sich eine umständliche, eher fach- als sprachbezogene Realdefinition erübrige, wenn ein bekanntes lateinisches Wort als kurze Nominaldefinition eingesetzt werde. [that the use of Latin belonged to an earlier tradition in (German) lexicography; that it could not be regarded as pedantic or unpatriotic and used (solely) for the explanation of offensive words; and in particular that a complicated encyclopedic definition concerned rather with technical facts than with language was unnecessary, when a well-known Latin word could be put in place as a short verbal definition] (Kirkness 1980, 38, paraphrasing Grimm 1854, cols. xxxix ff.)

Together with Reichmann (1990, 107–108), one could say that Grimm used Latin predominantly for ease. Note that Grimm did make use of an “erläuterung” in the German to specify the meaning of a word further. In 1862, when he himself was still right in the middle of work on the Lexicon Frisicum, Halbertsma thought about the metalanguage of the dictionaries by Kiliaan (1599) and Plantijn (i.e. the Thesaurus Theutonicae linguae, 1573). Unlike Kiliaan who explains his words in Latin, Plantijn also uses French. Halbertsma considered this as a major advantage, because this double translation makes it possible for us to not only learn the global meaning of the word, but also to determine its correct shade (nuance) of meaning (and that is what really matters). Plantijn’s double translation removes all doubts about the meaning of the word (J. Halbertsma 1863, 229). Halbertsma therefore stresses that there is much to be said for using a second language alongside Latin in a dictionary. Yet he did not do so in his own Lexicon Frisicum. So the user is generally entirely

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dependent on Latin.9 Even though he knew that using Latin as the metalanguage in the Lexicon Frisicum was fraught with major problems. It is not very easy, he says, to capture the correct shade of a meaning of a word and to find the Latin that comes close (Halbertsma c1856). With this observation Halbertsma, in fact, abandons the concept of nuance of meanings that he regarded as being so very important. Reichmann (1990, 107) correctly says that Grimm “einen Erläuterungstyp verwendet, der im strengen Sinne gar nichts erläutert, sondern nur andere deutsche oder fremdsprachige Wörter für das Lemmazeichen angibt. Diese Wörter erläutern nur indirekt, und zwar dadurch, daß der Wörterbuchbenutzer von ihnen aus auf die Bedeutung des Lemmazeichens schließt” [“uses a type of explanation which strictly speaking explains nothing at all, but simply gives German or foreign words for the lemmata. These words only explain indirectly, and this is how: the user of the dictionary reasons from them towards the meaning of the lemma.”] However, this is not always possible. We have already seen above, that even Matthias de Vries sometimes had great difficulty in determining the meaning of German words and expressions on the basis of the Latin in Grimm’s dictionary. Henne (1990, 92–93) gives a specific example of such a problem. Incidentally, he assumes that Grimm first wrote the dictionary articles and only subsequently, rather mechanically, added the Latin with the help of a Latin dictionary. This resulted in problems and inconsistencies, Henne thinks: “For the learned user of the dictionary can engage in this activity himself with the help of a Latin dictionary, as and when necessary, while the user who lacks this learning will find himself faced with the special and only partly accurate glosses, which he cannot understand.” Frank (1999, 100) is more positive about the use of Latin. She observes that the lemma Arbeit in the Deutsches Wörterbuch has the Latin parallel “labor”, which “Mühe, Anstrengung, als auch Not und Arbeit selbst sowie Werk zum Inhalt hat. Somit macht dieses einzige lat. Wort die Bedeutungen von Arbeit, ... auf einmal transparant” [“contains the senses 9 Sometimes he brings into practice the principle of adding a Dutch explanation, e.g. in J. Halbertsma 1872, col. 73, s.v. for-aka, “F.v. Hol. vermeerderen, augere”, where he first gives the Dutch and then the Latin. Halbertsma also regularly gives forms from other and older languages which may help in determining the meaning, but which mainly seem to be intended to show the position of the lemma in Germanic, e.g. ibid. col. 160: “BAI, f. F.b. bacca. Bend. 31. F. bei, cg. pl. beyen. Apud Gothos videntur viguisse formæ duæ hujus vocis, basi, f. et bagi vel bagns, unde bainabagms. ... Nl. frequentabant tum bese, besie, bes, ex basi, tum baeye, beye, ex bag. Confer Kilianum. Ags. beg, et berie, berige, f. Ang. berry, (r = s) Nl. bezie, f. Goth. basi, f. Neutra sunt Isl. ber et Alam. peri, bacca.”

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Mühe “trouble, toil”, Anstrengung “effort”, and likewise Not “need, hardship” and Arbeit “labour” itself, together with Werk “work”. Thus this single Latin word makes the meanings of Arbeit transparent all at once”]. Frank is, however, able to reach this conclusion, because Grimm’s lemma Arbeit has almost five columns with detailed etymological and semantic information. Grimm’s approach cannot be compared with the article ARBEID in the Lexicon Frisicum, which has only eight lines, half of which are examples, so that the user is unable to find the various meanings of labor: ARBEID, cg. labor. F.v. arbed, n. G.J. ærbeide, Nl. arbeid, m. Nl. v. aerbeid. Ags. earfoth, f. Anglis periit. Dat is nin arbeid lyk, (hoc nullæ operæ simile est) hoc effrenatum et præposterum est; hoc minime decet. It is ‘n droewich arbeid mei undoagensce bern, liberi improbi parentum miseria.

Because of the Latin, in the Lexicon Frisicum the user often gets but a very global idea of the meaning of the lemma. In the case of DRUCH, DRUGH, DROEGH it is, for example, rather difficult for the user to determine the meaning, based on the simple Latin translation siccus: DRUCH, DRUGH, DROEGH, adj. siccus. Ang. North. drue; drink the pot drue, ebibe cyathum. Ags. drîg, dryg, Ags. North. druig, drui, Ang. drye, dry, idem. F.b. drüügh, drue, Nl. droog. Druch yn ‘e kiel, guttur torridum. Phrases; Sa drugh as kork vel korkdrugh, subere siccior. W.o. bunk-drûch, osse siccior, E. I. 90; F. bien-druch, idem. - Hy mei syn wiet ind drugh wol, cibi et potus avidus est. Drugh, substantive, cibus, opponitur [...] wiet, humiditas, i. e. potus. - Hi is noch nat druch efter di earen, aurium terga ei adhuc madent ut infantibus, i. e. adhuc imberbis loquitur et agit ut adultus; Hy snydt op as prefester ind is noch uat [= nat] druch efter di éaren. Sax. l. He is nog nig dröge achter de oren, Bnl. I. 252, Holstein I. 257. W.o. Dan wol fri un is noch ni drûch tâft (to aft) d’ôr, adhuc puer ambit virgines. - It bern sliept al drugh, infans somno jam vesicam continet. Tropice, Myn wiif is drugh, vel sliept al drugh, purgationes menstruæ uxoris meæ cessant; Di frouliu wolle leáfst nat drugh sliepe, menstruorum cessatio, provectioris ætatis et sterilitatis indicium, feminis ingrata est.

According to Pinkster’s Woordenboek Latijn/Nederlands (2003), siccus can have the following definitions: 1. dry, dried out/up, barren, withered, without fluid; 2. not having drunk, thirsty; 3. (metaph.) sober, moderate; 4. (of the body) tawny, tough; 5. (rhetor.) sober, plain. It is impossible for the user, even after studying the examples given, to determine whether all the definitions of the Latin siccus coincide with

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those of the Frisian druch. In determining the correct meaning, the user is helped to some degree by the pre-modern and modern forms from other Germanic languages which Halbertsma gives in the article’s header and in examples. However, this does not really provide sufficient clarity. Tjalling Halbertsma thinks that the use of Latin often forced his father to use very long descriptions, partly because contemporary matters simply cannot easily be described in the language of Cicero and Cesar (T. Halbertsma 1872, vi; see Dykstra 2005, 153). Tjalling later experiences how difficult it is in practice to produce satisfactory definitions in Latin, in the case of the Friesch Woordenboek. Tjalling therefore agrees with Van Loon (and with the editor Buitenrust Hettema) that it should be suggested to the Provincial Executive that the meanings in Latin and in the new languages should be left out of the dictionary (Sybrandy 1969, 136–137). So, even the classicist Tjalling Halbertsma had considerable difficulty in defining the Frisian words in Latin (see Hoekema 1971, 159–160). One hundred years after Halbertsma’s death the Latin in the Lexicon Frisicum is discussed in articles by Buma and Sybrandy. According to Buma (1969, 103), one would have to be a Latinist of some stature to present the meanings and nuances of some Frisian words in the Silver Latin of the classic era. In this, Buma therefore agrees with Tjalling Halbertsma’s demand for Ciceronian Latin as the norm. Sybrandy (1969, 139ff) rightly rejects this. It is perhaps possible to maintain this in an oration or a letter, but a dictionary is completely different. After all, persevering would, according to Sybrandy, mean that a large part of the Latin language could not be used. Tjalling Halbertsma, together with the people who later agreed with his criticism regarding the quality of the Latin, had not, Sybrandy felt, taken this sufficiently into account. Sybrandy believes that it is, therefore, no surprise that, with respect to the choice of words in particular, the Lexicon Frisicum does not stick to classical Latin. Lübben (1875, 348) does not really blame Halbertsma for not using classical Latin, because modern words and expressions do not lend themselves to being translated into Latin, but, says Lübben, this should have been the reason for Halbertsma not to choose Latin. In a letter dated 8 February 1892 to Van Loon, Tjalling gives an example of a meaning description which, in his opinion, is (too) long as a result of the use of Latin. At the time he is still in favour of putting a short Latin translation after the Frisian words in the Friesch Woordenboek where possible. So not, in his view, for a word such as bollebuiskes, because, he writes, his father had to use six lines of Latin for the meaning description, and one still does not really know what the word actually means (Tresoar hs. 45 III c). Lübben (1875, 348) reaches the same

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conclusion as Tjalling, and makes his point, coincidentally or not, as a result of the description of the “bekannte gebäck ‘bolbeisjes’” [“the wellknown cakes ‘bolbeisjes’”]. In his opinion, here the “entsprechende holländische oder auch niederdeutsche ausdruck mit einem schlage” would have given “die richtige vorstellung” [the “corresponding Dutch or indeed Low German expression would at once have given the right idea”]. The question is, however, whether Tjalling and Lübben’s criticism in this specific case is justified. Let us take a closer look at the article bòllebuiskes: bòlle-buiskes, paniculi rotundi spongiosi ex farre optimo, lacte et uvis Corinthiacis, cocti in scrobunculis hemisphæricis butyro linitis sartaginis æneæ. F.o. bol-beisjes; bal-bel-beuskens, Stür. 13, idem, Hol. poffertjes. Confer Gal. les bouillon-baises de Marseille, Hol. boter-biesjes. - Bollebuiske igitur proprie est scriblita tumens et rotunda. (col. 441)

The description can be translated as: “round, light rolls, made of the best spelt, milk, and currants, baked in half round, buttered holes in a bronze griddle.” At the end of the article Halbertsma reaches a kind of conclusion: “Bolle-buiske actually is a swollen [risen] and round cake/pastry.” When we compare the meaning description of the lemma bollebuis from the WNT to Halbertsma’s, we cannot very well maintain that it is Latin which is responsible for Halbertsma’s long and unclear meaning description. The WNT, in fact, gives a Dutch description which is no longer or shorter, nor clearer or less clear that Halbertsma’s Latin in the Lexicon Frisicum. Sybrandy (1969, 140) stated that the need to give long Latin descriptions is a result of, among other things, the fact that many of the terms and concepts Halbertsma describes in the Lexicon Frisicum were unknown in the time of Caesar and Cicero (or in the Middle Ages). So Halbertsma had no choice than to describe them at some length. In other words, Latin is very much the cause of the long descriptions. As an editor of the Friesch Woordenboek, Gerben Colmjon also struggled with Halbertsma’s extensive Latin, which, in his opinion, needed reducing considerably (letter to Lucius Columba Murray Bakker dated 22 June 1880; see Faber 2003, 168). The letter is from the time when Latin translations were still going to be included in the Friesch Woordenboek, which Murray Bakker was going to do. Colmjon thought that Murray Bakker’s Latin meaning descriptions were also too long (Faber 2003, 353). Murray Bakker was, therefore, like Halbertsma, not always able to produce short, sharp Latin explanations.

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Some meaning descriptions in more detail Tjalling Halbertsma and Sybrandy are right when they say that many of the long meaning descriptions must be put down to the use of Latin as the metalanguage. However, this explanation does not hold water in all cases. Halbertsma, in fact, also uses descriptions in the Lexicon Frisicum where, in principle, a Latin equivalent would have sufficed. For example s.v. BEITEL, he writes “cg. cuneus ferreus acutus, qui malleo adigitur ad dolanda vel conformanda ligna” [“a sharp iron wedge, which is driven with a hammer for lopping or shaping wood”], where scalprum “chisel” could also have been used. So, apparently, he (sometimes) felt the need to give extensive meaning descriptions. Sybrandy illustrates that, in his dictionary, Halbertsma made better use of Latin than Kiliaan. Kiliaan translates borghmester with the anachronistic “consul, tribunus plebis” [“consul, tribune of the people”], while Halbertsma describes burmester (col. 563) as “rector vici vel urbis” [“the person in charge of a place or city”].10 In opting for descriptions instead of putting two incomprehensible words (burmester and consul) next to each other, Halbertsma gives the meaning better, and this is why, according to Sybrandy (1969, 140), Tjalling Halbertsma is also able to write that his father, on the whole, gives fairly clear meanings (T. Halbertsma 1872, viii; see Dykstra 2005, 159). Brouwer (1941, 23) praises the Lexicon Frisicum, among other things, for the carefully considered nuances in meaning which are presented with a fine feeling for language. In view of the above, Brouwer’s praise, like Tjalling and Sybrandy’s observation provokes some astonishment. In many cases Halbertsma, after all, provides only the Latin equivalents in his dictionary, which actually explain nothing, let alone giving any nuances in meaning. Tjalling, Sybrandy and Brouwer probably based their opinion on those instances where Halbertsma did make the effort to give nuances. This can be seen as an indication of the fact that Halbertsma did indeed regard the Lexicon Frisicum as an explanatory dictionary. Here are some examples: s.v. BAKKE, Halbertsma uses the object of the verb (panes, carnes, pisces and liba) in his meaning description to make it clear that bread is baked in the oven and meat, fish and pancake on a stove:

10

Sybrandy (1969, 141) notes that Halbertsma uses consul for boargemaster, s.v. aeis-diérre (col. 70) and for burgemeester, s.v. BINOMIA (col. 314), and uses that very same consul where he has to translate boargemaster in a running sentence in Latin.

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He adds to this that bakke always occurs by means of heating on, or by fire, and never by means of boiling water. With this addition, and the subsequent examples, he makes the difference clear between bakke and siede (cook). Sometimes Halbertsma also tries to clarify the literal Latin meaning description. S.v. libbens-dei (col. 637) he first gives the literal translation “dies vitæ” [“day of life”], and then the actual translation or meaning “i.e. vita” [“i.e. life”], after which he makes the meaning of the lemma even clearer by giving an antithesis: “opponitur mortis nocti” “opposed to the night of death”]. He translates bank “bench, couch” (col. 176) as “scamnum” [“bench, stool, chair”], to which he adds, just to be perfectly clear, that more than one person can sit on it at the same time: “in quo plures simul sedent”. One of the definitions of BÉAR is verres (a male pig). Halbertsma stresses that this is only for a boar-pig: “porcus non castratus.” Sometimes it seems as though an addition is superfluous. For Halbertsma BAERCH is “porcus in genere” [“pig in general”], in itself clear, but he apparently feels the need to add that this may refer to a male or female specimen: “porcus faemina et mas”. It is not unusual in the Lexicon Frisicum for words to be covered under a lemma they have nothing to do with. S.v. awend (cols. 137–138), for example, Halbertsma places akker opposite eker and ikker. Akker according to Halbertsma is used for the oblong pieces of land where peat is placed to dry. Ikker and eker on the other hand “non totum agrum notant” [“do not mean the whole akker”], but one of the long convex sections into which the Frisians divide their farmland and meadows, with trenches in between. It is, therefore, no surprise that for EKER, IKKER, he does not simply give the Latin ager, but rather the description “pars agri inter duos sulcos marginales” [“piece of land between two boundary trenches”].

In conclusion Jacob Grimm and Matthias de Vries, lexicographers and contemporaries of Halbertsma, declared themselves respectively in favour and against the use of Latin in their dictionaries. In both cases the choice of audience played a role. Grimm also wanted to give foreigners access to his dictionary, while De Vries was aiming at a Dutch audience. Grimm accepted the fact that with Latin it was more difficult to give the precise

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meaning of the words. For De Vries, on the other hand, this was a prohibitive objection. Halbertsma’s view is much closer to that of Grimm. Both contemporaries and later nineteenth-century commentators criticized Halbertsma’s choice of Latin as the metalanguage for the Lexicon Frisicum. Some of these points of criticism are also made in twentieth-century opinions on the dictionary. The objections against Halbertsma’s choice of Latin differ: (1) Latin as the international language of scholars and scientists is an anachronism in the nineteenth century; (2) because of Latin, the Lexicon Frisicum cannot be used by the “ordinary” Frisian; and (3) (classical) Latin is unsuited for indicating the nuances in the meanings of Frisian words and expressions. As to objection (1), Halbertsma seems to be quite certain of himself, yet he apparently feels the need to provide arguments (for himself) in favour of his choice of Latin. He opts for an international target group and, with that choice, accepts that the domestic market (see objection (2)), is not served well by the choice of Latin as the metalanguage for the Lexicon Frisicum. The third objection is lexicographically relevant: Halbertsma was aware of the fact that Latin would cause problems with explaining Frisian words. In the dictionary itself that awareness is not always obvious, especially when he provides only one ambiguous Latin equivalent of a Frisian lemma. The reproach that Latin forced him to use extra long meaning descriptions is partly justified. There are, however, also long(er) descriptions in the Lexicon Frisicum, which would seem to indicate that Halbertsma was aiming at compiling an explanatory dictionary of Frisian. Tjalling may be right when he says that Latin cost his father too much time and trouble. That could, among other things, explain why the Lexicon Frisicum remained a torso, in spite of the fact that Halbertsma worked on it for almost his entire life. There is still one question which remains unanswered: Did Halbertsma have an alternative? Buma’s suggestion that he should have chosen Frisian may, with hindsight, be regarded as completely unrealistic. Considering the fact that Grimm apparently thought even German unsuited for an international audience, Halbertsma’s rejection of Dutch as the metalanguage for his dictionary is understandable. He might have opted for English, but the question is whether his command of the language would have sufficed. In 1836, in his own opinion, this was definitely not the case (J. Halbertsma 1836, 35). He had therefore only one option: Latin!

CHAPTER FIFTEEN LE PARTI PRIS DE “LA BESOGNE DES MOTS”: LE « DICTIONNAIRE CRITIQUE » DE GEORGES BATAILLE LAURA SANTONE

Introduction Paris, avril 1929: le premier numéro de la revue Documents (2 ans, 15 numéros) paraît. Le sous-titre annonce qu’il s’agit d’un «magazine illustré», où s’inscrit la tétralogie: «Doctrines ʊ Archéologie ʊ Beaux-Arts ʊ Ethnographie». Le nom de Georges Bataille figure, outre dans la liste des collaborateurs, sous la mention de «secrétaire général», rôle qu’il exercera, de facto, dans la direction de la revue. Quant aux membres du Comité de Rédaction, on compte, entre autres, Jean Babelon, du Cabinet des Médailles de la Bibliothèque Nationale; Raymond Lantier, du Musée des Antiquités Nationales de Saint-Germain-en-Laye; Paul Rivet, directeur du Musée d’Ethnographie du Trocadéro et fondateur en 1925, avec LévyBruhl et Mauss, de l’Institut d’Ethnologie; Georges-Henri Rivière, qui sous la direction de Rivet avait entrepris les travaux de réaménagement du Musée du Trocadéro; Pierre d’Espezel et Georges Wildenstein, provenant de La Gazette des beaux arts et qui sont, avec Bataille, les fondateurs de Documents.1 La place privilégiée que le Comité de rédaction semble accorder, déjà à un premier regard, à la ‘médiation’ du musée, a pour la revue valeur de manifeste. L’ethnographie, en fait, assumera une position centrale dans le cadre du programme éditorial, et l’on ne s’étonne pas alors de retrouver au sommaire de ce premier numéro la présence, ‘symptomatique’, de Georges-Henri Rivière, qui signe pour l’occasion une contrib-

1

Wildenstein, entre autres, financera la revue.

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ution au titre tout autant symptomatique: «Le Musée d’ethnographie du Trocadéro». Mais nous y reviendrons plus avant. Mai 1929: le sommaire du numéro 1.2 propose, dans la liste des contributions, une étude ethnologique portant sur l’œuvre du peintre André Masson, par le poète et critique d’art allemand Carl Einstein2, suivie d’un article de Michel Leiris3 sur le Musée des sorciers. Mais la nouveauté de ce deuxième numéro réside dans l’inauguration, sous l’impulsion de Georges Bataille, d’un «Dictionnaire critique», dont le pivot est exactement la notion de «document» au sens ethnographique ʊ et anthropologique ʊ c’est-à-dire témoignage matériel «où les choses sont cueillies sur le vif» (Leiris 1938, 344) et sont par conséquent susceptibles d’enrichir «l’étude des races et des civilisations des langues»4. Bien loin des dictionnaires de Richelet, de Furetière ou de l’Académie Française, destinés «aux honnêtes gens» et visant à faire connaître ce que le français «a de plus fin, & de plus délicat» (Richelet 1680, **1r; **2r), et bien loin du ‘bon ton’ des dictionnaires se succédant au fil du temps du XIXème au XXème siècle, le «Dictionnaire critique» n’aura ni une vocation élitiste, ni une mission politique, et ne se voudra même pas un «trésor» de la langue répertoriant les mots et leurs emplois. Refusant tout ordre alphabétique, ce dictionnaire est conçu comme un ‘musée’, à savoir, en reprenant la définition que Bataille lui-même donne à l’entrée «musée», comme «un contenant dont le contenu est formé par les visiteurs [les usagers]» (Documents 2.5). Le «Dictionnaire critique», fidèle à cette démarche à l’allure métonymique, recueille, exhibe et re-classifie les signifiants de la vie collective selon ce principe anthropologique du collage qui fait de la culture une mosaïque de tesselles que l’on peut collecter, assembler, juxtaposer dans une nouvelle composition, jusqu’à toucher, dans notre cas spécifique, l’insolite, le bizarre5, l’inquiétant ʊ «l’irritant et l’hétéroclite», selon les mots de Leiris (1963/1966, 261). Car le lexicographe-ethnographe-anthropologue a, comme le surréaliste, «licence de choquer» (Clifford 1988/1999, 160). James Clifford, à qui nous empruntons cette dernière expression, 2

Einstein avait aussi publié un ouvrage consacré à l’art nègre. Qui notamment participera, en 1931–1933, à la mission ethnographique Dakar– Djibouti. 4 Selon le principe explicité dans les Instructions sommaires pour les collecteurs d’objets ethnographiques (Leiris 1931), cité par Catherine Maubon (1987, 55). 5 Bizarre est l’adjectif qui revient souvent sous la plume de James Clifford à propos de Documents. Dans «On Ethnographic Surrealism» il compare la revue à un «musée bizarre [qui] se limite à documenter, juxtaposer, relativiser: une collection perverse» (Clifford 1988/1999, 161). C’est moi qui traduis. 3

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insiste, à propos de Documents, sur l’enseignement capital de Marcel Mauss. Et c’est justement sur cet enseignement que nous voulons nous attarder avant d’explorer de plus près les plans et les entrées du «Dictionnaire critique».

La leçon de Mauss Il suffit de parcourir la liste des collaborateurs de Documents pour réaliser pleinement l’importance du code ethnologique. On y retrouve Mauss lui même, figurant dans le florilège des auteurs de l’«Hommage à Picasso» (Documents 2.3); toujours dans ce même hommage on reconnaît, à côté de lui, le jeune Lévi-Strauss, sous le pseudonyme de Georges Monnet.6 Mais à la revue et à son ‘équipe ethnographique’ ʊ comme il nous semble tout à fait approprié de la re-qualifier ʊ adhèrent aussi Marcel Griaule, Alfred Métraux, Michel Leiris, André Schaffner, pour ne citer que quelques uns des élèves de Mauss. A côté de l’ethnologie, la psychanalyse, présente dans les personnes du docteur Allendy et d’Adrien Borel.7 Conjonction, celle-ci, qui met en lumière au sein de la revue la complémentarité entre psychisme individuel et structure sociale, comme Mauss l’avait précisément réclamé en faisant appel, en premier, à l’inconscient, et en prônant ainsi la collaboration entre ethnologie et psychologie. Documents adoptera l’axe de cette alliance, dont le point de suture sera la notion de «fait social total» telle que Mauss l’avait introduite dans l’«Essai sur le don» (1923–1924). De là, tout d’abord, l’attention portée, à partir du titre fermement voulu par Bataille, à l’approche documentaire, en l’occurrence à la photographie8, point de départ de la plupart des articles et support iconographique de nombreuses entrées du «Dictionnaire critique». Ici la photographie fait office de planche, et sa tâche est celle de fournir un tableau où l’impact visuel vise à 6 Denis Hollier a été le premier à noter cette présence à partir d’une lettre adressée par Lévi-Strauss à Jean Jamin. Dans sa préface à la réédition de Documents (Hollier 1991, ix), Hollier révèle que sous le pseudonyme de Paul Monnet se cache en réalité le jeune anthropologue. Nous avons consulté le numéro en question et nous devons à ce propos préciser que Lévi-Strauss ne signe pas son article sous le prénom de Paul mais sous celui de Georges. 7 Fondateurs en 1938, avec Bataille, de la «Société de psychologie collective». 8 Et ce n’est pas un hasard si à l’entrée «document» le Trésor de la langue française rapporte, parmi ses citations, un passage de la Méthode de l’ethnographie de Marcel Griaule où il est question de la photographie et de la cinématographie en tant que «moyen d’établir les documents les plus indépendants et les plus impartiaux du système d’investigation ethnologique».

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nourrir une démarche d’investigation apte à sonder la nature effective du «tissu» du mot. Tissu «des mots-valeurs», comme le souligne Barthes (1972/1984), où la dimension épistémologique recouvre l’historique, l’archéologique, le biologique, le linguistique, le social, bref la complexité des phénomènes observés, jusqu’à pénétrer, selon le principe maussien du ‘fait social total’, dans l’inconscient, c’est-à-dire dans le refoulé ʊ dans l’ailleurs ʊ de tout dictionnaire. Dans le «Dictionnaire critique» nous voyons circuler ce paradigme de la synecdoque qui constitue, comme l’explique fort bien Clifford, le paradigme syncrétique de l’investigation ethnographique. Textes, objets, mots, photographies, assemblent ʊ et désagrègent à la fois ʊ des séries, des corpus d’éléments significatifs surdéterminant, par leurs valeurs et leurs relations, des « totalités » sous-jacentes, voire un réseau de sens cachés qui vont au plus profond du social et de l’individuel. Or, dans notre cas, l’attitude ethnographique se traduit chez Bataille et ses collaborateurs dans la volonté d’une «rupture choquante avec les usages» (Leiris 1966, 264) et dans le souci de remettre en question la commune pratique du sens. Qui doit surgir grâce à l’intrusion d’un détail porteur d’une valeur «qui précède et prédétermine le savoir» (Barthes 1972/1984, 275). Ainsi entendu, le «Dictionnaire critique» éclaire davantage sa charpente et sa singularité: il configure le «musée» d’un savoir insolite, étrange; musée «où l’homme se contemple enfin sous toutes ses faces» (j’emprunte à nouveau à l’entrée musée) et où les détails des objets représentés, voire les mots, détournent et ébranlent le savoir codifié pour un savoir déplacé, inattendu, s’articulant sous le signe d’une déclinaison paradoxale, inquiétante, «impossible» ʊ la déclinaison scandaleuse et souveraine du sacré. Si pour Roland Barthes tout dictionnaire peut se définir comme une grande «machine à rêver» (Hersant 1980, 153), le «Dictionnaire critique» de Georges Bataille peut à juste titre se définir comme une machine «à perturber». Et c’est dans l’ingénierie la plus secrète de cette machine que nous allons maintenant pénétrer.

Une ‘machine à perturber’ Aux antipodes du dictionnaire traditionnel se présentant sous la forme d’un volume généralement monolithique, maniable et consultable par ordre alphabétique, le «Dictionnaire critique» s’offre par contre sous forme d’une rubrique cataloguant à chaque issue quelques mots ʊ trois ou quatre au maximum ʊ et s’ordonnant sans aucune préoccupation à l’égard de l’alphabet. La première impression est celle d’une dispersion, d’une dissipation, mais, à bien y regarder, cette dispersion n’est qu’une appa-

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rence, car elle cache en réalité un critère lexicographique bien précis, renvoyant à un paradigme axial se déployant, comme l’a magistralement montré Barthes, sur les pôles noble/ignoble, haut/bas. Aucune présentation, aucune préface n’interviennent, en outre, pour illustrer lors de la première issue la perspective de l’ouvrage ou pour en donner des normes d’usage. Mais en dépit de ces lacunes apparentes, le dictionnaire révèle, au fur et à mesure que ses rubriques paraissent, un projet organique et cohérent, qui détient avec l’ensemble de la revue un rapport de solidarité en établissant toujours, par rapport à chaque sommaire, une sorte de continuité topologique inscrite dans le mouvement d’une nouvelle flexion. Le même rapport de solidarité organique régit, d’ailleurs, l’engrenage de l’équipe des apprentis-lexicographes: Bataille, Carl Einstein, Michel Leiris, Robert Desnos, Marcel Griaule, Jacques Baron, Arnaud Dandieu, Zdenko Reich. Equipe dont le travail répond déjà, dans sa mise en œuvre, à cette notion ethnographique de ‘groupe’ telle que Griaule l’illustrera plus tard dans sa Méthode de l’ethnographie (1957): le groupe est un mécanisme productif où le travail dépasse la simple collaboration étant une «unité tactique» qui élargit le réseau d’observation. Chaque composant de l’unité enrichit ce réseau avec les résultats de sa pratique de recherche, qu’il met à la disposition des autres tout en préservant ses propres spécificités personnelles. Les informations recueillies sont alors assemblées dans un corpus organisé de données et de documents (Clifford 1988/1999, 73– 114) fournissant le cadre d’ensemble et le ‘sens’ de l’enquête. Et c’est exactement ce qui s’avère dans le “Dictionnaire critique». L’article rédigé pour l’entrée œil, par exemple, est le résultat d’un travail comparatif de groupe mené par Desnos, Bataille et Griaule; même dynamisme à l’œuvre pour l’entrée métamorphose, rédigée en trois parties distinctes par Griaule, Leiris et Bataille; ou encore crachat, par Griaule et Leiris. Entrées qui tissent des définitions apparemment émiettées, pluralisées, selon ce principe de la juxtaposition ʊ du collage ʊ qui veut que la valeur de tout l’ensemble ne se dégage qu’à partir de la valeur impliquée dans chaque partie individuelle. A ce principe fondateur de la juxtaposition obéit, d’ailleurs, tout le «Dictionnaire critique», conçu carrément pour être assemblé, ‘collecté’. Conception qui marque un détournement de la valeur d’usage du dictionnaire tout court, destiné au marché pour être ‘consommé’ en tant que marchandise. Comme le remarque Denis Hollier, soulignant, dans sa préface à la réédition de Documents, une correspondance interne entre la notion de valeur d’usage contenue dans les pages du Capital de Marx et la réflexion muséographique de l’époque, «le spectateur [du musée], au lieu d’être l’homme qui regarde un vase, doit entrer dans l’espace de l’objet et

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se mettre dans la position de l’homme qui boit» (Hollier 1991, x). Hollier retravaille ici la définition de l’entrée poterie que Griaule avait rédigée pour la rubrique du «Dictionnaire critique» du numéro 2.4 de Documents. Griaule y avait dénoncé «les archéologues et les esthètes [qui] s’intéressent au contenant, et pas au contenu», et quelques lignes plus loin avait ajouté: «On admirera la forme d’une anse, mais on se gardera bien d’étudier la position de l’homme qui boit et de se demander pourquoi, chez de nombreux peuples, il est honteux de boire debout» (236). Prêter attention au «contenu» signifie, en d’autres termes, revendiquer cette valeur latente de l’objet surgissant à partir de son emploi; signifie prendre en compte la notion d’usage et se pencher, par voie de conséquence, sur une nouvelle archéologie du sens placée sous le signe du corps. Il en va de même pour le «Dictionnaire critique»: le lecteur, l’usager, doit entrer dans l’espace du mot et se mettre dans la position de l’homme qui articule le corps sur la langue. Langue versus discours, pouvoir de la lettre versus savoir. Mais pour saisir la nature particulière de cette articulation il nous faut regarder de plus près les entrées du «Dictionnaire critique».

Les noms et les vocables Avant de proposer, en guise d’échantillon, une sélection de quelques entrées, une courte prémisse est nécessaire. Encore une fois nous convoquons l’analyse de Roland Barthes, dont la réflexion linguistique sur le «Dictionnaire critique» demeure jusqu’à l’heure actuelle capitale. D’après Barthes il faudrait, en linguistique, une théorie des «motsvaleurs», autrement dits «vocables», à opposer aux «mots-savoir», autrement dits «noms» ʊ « lexèmes » pour le lexicographes. Les vocables, explique Barthes, «sont des mots sensibles, des mots subtils, des mots amoureux, dénotant des séductions ou des répulsions» (Barthes 1972/1984, 281). Cette prémisse faite, venons-en au «Dictionnaire critique» et voyons comment, tout en passant par le mouvement d’une nomenclature, il parvient effectivement à articuler un tissu de motsvocables déclinant les morphèmes de la valeur telle que Barthes l’envisage. Afin de mieux évaluer l’écart entre vocable/mot-valeur et nom/mot-savoir, il nous semble pertinent de comparer chaque entrée tirée du «Dictionnaire critique» avec le lexème correspondant qu’on trouve dans deux des dictionnaires les plus représentatifs de la langue française: Le Trésor de la langue française (TLF) et Le Grand Robert (Robert 1987). La rubrique du numéro inaugural (Documents 1.2) du «Dictionnaire critique» catalogue deux entrées: architecture, par Georges Bataille, et

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rossignol, par Carl Einstein. Les deux articles correspondants sont développés autour de ce paradigme axial que nous avons cité plus haut, soit autour des pôles haut/bas et noble/ignoble. Si l’article architecture recouvre le paradigme axial du bas, étant ici question de la «monstruosité bestiale» que l’être humain, en tant «qu’étape intermédiaire entre les singes et les grands édifices» (117), est susceptible de révéler, l’entrée rossignol recouvre le sème de l’ignoble en tant que pôle, comme le précise Barthes, des «conventions chargées d’ennui» et du lyrisme avilissant de la «cuisine poétique» (Barthes 1972/1984, 279). Cet article, en fait, plus encore que le premier, déclenche avec virulence son attaque au noble édifice des formes et des signifiés découlant du système des «conventions». On lit: Sauf en des cas exceptionnels, il ne s’agit pas d’un oiseau. Le rossignol est, en général, un lieu commun, une paresse, un narcotique et une ignorance […] on se sert des mots comme d’ornements de sa propre personne. Les mots sont en général des pétrifications qui provoquent en nous des réactions mécaniques […] Le rossignol appartient à la catégorie des paraphrases de l’absolu : il est le doyen de tous les moyens de séductions classiques dans lesquels on a recours au charme du petit […] Le rossignol est une allégorie, un cache-cache. (117)

Suit, donc, la définition détaillée de l’image rhétorique de l’allégorie. Non plus l’image où «les qualités morales sont représentées», comme l’on peut lire dans tout traité de rhétorique ou de linguistique,9 mais: … l’allégorie est une manière d’assassinat, puisqu’elle supprime l’objet et lui vole son sens propre […] L’allégorie, le surrogat doivent cacher la faillite de l’homme et sa laideur…

C’est ainsi que: Personne ne pense que le rossignol est un fauve, un érotique d’une intensité dégoûtante (Documents 2, 117-18; je souligne).

Définition qui contraste nettement avec l’itinéraire sémantique tracé par le Trésor de la langue française et Le Grand Robert. Si pour le Trésor le rossignol est un «oiseau migrateur» caractérisé, entre autres, «par la pureté, la variété du chant aux sonorités éclatantes et harmonieuses» et qui par analogie évoque «une voix bien modulée», «d’une qualité mélo9 Comme, par exemple, à l’entrée allégorie dans Le Dictionnaire de la linguistique de Mounin (1974).

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dieuse», ou encore un «poète lyrique» ou un «écrivain au talent prestigieux» (TLF, ad vocem), le Grand Robert au sème du charme et de la mélodie ajoute, par ses citations, celui du bonheur et de sa «sublime expression». A la lumière de cette comparaison la tâche du “Dictionnaire critique» s’explicite clairement. Il s’agit de passer de la connaissance à la ‘puissance’ du mot; il s’agit de dénicher un sens qui excède le pouvoir de contrainte morale des représentations des dictionnaires traditionnels pour un sens ‘second’, plus lointain ʊ tout autre. Un sens excédant, ‘redoublé’, et dont la force est comparable à celle d’un objet-sacré ʊ ou encore, d’un objet-fétiche ʊ susceptible de se manifester, selon son emploi, sous la double forme du bien et du mal, du pur et de l’impur.10 Cette tâche, d’ailleurs, Bataille la postulera expressément dans l’article qu’il écrit dans le numéro 1.7 pour l’entrée informe, dont l’incipit résonne de cette façon: Un dictionnaire commencerait à partir du moment où il ne donnerait plus le sens mais les besognes des mots (217).

Or, cette définition est très importante en ce qu’elle évoque des consonances avec deux autres articles du «Dictionnaire» rédigés par Bataille: cheminée d’usine (1.6) et esthète (2.4). Ces trois articles ʊ informe, cheminée d’usine, esthète ʊ permettent de remonter, en fait, à la préface jamais bâtie; préface qui, suivant la démarche de l’investigation ethnologique, se dégage elle aussi en vertu d’un travail de reconstruction et d’assemblage recomposant le ‘déconnecté’. A l’entrée cheminée d’usine on lit: Or, le seul sens que peut avoir le dictionnaire ici publié est précisément de montrer l’erreur des définitions de ce genre» (332);

c’est-à-dire les définitions qui substituent à une «manière de voir enfantine ou sauvage»11 une «manière de voir savante» et qualifient par conséquent une cheminée d’usine comme «une construction de pierre formant un tuyau destiné à l’évacuation à grande hauteur de fumée» (332). La cheminée d’usine, par contre, n’est sous la plume de Bataille ni un «conduit de dégagements de produits de combustion», comme le dit le Trésor, ni un «tuyau de maçonnerie surmontant un foyer, un fourneau d’usine», comme l’atteste Le Grand Robert, étant donné que: 10

Notamment les deux pôles du sacré: le sacré droit ou sacré pur ʊ du respect et de l’amour ʊ et le sacré gauche ou impur ʊ le sacré de transgression. 11 C’est Bataille qui souligne.

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Cette nouvelle acception trouve son support matériel dans une photographie censée montrer «les formes d’architecture terrifiantes» de ces «véritables tuyaux de communication entre le ciel sinistrement sale et la terre boueuse» (329). Et venons maintenant à l’entrée esthète: Les mots ont bien le droit, en fin de compte, de bousculer les choses et d’écœurer […] Il y a un plaisir cynique à considérer des mots qui traînent quelque chose de nous jusqu’à la poubelle. (235)

A la suite de ces définitions, éclatant se fait chez Bataille le refus du dictionnaire en tant que machine ontologique «savante». La facture du «Dictionnaire critique», en revanche, qui ne peut certes être assimilée aux formes du savoir «haut» et «noble», relève d’une vision «sauvage», aux traits enfantins ʊ dans le sens du jeu et du rêve, ʊ vision où le sens se trouve saisi dans une chaîne paradigmatique renvoyant aux différents degrés du «bas» et de l’«ignoble». L’image de la poubelle, de la terre boueuse, le «terrifiant», le «monstrueux», l’«écœurant» sont alors les différentes ‘variétés’ d’une séduction basse, mais sont aussi les étapes de ce «va-et-vient de l’ordure à l’idéal et de l’idéal à l’ordure», comme Bataille l’écrit dans «Le gros orteil», étude qu’il publie toujours dans le numéro 1.6 (297–302) et dont les résonances se réverbèrent clairement dans l’article de cheminée d’usine. Vient se préciser, à ce point, la notion de «besogne». Notion qui va bien plus loin que la conception linguistique d’emploi formulée par Wittgenstein (a1951/1961) ʊ «meaning is use». La besogne dont parle Bataille a, en fait, une connotation négative ne recouvrant pas une fonction dans le procès de communication, mais révélant, par contre, un excès, une coupure, une puissance de rupture des codes traditionnels. Nous passons, explique Barthes (1972/1984, 282), de l’usage en son sens fonctionnel «au travail du mot, à la jouissance du mot». L’appareil terminologique qui en ressort met en échec la valeur au sens de Saussure au profit d’une valeur ‘hors d’usage’ qui va se réapproprier des instances de la séduction et du désir. Le mot est un corps vivant et le dictionnaire doit répondre à ses «besognes», à ses «nécessités», comme le veut l’étymologie même de «besogne».

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Voyons alors comment les autres entrées du «Dictionnaire critique» prennent en charge cette «besogne». Faute de temps, nous nous bornerons à en signaler quelques-une seulement: crachat, œil, homme. Paru dans le numéro 1.7, crachat est la première des trois entrées de cette rubrique ʊ les deux autres étant débâcle et informe. Rédigées en deux parties, les (re)définitions suivent de près la pente de l’ethnologie, étant signées par Marcel Griaule et Michel Leiris. Griaule, de son côté, rédige son article sur la base des données d’une documentation provenant de l’Afrique Noire et de l’Islam: «C’est que le crachat est plus que le produit d’une glande», il tient à préciser en marquant d’emblée la coupure avec les définitions traditionnelles. Cette «substance sécrétée par les muqueuses et projetée par la bouche» ʊ selon l’acception du Trésor ʊ est associée par l’élève de Mauss à «l’âme en mouvement»: de la maléficience à la bienfaisance, de l’insulte au miracle, le crachat se comporte comme l’âme: baume ou ordure. (381)

Leiris, quant à lui, pousse encore plus loin la définition de Griaule en montrant que la salive, sorte de sperme, restitue à la bouche, organe noble de la parole, une «fonction d’éjection» de nature «répugnante». «Le crachat», écrit Leiris: touche de très près aux manifestations érotiques […] Comme l’acte sexuel accompli au grand jour, il est le scandale même, puisqu’il ravale la bouche ʊ qui est le signe visible de l’intelligence ʊ au rang des organes les plus honteux. (381–382)

Bref, le crachat dénote un sacrilège, une transgression, et cracher, comme penser ou parler, re-symbolise une forme d’éjaculation. Mais le crachat est aussi, «par son humidité … le symbole même de l’informe», continue Leiris, en traçant ainsi une nouvelle extension du mot qui recouvre directement l’article rédigé à l’entrée informe par Bataille, qui clôt la rubrique de ce numéro dans un effet d’échos réciproques avec les entrées précédentes: affirmer que l’univers ne ressemble a [sic] rien et n’est qu’informe revient à dire que l’univers est quelque chose comme une araignée ou un crachat. (382; je souligne)

Mais il y a plus. Car l’entrée crachat, de surcroît, applique de façon extraordinaire les leçons d’ethnologie descriptive tenues par Mauss dans ses cours à l’Institut d’Ethnologie, et annonce, de façon non moins

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extraordinaire, cette archéologie des habitudes corporelles qui seront plus tard interrogées dans «Les techniques du corps» (communication présentée à la Société de Psychologie, 1934). Dans le chapitre premier de cet essai Mauss dira: «‘Divers’. C’est là qu’il faut pénétrer. On est sûr que c’est là qu’il y a des vérités à trouver» (1936/1950, 365). Eh bien, cela pourrait être exactement la devise du «Dictionnaire critique», qui pénètre dans le modus et le tonus du «divers», à savoir cette matière hétéroclite et scandaleuse démystifiant les grandes appareils ontologiques. Et voilà, alors, que dans ce type de dictionnaire à l’entrée homme on ne trouve plus une définition portant sur «l’espèce animale la plus développée» (TLF, ad vocem) et «la plus évoluée de la Terre» (Robert 1987, ad vocem), mais, en revanche, l’on tombe sur un article très synthétique ʊ 16 lignes contre les six pages et demi du Grand Robert ʊ où il est question de «matières premières» de sa composition chimique: graisse du corps suffisant «pour fabriquer 7 morceaux de savonnette … assez de fer pour fabriquer un clou de grosseur moyenne et du sucre pour sucrer une tasse de café», phosphore en quantité pour «2.200 allumettes». Ou, encore, l’entrée œil (1.4, septembre 1929). Là aussi, il ne s’agit plus de «l’appareil optique de l’homme et de nombreux animaux» (TLF, ad vocem) ou des yeux en tant que «reflet d’un état d’âme, d’une émotion» (Robert 1987, ad vocem), mais de l’œil en tant que «friandise cannibale», lieu d’une «séduction extrême» s’exerçant «à la limite de l’horreur». Si les dictionnaires traditionnels s’en tiennent, en ce qui concerne les connotations négatives du mot, au «mauvais œil», ici le champ des connotations est corrélé aux zones sémantiques du «tranchant» (216), étant développé autour de l’image du rasoir qui, dans Un chien andalou de Buñuel et Dali (juin 1929), tranche à vif l’œil d’une jeune femme. L’œil, donc, relève de l’imaginaire de l’inquiétant; il s’agit d’un «œil sauvage», qui provoque des «réactions aigües et contradictoires» oscillant entre la séduction et la répulsion ʊ le fascinans tremendum du sacré. L’œil est déclassé au rang d’objet: objet d’un appétit, voire à dévorer, à énucléer, à prendre dans une cuillère à café. D’où une chaîne métaphorique de substitutions qui vont de l’humide ʊ œil sanglant ʊ au globuleux ʊ œil/œuf, œil/cadeau, œil/verre.12 Tout l’article s’appuie sur un corpus de photographies, parmi lesquelles les yeux écarquillés, quasi hallucinés, de l’actrice Joan Crawford; un tableau de Salvador Dali (Le sang est plus doux que le miel, 1927); une amulette abyssine venant de la collection Marcel Griaule. «La 12

Chaîne que Bataille développera, notamment, dans L’histoire de l’œil, son premier roman paru en 1928 sous le pseudonyme de Lord Auch, avec huit lithographies originales d’André Masson. Nous renvoyons à l’analyse qu’en donne Barthes dans son article «La métaphore de l’œil» (1963/1964).

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photographie», comme le souligne Denis Hollier, «y prend la place du rêve» (1991, xxi). Et l’espace du rêve semblent aussi convoquer les photographies qui accompagnent l’article de gratte-ciel, par Michel Leiris. L’image de l’Empire Building s’élève hyperboliquement, dans une sorte de dilatation onirique qui semble déplacer continuellement le centre focal. Le gratteciel, d’ailleurs, est re-symbolisé sous la plume de Leiris exactement à la lumière de ce rêve collectif qu’est le mythe, notamment Œdipe: une image érotique, où le building, qui gratte, est un phallus plus net encore que celui de la tour de Babel, et le ciel, qui est gratté ʊ objet de convoitise du dit phallus ʊ la mère désirée incestueusement […] les gratte-ciel sont donc de merveilleux et modernes symboles, tant pour le nom que pour la forme, d’une des plus graves constantes humaines : celle qui fut cause du meurtre de Laïus par son fils. (Documents 2.7: 433)

Le «Dictionnaire critique» cesse de paraître avec le numéro 7 de la deuxième année de Documents. 38 les mots-vocables analysés. Avec le numéro 2.8, le quinzième de toute la série, la revue terminera son aventure en raison de problèmes financiers. D’architecture à rossignol, d’informe à crachat, d’homme à cheminée d’usine, d’œil à gratte-ciel, pour en rester aux entrées ici analysées, le «Dictionnaire critique» prend le parti de la «besogne» des mots, c’est-à-dire le parti de l’«impossible» de tout dictionnaire, en poussant les mots et leur sens dans cet espace de l’altérité et du désir où se joue la dialectique de l’un et de son double ʊ l’un et le multiple ʊ du même et de l’autre. Il fait de l’autre ce noyau central que, depuis une vingtaine d’années, les nombreux dictionnaires ayant trait à l’ethnologie, à l’anthropologie, à l’altérité et aux relations interculturelles ne cessent d’interroger.13 Il touche à ce centre incandescent où le langage dévoile le réel d’un contenu sémantique fuyant sous le signifiant. Un contenu passionnel, allant de pair avec la force pulsionnelle de la lettre et de ses pouvoirs d’attraction et répulsion. Et si cela, dans la champ de la lexicographie et de la lexicologie est en effet, à cette époque-là, assez 13

«La dialectique de l’un et du multiple, du même et de l’autre, de l’intériorité et de l’extériorité est ici centrale, de même que le processus d’identification, les logiques de différenciation et de réciprocité, les phénomènes de dissonances cognitives», affirme l’«Avant-propos» du Dictionnaire de l’altérité et des relations interculturelles publié en 2003 sous la direction de Gilles Ferréol et Guy Jucquois. Alors que l’«Avant-propos» du Dictionnaire de l’ethnologie et de l’anthropologie (Bonte et al., 1991) explique qu’il s’agit «d’une conception entièrement nouvelle et telle qu’en cheminant à travers ces pages, il soit assuré d’y rencontrer l’homme: l’autre et lui-même».

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surprenant, ce qui l’est encore plus est le fait que la démarche du «Dictionnaire critique» semble déjà annoncer, en arrière-fond, l’investigation que le linguiste Iván Fónagy portera plus tard sur «Les bases pulsionnelles de la phonation» (1970–1971/1983), à savoir l’investigation de ce discours sous-jacent, ‘explosif’, jusqu’alors négligé par la linguistique, qui répond à la «besogne» de jouissance de la lettre par la valeur du son et du tissu de ses différents registres: haut/bas, pur/impur, clair /sombre, oral/anal/urétral … Mais cela nous engagerait dans un autre discours et dans un autre colloque.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN EDMUND PECK AND THE MAKING OF THE ESKIMO–ENGLISH DICTIONARY: MYTHS OF THE MISSIONARY LEXICOGRAPHER SYLVIA BROWN

Edmund Peck is one of history’s more romantic lexicographers. An Anglican missionary active in the field between 1876 and 1905, Peck lived and worked among the native peoples of what is now northern Quebec and Baffin Island. In this harsh, often deadly environment, Peck ate seal meat to stave off scurvy; got drinking water by melting snow, or even better, a piece of iceberg; and preached in a tent made of skin—until hungry sled dogs ate his church. Yet Edmund Peck also spent at least half or more of every day at his desk in intense language study: learning the Eskimo language and its local variants and, especially, preparing translations of Scripture for the use of the native people. Peck achieved a degree of competence in Inuktitut that earned him the name Uqammaq, “he who speaks well”, from the Inuit themselves, and is credited with the introduction of the syllabic system still used by Inuit. Once he had retired to Ottawa, Peck published an Eskimo grammar in 1919—still in print today. An Eskimo– English dictionary (EED) was printed posthumously in Hamilton, Ontario, in 1925, the year after Peck’s death. I begin deliberately with this romantic picture of the Arctic lexicographer in order to suggest how seductive it still is. I do not want to suggest that Edmund Peck did not work in considerable isolation and in an extreme environment, show fortitude, or gain expertise in the language of the Inuit. He did all these things. Rather, I want to suggest how ready we are to fit Peck’s undoubtedly interesting and impressive story—and, by extension, the Eskimo–English dictionary attributed to him—into the heroic myth of the missionary scholar-lexicographer. In the case of Edmund Peck, the allure of this myth has worked to help obscure the equally interesting but complex story of the making of the Eskimo–English

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dictionary. This chapter aims to unpack the story of the making of this dictionary, which can only be done by also unpacking the myth of the missionary-lexicographer. * * * The myth of the missionary-lexicographer has points of contact with the representation of scholarly labour, and the making of dictionaries in particular, as heroic. John Considine (2000) has shown how Samuel Johnson relied on the self-representation of the scholar-printer Henri Estienne, to develop a personal mythos, at once self-deprecatory and aggrandizing, of the lexicographer as heroic drudge, engaged in Herculean labours against a hostile world. What we might call the Johnsonian model of the dictionary-maker as a solitary, labouring, heroic man grafts easily onto other narratives of self-sacrifice, especially Christian narratives of service and martyrdom. Parallel resonances abound in the world of nineteenth- and twentieth-century evangelical missionaries, especially in the rousing stories of their labours for the gospel against all odds, in outlandish tongues and among outlandish peoples.1 These stories circulated back home in missionary periodicals, in the quasi-hagiographical biographies of missionaries, and in lectures designed to raise funds and attract new workers for the gospel. Necessary linguistic and lexicographical work were represented as part of the adventure, as in this piece on Edmund Peck: Thrilling chapters might be written of the remarkable pioneering work accomplished by the Church of England in Canada. The gripping part of the story is that this adventurous work was undertaken in remote and barren outposts, among the Red Indians or Eskimo. Almost every pioneer was a translator. (McNab 1936, 55)

Its author, John McNab, was also the author of a 1939 book titled In other tongues: Tales of the triumphs of Canadian translators of scripture. Grammars, dictionaries, and, above all, Bible translations were the tangible proofs and esteemed relics of heroic missionary work.2 1 It is perhaps significant that the representation of heroic lexicography first arose in a Reformation context, Erasmus and Estienne (with their differing evangelizing commitments) both providing models of the Christian scholar taking on Herculean labours (Considine 2000, 212–215). 2 Some Canadian examples of missionary dictionaries include Frederic Baraga’s 1853 Ojibwa dictionary, republished by the Oblate missionary Albert Lacombe in 1878–1880; E.A. Watkins’ Cree dictionary of 1865, revised and updated by J. A.

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The pattern of expectation was thus set for the home consumers of these heroic narratives and for the missionaries themselves, who strove to live up to expectations by producing linguistic and lexicographical texts— even when ill-equipped to do so by reason of scant acquaintance with the language.3 Missionaries also represented themselves in reports, letters, and in the semi-public journals they were often encouraged to write by their missionary societies as isolated but heroically self-sufficient and studious, producing the scholarly work of a scripture translation in the middle of a deadly jungle or barren wilderness. Those in early contact with people with no writing systems of their own—like the Inuit or the Cree—were especially likely also to invent or adapt writing systems and to produce systematizing reference works like grammars and dictionaries.4 Missionaries were thus sometimes strangely represented as bringers of language to peoples who were always more expert than the missionary. What is perhaps more surprising is the persistence of aspects of this myth of the missionary lexicographer even in current scholarly, and supposedly objective, literature. In the case of Edmund Peck, the myth has operated principally to suppress the genealogy of the Eskimo–English dictionary, obscuring a story of complex provenance and collaboration with a simpler narrative of self-sufficient achievement. Frédéric Laugrand’s recent (2005) entry for Edmund Peck in The dictionary of Canadian biography, for instance, simply states that Edmund Peck “wrote” a dictionary of Inuktitut, just as any standard bibliographic search gives Peck as the “author” of the Eskimo–English dictionary. These shorthand attributions seem unproblematic to our ears, yet they simultaneously activate mythologies of scholarly and missionary achievement while leaving unexamined the question of how this dictionary actually came to be. We might also blame Samuel Johnson for further distortions resulting from the attribution of authorship to the makers of dictionaries (Lipking 1998, 103ff.). To say that a man has written a dictionary, that he is the author of a dictionary, implies not only a heroic narrative of dictionary-makingʊone that runs along a triumphant trajectory of labour, mastery, and productionʊbut also one that obscures McKay in 1938; S. T. Rand’s Micmac dictionary of 1888; and T. H. Canham’s English–Tutchone vocabulary in 1898. 3 See, for instance, the case of a later Anglican missionary to the Inuit, Maurice Flint, discussed in Brown and Zinck 2006. 4 A Methodist missionary, James Evans, invented the Cree syllabic system around 1840. This system was later adapted to Inuktitut by the Anglican missionaries John Horden and E. A. Watkins, although Edmund Peck is often erroneously given credit for the adaptation (Rogers 2005, 249–253; Harper 1983 and Harper et al. 1983).

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the necessarily collaborative and derivative nature of any lexicographical work. Missionary lexicographers were especially likely to need teachers and collaborators, to depend on the labour of those who had been in the field before or, even more fundamentally, those who were native to it. For English-speaking missionaries to the Arctic, seeking to learn and document a language they could scarcely even obtain an introduction to before arriving in the field, reliance on the expertise and willing help of native speakers was a given. Yet, perhaps like many givens, it went without saying. In what follows, I discuss what we can recover of the many helps Edmund Peck received in his linguistic and lexicographical work. These included textual aids produced by fellow missionaries and others working in the north, which form the basis of what was printed as the Eskimo–English dictionary in 1925; indeed, the dictionary’s subtitle explicitly states that it was “Compiled from Erdman’s [sic] EskimoGerman Edition 1864 A.D.” Peck also received help from native speakers of Inuktitut and from womenʊtwo categories of helpmeet that received less public acknowledgement. In fact, the publication of the EskimoEnglish dictionary was due as much to the heroic labours of one woman, Sarah Archer, as to the work of any of the several people who can be shown to have had a part in its making. * * * Missionaries of the tribe that Edmund Peck belonged to went into the field fully expecting to be learners and documentors of language. Peck went to work among the natives of northern Canada under the auspices of the Church Missionary Society, a voluntary and evangelical Church of England body that had developed an explicit and sophisticated policy on the linguistic work undertaken by their missionaries and who, by the midnineteenth-century, had established missions worldwide, including to the MƗori in New Zealand and to North American Indians at Red River, Manitoba. The energetic and efficient secretary of the CMS, Henry Venn, developed what was called the “Native Church Policy” as a way of managing (and also promoting) this worldwide spread of the gospel. It involved not only the recruiting of a native ministry as soon as possible, but perhaps even more centrally the a priori condition of offering the gospel to the people in their vernacular. Thus, Venn insisted that missionaries speak the native language and translate the scriptures into that language as soon as possible (Usher 1970, 49). Teaching English, in other words, was not a priority, and this meant that English-speaking CMS missionaries arrived in the field not as linguistic experts but as learners

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from the start. “The first great work of every missionary is to acquire the language of the people as well as gain their confidence” (A. Lewis 1904/1908, 77). So wrote, categorically, the Reverend Arthur Lewis in one of those quasi-hagiographical books that were crucial for promoting the work of foreign missions, The Life & Work of E. J. Peck among the Eskimos, first published in 1904 while Peck was still in the field and in its third edition by 1908. Lewis quotes from Peck’s journal the story of how, as a new missionary on the voyage to Canada, he studied a copy of the New Testament, translated into Labrador Eskimo by German Moravian missionaries who had begun working among the natives of Labrador from the end of the eighteenth century. Peck wrote, “This, to me, great treasure I studied when on the trackless deep, and by carefully comparing it with our English translation I was ableʊespecially where there was a repetition of the same words, as in St. John, chap. iʊfinally to hit upon the meanings” (A. Lewis 1904/1908, 69). Study over the “trackless deep” is another variation on the familiar heroic theme of scholarship in the barren wilderness. This transatlantic study, Lewis wrote, enabled Peck to “set to work among the people without delay” (ibid. 77); although Lewis also wrote that Peck relied heavily on the help of at least two named native interpreters, Adam Lucy and John Molucto, and also had to contend with differences between the dialect of the Eskimo of Labrador and those of Hudson Bay, where he was first stationed (ibid. 71, 78). The CMS insistence on the native vernacular made native help and collaboration indispensible; but, because it was ultimately to result in authoritative translations of scripture into that vernacular, it also set up the missionaries with rather daunting scholarly, and indeed lexicographical, expectations.5 The contradictions between being ignorant and dependent language learners and authoritative bearers of God’s Word were not always smoothed out in missionary narratives. For instance, Arthur Lewis wrote of Edmund Peck inviting “a little Eskimo boy about ten years old to come and live with him”, ostensibly to relieve his “utter loneliness” but also, as it happened, to improve Peck’s acquisition of the native language. Arthur Lewis imagined the scene for the benefit of supporters of missions back home: 5

“But the missionary cannot rest satisfied with merely mastering for preaching purposes and conversation the language of the people among whom he lives. He must always remain sensible of deficiency until he has placed the Bible in their hands in such a form that they can read it for themselves. With this object in view, as soon as the first winter was over, Mr. Peck determined on transcribing portions of the Moravian Eskimo Testament into what is known as the Syllabic character” (A. Lewis 1904/1908, 81–82).

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Edmund Peck’s own account of his language learning procedures is less idealized and gives a more straightforward sense of his dependence on the knowledge of others, in contrast to Lewis’ imagined scene, where even though the boy and Peck are “mutual teacher and scholar”, it is clearly Peck who has the more valuable gift to bestow, the holy light that breaks in on the boy’s darkness. Only a couple of months after his arrival in northern Canada, Peck himself wrote in his journal on 6 November 1876 of his collection of both Eskimo and Indian words (both Inuit and Cree gathered at the Hudson Bay Company’s post at Whale River, where Peck was first stationed): My plan is to write down over night some simple words and sentences. I then get the corresponding Eskimo words from Adam Lucy or Molucto; the Indian words are gathered from one of the Company’s men, David Loutett. I find all very willing to help me, for which I am indeed thankful. My daily collection averages from eighty to a hundred words. These are learned the following day ... I have now got some thousands of words, mostly Eskimo, which I gathered by study of the Testament and from my different friends. (quoted A. Lewis 1904/1908, 81)

Peck’s own account describes a procedure hovering uncertainly between lexicography and language-learning. Peck gathers and collects words much as the anthropologist Franz Boas asked him, twenty years later, to acquire Inuit artefacts for a representative collection he (Boas) wished to make.6 6

Franz Boas to E. J. Peck, New York, 12 April 1897 (Peck Papers, XXI a.i.): “I should like very much to secure a full collection of objects from the Eskimo of [Cumberland] Sound, and I shall take pleasure in making out a list of what I want.” These records are cited with the permission of the Archives of the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Canada. I am grateful to the staff there for their extraordinary helpfulness.

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It is also surprising that Peck should have already “got some thousands of words, mostly Eskimo” by November 1876 when, six months before, he had not yet begun his study of the language, even by the indirect means of Moravian translations of Labrador Eskimo. Indeed, six months before, he had not yet left England. In accounts of other CMS missionaries to the Inuit, we find similar reports of precocious linguistic and even lexicographical activity. For instance, Peck’s young assistant in the founding of the first Anglican mission on Baffin Island, Joseph Parker, was reported to have been “working especially hard upon an Eskimo dictionary” (A. Lewis 1904/1908, 259) at the time when he tragically died in a boating accident, although it is evident from Peck’s journal that Parker was still at an apprentice stage in learning the language and that what he was working hard at was “copying out an Eskimo Dictionary” (Laugrand et al. 2006, 80). For these missionaries, making a dictionary may have meant simply the making of pragmatic wordlists.7 At the same time, the tendency to call even quite brief lists of vocabulary “dictionaries” suggests a willingness on the part of at least some missionaries, their promoters, and their archivists to take full advantage of the dubious territory between language apprenticeship and authoritative mastery. * * * Edmund Peck’s more careful characterization of his young colleague’s linguistic activities, however, points us towards the long and involved story of the making of the Eskimo–English dictionary which became Peck’s own memorial. The story has been partially obscured by the easy attribution of uncomplicated authorship of the dictionary to one man, Peck, even though an examination of copies of the printed dictionary itself yields clear evidence of a much more collective and layered production. In a pamphlet written to celebrate one hundred years of the presence of the Anglican Church in the north of Canada, Peck, now retired, narrated some of his early missionary experiences, including his arrival in 1876 at 7

As an example: on 22 May 1917, not quite two years after writing Peck for help to begin his work on Copper Eskimo, Herbert Girling wrote again to report that he had already completed “A fairly large dictionary” of the Copper Eskimo dialect, in addition to an outline grammar and translations of four hymns, “a form of Christian instruction”, the Lord’s prayer, and a grace for meals (Peck Papers, V c.ii.). Girling had begun his study of Copper Eskimo already possessing “a fair conversant knowledge of Mackenzie Bay dialect” (Peck Papers, V c.i.), but even so, composing a “fairly large dictionary” in two years is a prodigious feat, unless one reads “dictionary” as a pragmatic wordlist.

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Moose Factory, his first port of call in Canada, and his meeting there with John Horden, bishop of the Diocese of Moosonee. As well as introducing him to Adam Lucy and giving him a book compiled by himself of the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed, and some hymns in Eskimo in a newly adapted system of syllabics, Bishop Horden also gave Peck a dictionary.

Figure 16.1: Edmund Peck’s copy of Erdmann’s Eskimoisches Wörterbuch (title page of National Library of Canada, PM63 E74, copy 2; detail)

Peck wrote, “The Bishop had secured a copy of an Eskimo Dictionary which had been compiled by one of the Moravian missionaries and which had been translated by a friend” (Peck [1922?], 13). This was the Eskimoisches Wörterbuch of Friedrich Erdmann, a German Moravian missionary to the Eskimo of Labrador, published in 1864ʊthat is, twelve years before Peck received a copy from Horden. Like the Moravian New Testament that Peck studied on the voyage over, it could be adapted for

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use among the Inuit of the northeastern Arctic, to whom Peck would devote most of his years in the mission field. We know that Peck kept, used, and annotated this copy of Erdmann throughout his long career because it survives, now housed in the National Library of Canada (PM63 E74. Copy 2). It was already heavily supplemented and annotated when Peck received it, to accommodate the English translations of the German in the original.

Figure 16.2: J. L. Cotter’s interleaved translations from Erdmann’s German (from National Library of Canada, PM63 E74, copy 2; detail)

The translations from the German were by James Laurence Cotter, who had been a clerk for the Hudson’s Bay Company in Moose Factory between 1867 and 1872, the “friend” of Bishop Horden mentioned by Peck.8 The well-born Cotter had arrived in Canada at the age of eighteen

8 See the notice of Cotter in the “Hudson’s Bay Company Archives: Biographical sheets” database; see also the variant Introduction dated July 1925 in EED

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and was described by the Company’s Governor, George Simpson, as “a young gentleman of good education”. Simpson sent him initially to Fort LaCloche on Lake Huron to pick up the “French & Indian” languages (S. A. Smith 1982).9 Cotter had perhaps been enlisted by Horden himself to make Erdmann’s dictionary usable for anglophone missionaries; as it turned out, Cotter’s translations remained in use for fifty years, copied and recopied.10 In the Erdmann dictionary given to Peck, interleaved pages gave Cotter’s English translations of the German definitions of the Eskimo words on the facing page; the Eskimo words were furthermore numbered to correspond with the English definitions. The same careful hand also directly annotated some of the printed entries, particularly when a translation was missing on the interleaved page. This hand may have belonged to Cotter himself but also possibly to another copyist. What is certain is that these German-to-English translations, which constitute by far the majority of handwritten additions to the NAC copy, are not in the bold and distinctive hand of Peck’s many surviving letters and journals. Peck’s hand does contribute some annotations, but these are a minority, contrary to the description in the Canadian National Catalogue.11 Modern cataloguers may have been misled here by modern ideas about authorship and textual reproduction. To the modern eye, inscription by hand signals an author’s rough draft, what happens before the stage of mechanical textual production and dissemination. Missionaries to the Arctic in the period between Canadian Confederation and the 1920s relied, however, on a much older technology of reproduction and dissemination for one of their essential language reference works: scribal labour.12 At the (replaced in some copies by a variant dated September 1925 which omits mention of Cotter). 9 Cotter had been educated at Loretto School near Edinburgh and may well have acquired his German there. He is perhaps best known for his early photographs of life in the north. 10 As acknowledged in the July 1925 Introduction to EED. 11 The catalogue entry for Peck’s copy of Erdmann reads “Interleaved with an English translation of the text in ms.; German text heavily annotated in the same hand. Presumably these translations and annotations are by the Rev. E.J. Peck, who translated this work into English”. These presumptions about the hand and the source of the translation are incorrect. Canadian National Catalogue/AMICUS No. 4052179. Accessed 28 May 2010. 12 Peck’s journals suggest that the labour of copying, “preparing new books for our Eskimo friends”, occupied much of his time (e.g. entry for Sunday 31 July to Sunday 7 August 1898 in Laugrand et al. 2006, 103). A letter from J. Lofthouse, missionary at Churchill, dated 9 February 1893 expresses doubt about the wisdom of each missionary station having its own set of translations, when there is so much

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time of his accidental death by drowning, Joseph Parker was probably engaged in making another copy of the improved Erdmann’s dictionary, using as exemplar the interleaved book Peck had received from Horden twenty years earlier. As well as making Erdmann useful to Peck and other German-less missionaries, the interleavings signalled that this dictionary was to be a working text. An analogous example is an interleaved copy of Joseph Howse’s 1844 Grammar of the Cree language in the Bruce Peel Special Collections Library at the University of Alberta (PM 987 H86 copy 1). This copy belonged to William Mason, a Methodist missionary who worked with James Evans, the inventor of the syllabic system that was eventually adapted to use with Cree and Inuktitut (see Hutchinson 1988).13 The interleaved copy of Howse’s Cree grammar, like the interleaved Eskimo dictionary, was formatted to be used by the missionary in the field, not only to help him acquire essential linguistic knowledge but also to provide space for the recording of new knowledge. The blank spaces of the inserted pages invited missionaries to collect words. Thus, they were a practical aid to language learning, but they also set up the missionary’s lexicographical pretensions. This brings us to the question of how much new knowledge Peck added to the copy of Erdmann he received from Horden. How much original lexicographical work did Peck do? Peck’s bolder hand made some further improvements, but it is striking how little he added to Erdmann. When Peck annotated, he typically did so to correct Eskimo forms and sometimes pronunciation, adapting the Labrador dialect to the usage of his own mission field. Interestingly, not all of these corrections made it into the printed dictionary. For example, the entry “aglagæksák, sæk, set, RG aglaræksak, 3DSLHU”, glossed by the translating hand as “paper”, is supplemented by a clear annotation in Peck’s bolder hand, giving “aglakviksak” as a possible “better” form, but in the printed EED this becomes “aglakulksak”. For the entry “Aimarngnalik, lik, lit, HLQ5HQQWKLHUPLWHLQHP+RUQ”, which the translating hand renders “A reindeer with a horn”, Peck’s hand corrects the translation to “A commonality in the language. Lofthouse also writes that he has “the whole Book of CP in Roman letters in manuscript” (Peck Papers XXIX.11). The isolation of these missionaries may have forced them to return to pre-modern ways of reproducing and circulating knowledge, but it may also be that their conception of themselves as isolated heroic labourers for the gospel led them to choose anachronisticʊand laboriousʊmethods (cf. also note 1). 13 Mason mainly used the interleavings to give the Cree vocabulary in syllabics; Howse had of course used roman orthography.

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reindeer without horns”, but EED prints “A reindeer with one horn only”. In both cases, Peck’s annotation was either mistranscribed or corrected by further editorial intervention. In his copy of Erdmann, Peck sometimes explicitly noted local meanings and usage. Peck annotated the entry “Akbik, bƭk, bƭt, 3RODU %URPEHHUH (Rubus Chamamorus)” with the observation, “At L. W. R. Eyeberry”, L. W. R. standing for Little Whale River (now Petite Rivière de la Baleine in Quebec), Peck’s first missionary posting. This annotation did make it into the printed EED. Peck’s most frequent marking of regional usage was a simple “r” beside Eskimo headwords. These markings appeared in the EED as asterisks noting words “most frequently used in Baffin’s Land and on the east coast of Hudson Bay”.

Figure 16.3: Annotations in Erdmann: most are not by Peck. (National Library of Canada, PM63 E74, copy 2; detail)

A search for more straightforwardly lexicographical annotations yields only a few examples. Peck added an additional sense for ajuktaut, “A line used for beating, playing at ball”, and for angoarpok, “He swims a fish or seal” [which EED renders “He (a fish or seal) swims”]. At one point, Peck adds a new headword, “Annetalo! This is good that such a thing happen-

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ed”, together with other senses and new headwordsʊhis most substantive lexicographical addition.14 One must conclude that Peck’s personal copy of Erdmann’s dictionary bears witness more to Peck’s language learning than to his lexicography. More than a draft or even a set of notes towards a new dictionary, it is a working textbook, adapted to the Arctic region where Peck found himself stationed and to the immediate pressures of the language learning involved in his mission work.15 Still, Peck’s undoubtedly deserved reputation as one who did learn to communicate well with the Inuit set him up as the kind of authority who might be expected to produce a missionary dictionary as the crown of his labours and expertise. Expectations that Peck would produce such a dictionary in effect caused such a dictionary to appear. How this happened, as part of a story of collaborative, layered, and ultimately suppressed authorship, is the focus of the final section of this chapter. * * * Even after he had retired to concentrate on fundraising for Anglican Arctic missions (now run entirely from Canada), Peck was receiving requests from missionaries in the field for material help with language and translation. Herbert Girling wrote to Peck in Toronto in August 1915, a decade after Peck himself had left the Arctic, explicitly asking for “[a]ny work of either the Moravians or yourself” to help with his own task of committing the language of the “Copper” or “Blonde Eskimo” to paper. The work of the Moravians was now considerably less fresh than it had been when Peck first applied himself to language learning and translation work, but Girling may also have been aware that Peck had various versions of an Eskimo grammar that he intended one day to publish. This was printed, finally, in 1919, a project of nearly forty years standing realized.16

14

These annotations are found on p. 32, Column B. A final annotation in Peck’s copy of Erdmann may be worth mentioning here. A large X appears in the margin beside an Eskimo formula, Jesusib aunga epkejautiksarivavut ajorniptingnit, which translates as “The blood of Jesus cleanseth us from our sins”. 16 The National Library of Canada has a little typewritten book, partially mimeographed, produced by Edmund Peck at Little Whale River, Quebec, in 1883, and titled The new Eskimo grammar. An autograph MS note on the first page reads: “N. B. These notes refer to a larger grammar which will ... be compiled” (Canadian National Catalogue/AMICUS No. 15594752). There are many “Eskimo Grammars” 15

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And there were ongoing expectations, clearly, of an authoritative dictionary from the man who had become known as “the Apostle to the Eskimos”. In May of 1920, four years before Peck’s death, the American explorer Donald B. Macmillan wrote to him, asking about a dictionary to take with him on a planned expedition: If I remember rightly you were engaged a few years ago upon the work of compiling a dictionary of the Baffin Land Eskimo. Did you finish this and has it been edited? If so I am very anxious to secure a copy, for with all your experience it should be authoritative in every way. (Peck Papers VI c.ii.)

Peck does indeed seem to have been engaged in the collection and refinement of Eskimo vocabulary during his time of retirement from the mission field. He received help as well as giving it. As ever, his lexicographical work was thoroughly collaborative, dependent on the labours of helpers who have tended to drop beneath the threshold of visibility. Interestinglyʊand perhaps not surprisingly, given their tendency to disappearʊhis most important helpers were women. In 1915, the same year that Herbert Girling wrote to him, Peck received a letter from a woman whom he had evidently asked to be one of his language informants, Sarah Elizabeth Ford: “I am sending you some words which I know are not used at Lake Harbour. You will see the Labrador word on one side & the Baffin Land opposite”. The letter continues: “I have been so long before writing I fear you are sorely tired of waiting, but have been very busy sewing for friends ...”.17 This letter suggests that in 1915, 10 years after he had ceased being an active missionary in the Arctic, Peck was still known to be collecting words and refining differences between Labrador and Baffin Land Eskimo. Sarah Ford, moreover, adds further diversity to the range of Peck’s informants—as well as some mystery. She was the young widow of a Hudson’s Bay Company man, William Ford, who was the post manager at Lake Harbour, Baffin Island, when he drowned in 1913. Left with two young children, in 1915 Sarah was managing a hotel owned by her brother, Henry Ford, in Twillingate, Newfoundland.18 Writing from Twillin various states in the Peck papers, some with vocabulary lists (see the items in XXXVIII, for instance). 17 Peck Papers, S. E. Ford to Peck, 19 January 1915, XXXVIII.8. The enclosed word list seems not to have survived. 18 Newfoundland and Labrador 2005. Sarah’s maiden name, as well as her married name, was Ford; William Ford was in fact a distant cousin.

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ingate, she mixed her lexicographical information about the Baffin Land and Labrador Eskimo dialects with cozy news about her sewing and the weather. How did she come by her linguistic expertise? Peter Pisteolak, recalling her husband William Ford, wrote that for “a white man, Willie Ford spoke the Eskimo language really well. We were amazed. He spoke truly the Eskimo way” (Pisteolak and Eber 1993, 83). Sarah Ford herself claimed that her mother was part Inuit and that she was raised among Inuit on Baffin Island, although the HBC archives cast doubt on this, stating that her mother was a Newfoundlander who died circa 1905. Her father, George Ford, entered service with the HBC in 1877 as an “Interpreter” at Nachvak, Labrador.19 Whatever her history, Sarah Ford undoubtedly had close contact with competent speakers of Eskimo and acquired enough knowledge of dialectal variation to be consulted by Peck. Later in life, she traded on her knowledge of Inuit language and culture, reinventing herself as Anauta the Eskimo woman and taking to the American lecture circuit. Her co-written “autobiography”, Land of the good shadows: The life story of Anauta, an Eskimo woman (Washburne and Anauta 1940), recast the contact she had with Peck to give her a much more prominent part in his translation activities. Indeed, it suggested that she herself was the primary translator of Psalms in Eskimo (Baffin Land dialect), published by the British and Foreign Bible Society in 1917 and usually attributed to Peck (although the volume itself gives no names).20 In Anauta’s autobiography, the solitary and heroic linguistic labourer is the native helper herself: Anauta received a letter from the Reverend E. J. Peck in Toronto requesting her to translate the Psalms into Eskimo. The work had been sent to him from a Bible House in England but he was not familiar enough with the Eskimo language to do the translating and he did not know the native writing. ... It was a long task, but a beautiful book was finally accomplished and many copies were made up and sent back. While Anauta received no money for this work, she had the satisfaction of knowing that now the Eskimos had the Psalms to read. (Washburne and Anauta 1940, 305–306)

19

See the notices of George Ford and William Ford in the “Hudson’s Bay Company Archives: Biographical sheets” database (accessed 13 May 2010). 20 In common with other publications issued by C.M.S. missionaries (such as Portions of the Holy Scripture for the use of the Esquimaux on the Northern and Eastern Shores of Hudson’s Bay, “edited by Edmund Peck”, and published by the S.P.C.K. in 1894), this was essentially an adaptation of a nineteenth-century Moravian missionary translation, including a conversion into the syllabic script introduced by Horden and Watkins.

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Perhaps, like her near contemporary Archibald Belaney (a.k.a. “Grey Owl”), Sarah Ford belonged more to what Rayna Green (1988) has called “The tribe called Wannabee” than to the Inuit. Yet, behind the apparent elaborations of the autobiography was a documented linguistic exchange, Sarah Ford’s word list produced at the request of Peck; though the list itself is lost, Peck kept her letter, which was ultimately archived among papers relating to his longstanding work on an Eskimo grammar. The improved story in Land of the good shadows may have expressed Sarah Ford’s sense that while Peck did make use of her linguistic expertise, this dependence had not been publically acknowledged. As a mediating figure between the missionary scholar and Inuit language and culture, the mysterious woman who moved between Baffin Land and Newfoundland, and between Inuit and European cultures and languages, might well have dropped below the threshold of visibilityʊsave for her surviving cover letter and her own flamboyance. Edmund Peck’s last and most important helper, as far as the Eskimo– English Dictionary was concerned, was another woman: Sarah Archer. In fact, although Peck’s name is always coupled with this dictionary, and although it was published as an explicit memorial to this undoubtedly accomplished and long-serving missionary, the bulk of its content and form is attributable to two other persons: Friedrich Erdmann and Sarah Archer. It origins are disclosed in a prefatory “History of the Memorial Dictionary” by Sarah Archer which is glued in to some copies of the Eskimo–English dictionary, along with a revised Introduction, such as the copy that Archer herself inscribed and presented to Archdeacon Archibald Fleming, now in the Circumpolar Library of the University of Alberta.21 It may be that Sarah Archer, like Anauta, wanted to set the public record straight about her own contribution to a missionary linguistic project, well aware perhaps of how readily the public attributed such projects to the solitary, heroic, European, and male missionary, of which Edmund Peck was a prime exemplar. In Archer’s presentation copy, a new printed “Introduction”, dated September 1925 and signed by “George E. Saskatchewan” (i.e. by George Exton Lloyd, Anglican Bishop of Saskatchewan), replaced an “Introduction” dated July 1925 and signed “The Editor”.22 The replacement 21

PM 50 Z5 P357 1925 copy 1. Archibald Fleming was Archdeacon of the Arctic between 1927 and 1933, which delimits the time of presentation. 22 The original introduction was most likely written by the Reverend William Gladstone Walton, another C.M.S. missionary in the Arctic, who is named on the title page as “Editor”. Other than that mention, however, his contribution to the dictionary is unclear. He does not appear, for instance, in Sarah Archer’s “History of the Memorial Dictionary”. (Stuart Walton, his great grandson, claims on his

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introduction gave Sarah Archer a more prominent role in the making of the dictionary and was therefore perhaps produced on her initiative. It identified, for instance, the previously unnamed “compiler” as “Mrs. R. H. Archer, a Life Member of Ottawa Diocesan Woman’s Auxiliary”; omitted are a pair of sentences which cast Peck as the originating force behind the dictionary and Sarah Archer in a bit part, coming in at the end to finish what he started.23 While the earlier introduction acknowledged Sarah Archer as “the compiler of the Indices and as the Amanuensis of Dr. Peck” and stated mildly that “her contribution has been invaluable”, Bishop Lloyd’s revised version more enthusiastically described her as “the Sole Compiler of the Indices and the Originator of the Memorial Idea, [for which] she has the thanks of the whole Church in Canada”. Although the revised Introduction makes clearer some stages in the making of EED, such as explicitly mentioning the translated Erdmann given to Peck by Bishop Horden whereas the original does not, it obscures other contributions. The translator, James Laurence Cotter, is only named in the original Introduction, for instance. Still, it is the supplementary “History of the Memorial Dictionary (by Mrs. Archer)”, inserted with the revised Introduction, that gives the fullest account of the making of the EED. According to the “History”, in February 1921 Peck approached Sarah Archer, the President of the Ottawa Diocesan Women’s Association, with his old annotated copy of Erdmann’s Eskimoisches Wörterbuch plus three clean copies with blank interleaved pages. Peck was by this time nearly blind, probably from cataracts,24 and was wondering if someone from the Women’s Association could copy, by hand, the English translations and annotations from his old copy of Erdmann into the three fresh books in time for the July boat, which was to take some new missionaries up to the business website that “Mr. and Mrs. Walton together translated and published the first Eskimo–English Dictionary” (Walton 2010)). According to Laugrand 2005, Walton collaborated with Peck on his transcriptions and translations. At Peck’s funeral, Walton represented “the Bible Society”ʊpresumably the British and Foreign Bible Society, which printed some of those translations (The Globe 12 September 1924). 23 “The compilation was begun by the Rev. E. J. Peck, D.D., who however was called to his rest before the work was finished. The task was completed later by Mrs. S. A. Archer and others” (July 1926). Sarah Archer’s husband was the Reverend R. H. Archer, an Anglican minister who had served as a chaplain in the First World War (Kirkwood and Young 1922, 73). The ambiguous term “compiler” was also used for Sarah Archer’s role in preparing the memoirs of Charlotte Selina Bompas, wife of the First Bishop of Selkirk, for publication (Bompas 1929, title page). 24 Letters of 13 May 1920, 4 January 1921, Peck Papers VII c.iii., vii.

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Arctic. Sarah Archer and her husband, a retired Anglican minister, both as Mrs Archer put it “semi-invalids at the time”, rose to the task, completing two books by the July deadline. A magnifying glass was necessary to read the fine and faded writing. After her husband’s death, Sarah Archer finished the third copy and sent it to the Bishop of Moosonee (John George Anderson, the third Bishop after John Horden), offering to prepare copy for the press so that young Canadian monolingual missionaries need no longer contend with the German. Peck, as Sarah Archer noted, was “by this time in England, and had become absolutely blind”, which suggests that the idea of using the printing press, rather than continuing laboriously to make copies by hand, as had been the procedure for fifty years, was the innovative idea of the President of the Ottawa W.A. Thus, the Eskimo–English dictionary which resulted, published by “The Church of the Ascension Thank-Offering Mission Fund, Hamilton”, was in the main Erdmann without the German.25 As we have seen, some of Peck’s corrections to his personal copy of Erdmann were incorporated and some were not. Between the working copy of Erdmann and the publication of the EED in 1925, further corrections must have been made—and some of Peck’s vetoed—by three “experts” named as consultants in both versions of the introduction: an anthropologist, a missionary, and a Hudson’s Bay man were consulted on doubtful points.26 Yet most of the content and even the formatting of the EED derive directly from the copy of Erdmann owned by Peck which became Sarah Archer’s copytext. To anyone who casually opens a copy of the EED, one of its initially puzzling features is the division of the double columns of entries into short blocks of text, headed A—1, B—1, A—2, B—2, A—3, and so on. This is a fossil of the annotated and interleaved Erdmann. The translator labelled the two columns of headwords in Erdmann with the letters A and B, numbering the words in each column, to correspond to two columns of numbered translations on the opposite interleaved page. The printed Eskimo–English dictionary preserved not only the labelled columns (and the pagination) of 25

EED manages to preserve some Germanic features even with the excision of the German language, such as in the entry for attigivok, which gives a stilted English translation preserving German word order, “He also has it put on” (41). The connection of the Hamilton, Ontario parish with the publication of the dictionary is another still submerged thread in the story of its making. 26 The experts were “D. Jenness, Esq., M.A. (Oxon), the Rev. A. L. Fleming, L. Th., and Donald Gillies, Esq., of the Hudson’s Bay Company” (September 1925 Introduction). The honorifics were no doubt included to suggest the authoritative scholarliness of a publishing endeavour which was, in fact, largely the work of a well-meaning parish lady with no knowledge of Inuktitut.

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its copytext in its own divisions and headings of text, but also the numbering of words, which begins anew under each heading A—1, B—1, A—2 etc. Yet Sarah Archer also attempted to go beyond merely reproducing Peck’s working copy of Erdmann by compiling indices which were to supply the place of an English–Eskimo dictionary. There was both a general index and a “Special Index” organized into taxonomic headings and subheadings on such subjects as “Driving Dogs”, “Noise”, and “Sin”. How useful Sarah Archer’s indices would have been to anyone using the dictionary to translate English into Inuktitut must remain a question. Browsing in the Eskimo–English part of the dictionary, for instance, one finds that the word used by Inuit for blood soup is also used for coffee, kajok. Yet if one starts from the entry “coffee” in the general index, it sends one to kablunaripok, which is translated as “It smells of Europeans”. On the other hand, if you want any Inuktitut words for “blood”, there are no entries at all for this word in the English indices. Still, the smell of the lamp hangs over the indices just as the phantom traces of Peck’s annotated Erdmann haunt the dictionary as a whole. Seeing the EED into print was clearly an immensely laborious task for Sarah Archer. Peck’s Erdmann was literally falling apart when she received it, and it was rebound under her direction, as notes on page order to the binder in her hand demonstrate. Also in her hand is a note, still preserved with Peck’s Erdmann in the National Library of Canada, which reads: This is the very book Bishop Horden gave to Dr Peck when he first went North is all I had to go on.27

The underlinings convey Sarah Archer’s sense of heroic accomplishment in preserving a useful artefact of pioneering missionary work in the Arctic. The note also suggests that there was no great Eskimo–English dictionary in the making apart from Peck’s pragmatic use of Erdmann. Sarah Archer was keen to assign credit where credit was dueʊunderstandably, after her Herculean labours. On the title page of the copy of EED which she inscribed and presented to Archibald Fleming (with revised introduction and her supplementary “History of the Memorial Dictionary”), Archer carefully crossed out “by” Edmund J. Peck, and wrote instead, “In honour of”.

27

Another accompanying note gives the provenance of Peck’s Erdmann, which is: “Bishop Horden, Rev. E.J. Peck, Mrs. R.H. Archer, Edward Archer, Sue Mitchell. Acquired Mar. 2004”.

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Figure 16.4: Copy of EED presented by Sarah Archer to Archibald Fleming (Circumpolar Library, University of Alberta, PM50 Z5 P357 1925 c. 1).

When Edmund Peck heard of Sarah Archer’s work in progress, he responded to news of this project with an encouraging letter from England but died before it was completed (“History of the Memorial Dictionary”). Peck died on 10 September 1924 in Ottawa. On 2 October 1924, John G. Anderson, the Bishop of Moosonee, wrote to his widow Sarah Peck:

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You will be glad to hear that the General Synod has appointed a Special Committee to see that your dear husband’s Eskimo Dictionary which Mrs Archer has just completed is published as his memorial as soon as possible.28

The Eskimo–English Dictionary, then, was explicitly published as a memorial to Edmund Peck. Yet despite this explicitness, and despite the fact that, in addition to Peck, a whole crowd of word-workers put their labour into this bookʊfrom the unnamed and unacknowledged Labrador Inuit who helped Friedrich Erdmann gain his expertise in the first place to the active parish lady who saw it to the pressʊthe Eskimo–English Dictionary has persisted, from the moment of its publication, in being represented as the authoritative work of one heroic missionary lexicographer.29 This distorted representation covered a much more complex story. What if it had been otherwise? What if the derivative, pragmatic, collaborative nature of this dictionary had been recognized and acknowledged from the start? That might have made it more of an “open” dictionary, receptive to revision, criticism, renewalʊespecially perhaps by indigenous speakers. As it was, the time of the dictionary’s publication, the 1920s, marked the beginning of a shameful history of institutionalized language extinction, forced on the First Nations of Canada by the newly compulsory, church-run residential schools.30 If the Eskimo–English dictionary was received, and continues to be received, as the crowning achievement of a dead missionary’s authority and expertise, as belonging to one man, then it is indeed a monument, a tomb for the living languages and cultures of the Inuit.

28

Peck Papers, VII h.xxviii, continuing “It will be a most useful work and our young missionaries will rejoice to have it.” 29 An article in The Globe for 12 September 1924, two days after Peck’s death, celebrated his heroic missionary work (noting especially the famous sealskin church eaten by dogs) and noted that “the last few years of his life were devoted to the making of an Eskimo grammar and dictionary for his people.” 30 For personal testimonies of forced language extinction, see Jaine 1995.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN LEGACIES OF THE EARLY MODERN ENGLISH DICTIONARY MICHAEL ADAMS

Any urge to make a dictionary on historical principles is surely a symptom of pathological optimism. Still, there are plenty of completed historical dictionaries to define and illustrate the genre, so one might not bother with the Early Modern English Dictionary (EMED), ostensibly a twice-failed project of the University of Michigan, first under the direction of Charles Carpenter Fries from 1928–1940, second under Richard W. Bailey, Jay L. Robinson, and James W. Downer’s leadership from roughly 1967–1975. Printed specimens of EMED appeared in 1932 (the entry sonnet) and around 1937 (the ranges L–LEE and A–ATR).1 Further 1

The 1932 specimen is reproduced in Bailey 1980, 205–206. I refer to the later specimens as “the 1937 specimens” for convenience. The principles for editorial work were laid down in Fries’ 1936 decisions, and specimens were afterward prepared for part of L and for A. As Bailey (1980, 216) notes, the EMED published the L specimen in 1937, and as I note below, this was in concert with the MED, which also published an L specimen in 1937. Then, as a result of criticism leveled at the L specimen, Bailey reports (loc. cit.), the EMED produced the A specimen, the date of which is somewhat unclear. In a letter to Kenneth Sisam, then Secretary to the Delegates of the Oxford University Press, dated 19 July 1939, Thomas Knott, Editor of the MED, wrote that he had been “authorized by the Dictionary Committee [at the University of Michigan] to instruct you to break up the type for the A material of the Early Modern English Dictionary after taking galley proofs of it in its present form” (OUPA, dropped file 4665, quoted here by permision of the Secretary to the Delegates of Oxford University Press). So, one may reasonably assume, the A specimen was in print no later than 1938 and was probably in part prepared before the EMED switched to it exclusively from L in 1937, since it is incredible that the EMED staff could have prepared most of A from scratch in just one year. In the letter quoted above, Knott asked Sisam to send ten copies of the galley proofs to Michigan, but Richard W. Bailey owns the only known extant

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materials from it were published in 1975 (MEMEM: see below), but no volume or fascicle was ever completed. It would be a mistake, I think, to view the EMED as a failure except in a narrowly conventional sense, because a consideration of the EMED’s legacies serves not only as a basis to reevaluate that project, or further to reevaluate projects in some way, directly or tenuously, related to it, or, indeed, to induce someone to attempt its completion yet a third time, but also to develop an accommodating historiography of historical lexicography, one in which we do not overlook notable and informative success just because we have fixed on completion of a dictionary as an essential measure of success for a dictionary project. Though continuously incomplete, the EMED exerted remarkable influence on at least three historical dictionary projects: the Middle English Dictionary (MED), the Dictionary of American Regional English (DARE), and the Dictionary of Old English (DOE). The character of influence in each case was quite different from the others. Influence of the EMED on the MED was both direct and indirect, depending on the decade. In the 1930s, the MED deferred to the EMED and picked up a number of its bad habits. In 1945, Hans Kurath reviewed the MED of his immediately preceding editors—printed specimens, editorial guides, correspondence—and rejected it. Kurath’s reaction to the EMED’s unfortunate influence figured significantly in shaping his MED, the one whose first fascicle appeared in print to much acclaim in 1952 and was at long last completed in 2001.2 DARE also adapted some of the EMED’s putatively bad practices, but, in the context of a dictionary with quite different purposes, materials, and methods from both the MED and EMED, these adaptations were not only appropriate, but evidence (should we need it) of Frederic G. Cassidy’s lexicographical insight and art. The EMED’s influence on the DOE was of a quite different nature. As they developed their plan, editors of the DOE discussed it with a wide network of scholars of Old English and lexicographers, but prominent among these were lexicographers with ties to the first and second iterations of the EMED. We have some reason to believe that the DOE owes some of its success to that conversation and to both DARE and the second iteration of the EMED, as examples of outstanding lexicographical practice.

copy of the 1937 specimens; he kindly allowed me to borrow and study it, and I am grateful for permission to quote it here. 2 Or, one might consider the MED complete with publication of the fully revised Plan and bibliography (R. E. Lewis, Williams, and Miller 2007), but the A–Z text was complete at the earlier date.

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The EMED was one of several historical dictionaries William A. Craigie had proposed in an address to the Philological Society in 1919 (Craigie 1919/1931). Fries worked hard to capture the EMED for Michigan and he proved a serious and adventurous lexicographer, though his experiments in historical lexicography were, in my opinion, often wrong-headed. Richard W. Bailey identifies two of Fries’ “innovations”. First, Fries proposed to include a section of ambiguous quotations in some entries, in order, as he put it in one of his “decisions”, or editorial guidelines, of 1936, “to explain a transition in meaning … demonstrate the existence and range of double or unspecialized meanings … or to oppose recorded judgments that have given either wrongly specialized or too specialized meanings”. Second, Fries proposed, “experimentally for the present”, as he wrote in his 1936 “decisions”, to include a section of “contemporary comments” in entries where such would “throw particular light upon meanings, range of use, or attitude toward the word and its various uses”. That is, Fries had invented a category of encyclopedic material for his entries: “These contemporary comments are to be regarded not solely as evidence of meaning or use but as the explicit thought of the people of the time concerning their own language.” Fries had an unfortunate tendency towards encyclopedic treatment of Early Modern English lexis (see Bailey 1980, 207). In 1932, he presented a brief specimen of his work to public scrutiny, the entry for sonnet. As a head-note to section IV of the entry, titled “Ambiguous Instances,” explains, “In many quotations it is impossible to determine the precise meaning of the word sonnet, for the same writer sometimes uses the word in all three of its major senses” (reproduced Bailey 1980, 206). Most historical lexicographers would define from those quotations in which meaning was precise enough to have defining value, but Fries preferred to explain rather than define. As he wrote in his editorial guidelines, “In all cases the points at issue should be explained in lieu of the usual definitions of meaning.” Similarly, if the EMED specimens of 1932 and later are good evidence, what Fries called “contemporary comments” illustrate cultural phenomena related to the word in question, but not the word per se—the comments aren’t about words so much as the “things” they supposedly represent.3

3

The notion of “contemporary comments” is not to be dismissed out of hand, however, and proponents of “folk linguistics” (for instance Niedzielski and Preston 2003) might see in Fries’ approach an early attempt at recording perception of lexical phenomena, “the explicit thought of the people of the time concerning their own language”, in addition to usage conventionally illustrated by quotations.

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Often Fries and his colleagues wrote encyclopedic notes of a kind generally avoided in historical lexicography, or would even adulterate definitions with encyclopedic passages. Besides the thirteen-line note on “Ambiguous Instances,” the sonnet entry begins with a twenty-one-line note from which we learn, among other things, that, though sonnet entered English in the fourteenth century, Chaucer never used it, and that “English use of the word sonnet to indicate a 14-line poem, each line consisting of 5 accents and riming according to certain fixed patterns, begins in the 16th c[entury] after Wyatt’s imitations of Italian verse” (reproduced Bailey 1980, 205)—good material for an “Oxford companion to lyric poetry,” but not for a dictionary on historical principles, especially since NONE of the quotations illustrating this sense of sonnet, sense II.3 in the specimen, actually provides evidence of “A poem strictly limited to fourteen iambic pentameter lines [note that this is even more prescriptive than the head note], riming according to a conventional scheme.” Rather, the quotations illustrate uses of sonnet contiguous within a book to one or more fourteenline poems; they are accompanied by bracketed editorial notes like “[10 poems, all sonnets in the modern sense]”, which simply beg the definition. Other uses of sonnet are contiguous to poems with more or fewer than fourteen lines, but there is no indication that those quoted in EMED distinguish between lyric poems of one length versus another. The editors invented the sense division ex post facto from what might well be ambiguous instances—arguably ALL of the quotations about literary form in the sonnet entry are ambiguous. The 1932 specimen met with disapproval from Oxford University Press and its consultants (Bailey 1980, 212), and, in the much larger specimen containing the range A–ATR, probably published in 1938, I have found no vestige of Ambiguous Instances or Contemporary Comments. Nevertheless, Fries and his editors were unable to resist the encyclopedic temptation. In the entry for apple, for instance, far from stopping after observing, 1.a, that apple means “The fruit of any tree of the genus Malus,” they observe that the many varieties were “derived from the wilding [a term that would not be entered in the EMED] or crab [a term, the boldface tells us, that would] (M. Sylvestris) and were propagated chiefly from seed or grafts upon it or the Dwarf paradise apple (M. s. paradisiaca).” Since, until the advent of genetic engineering, apples propagated only by seed or graft, the note is at best superfluous; and since notes on the same subjects in the current Oxford English Dictionary Below, I suggest that Cassidy adapted the notion of “contemporary comments” to the special purposes of DARE.

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(OED3) are more circumspect about origins and identify different original species, it may well be in error. To be fair to the EMED, in entries for folk terms for flora and fauna, the OED, throughout its history, often has been more annotative than in entries for other types of words. The notes in OED3 s.v. apple are much better than those in the EMED, on the principle that, if one turns encyclopedic, the material should be as brief, correct, and lexically relevant as possible. To be even fairer, OED3’s entry for apple was revised in June 2008: the original OED entry for apple involved less editorial supposition, but better botanical knowledge warrants a more informative entry. The EMED’s encyclopedic tendencies tempted the MED into a similar fall from graceful lexicography. In 1936, even as the EMED was preparing a specimen which included the range L–LEE, the MED was preparing its first specimen (published in 1937), covering L–LAIK.4 Editors from the two dictionaries working in the early Ls collaborated for some period of time, as Sanford Meech, one of the MED’s assistant editors, explained in a letter to Kemp Malone in 21 January 1938: Mr. Knott’s shortcomings in administration come partly from his ignorance of linguistics and partly from his lack of common sense. He tried out the procedure of having an editor of the Middle English Dictionary and an editor of the Early Modern one work at one word simultaneously with himself as arbiter” (quoted in Adams 1995, 155).

The first iteration of the EMED and Knott’s MED shared the same problems of defining, and, given Meech’s complaint, it is hard to see the similarities as accidental. The similarities, however, are clear enough. For instance, in the MED specimen entry for ladanum, the definition explains more than the quotations support and refers to texts mostly outside of the Middle English corpus: A bitter, aromatic gum resin, obtained from various plants of the genus Cistus. It was used in perfumes and in Medicines [sic.], esp. in internal astringents. Cp. Pliny Hist. Nat. XII.xxxvii, XXVI.xxx; Guyde [sic] Chauliac Chirurgie, ed. Nicaise, p. 649; Alphita, p. 89; and Sinon Bart., p. 27.

4

Copies of the 1937 specimen of the MED can be found in the Oxford University Press archives, dropped file 4665, and in the Middle English Dictionary archives, housed in the Bentley Historical Library at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

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None of these appears in the quotation paragraph, by the way, which includes material from Trevisa, Lanfranc, and Arderne with little defining value: “Take .. olium ladani & anointe þerewith his heed”, Lanfranc advises in his Cirurgie, but there’s no mention of perfume or internal astringents. Besides this encyclopedic tendency, Knott’s MED also exhibits the EMED’s tendency towards over-elaborate definitions, what Meech called unkindly in his letter to Malone “labored and often laughable definitions.” Meech pointed to several examples from the 1937 specimen, one of which was ladder: “An appliance of wood, leather, etc., usually portable, consisting frequently of two side pieces (stales, stalkes) crossed at intervals by rungs or staves upon which one steps in ascending or descending.” In fact, this isn’t so bad, for consider the OED alternative: “An appliance made of wood, metal, or rope, usually portable, consisting of a series of bars (‘rungs’) or steps fixed between two supports, by means of which one may ascend to or descend from a height.” The issue is to what extent the details are superfluous, arbitrary, and supported by the quotations subsequently supplied. Only from Firumbras and Chaucer, of the six texts quoted to illustrate the literal meaning, both dated around 1400, do we glean any of the material details of ladders mentioned in the MED definition. In the 1930s, the EMED and MED were both housed on the fifth floor of Angell Hall at the University of Michigan. Had the two chief editors been equal in stature and strength of personality, influence might have been reciprocal, bad examples might have been resisted. Knott, however, was no match for Fries. Fries was an overachiever, well established at Michigan by the time Knott arrived in 1935—he started as an instructor in 1921 and had been promoted to professor by the time he assumed responsibility for the EMED in 1928 (Bailey 1985, 2). As Richard W. Bailey describes him, Fries was robust and vigorous in all that he did. As an undergraduate, he was an enthusiastic participant in wrestling, fencing, football, and baseball. At a picnic in 1918 at which his future wife was a guest, he astonished her and others by ascending high in a huge tree to whose lower limbs he had reached by clambering up the twisted vines of a wild grape (Bailey 1985, 12).

Others, of course, would have relied on a ladder. Fries knew what he wanted out of the EMED, even if some of what he wanted was problematic. In contrast, Knott had no idea what he wanted out of the MED: every year he gave a paper at one conference or another

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outlining his firm convictions about how the MED should be edited, each paper arguing the opposite of the preceding and succeeding ones (Adams 2002a, 105–107). Fries competed weekly at water-polo, “his skill little diminished by age—until his eightieth year” (Bailey 1985, 12). Knott had an operation to remove his thyroid in 1942, after which, according to Frederic G. Cassidy, Knott appeared in the MED offices to announce, “I used to think I had a great deal of will-power; now I know I only had a gland” (quoted in Adams 1995, 180 n 53). Even with the gland, Knott found it hard to resist the authority of a character such as Fries, and it may have been rather sly and dishonest of Meech to have placed so much responsibility for editorial collaboration on Knott’s shoulders. Fries was clearly the senior and superior editor during the crisis that led to dismissal of Meech and Harold Whitehall from the staff of the MED in April 1938, because Meech had attacked Knott publicly, in the letter to Kemp Malone quoted above, and Whitehall had agreed with Meech’s criticisms; in the extant record, Fries’ comments are most frequent, most demanding, least forgiving of what he saw as Meech’s perfidy (Adams 1995, 172–173). His role as originator of the dictionary projects, his position in the university, and sheer force of personality allowed him to lead the defense of someone else’s dictionary, suggesting that, in the defense, something was at stake for him, that, in some sense, the MED was his dictionary, too. By 29 July 1939, the University of Michigan had decided to suspend work on the EMED and focus its resources on the MED, which is why Knott asked that OUP break up type for the EMED’s A specimen. But the letterhead on which Knott wrote tells a story about the distribution of power between Fries and Knott up to that point: on the left upper corner, the list of EMED staff includes ten names, starting with “Charles C. Fries, Editor”, followed by “Thomas A. Knott, Co-Editor”, then by “Sir William A. Craigie, Consulting Editor”, and “Hereward T. Price, Associate Editor”, etc.; the right upper corner identifies Thomas A. Knott as “Editor” of the MED and James F. Rettger as “Associate Editor”, the only two members of the MED staff remaining, after the departure of Meech and Whitehall, until several of the EMED editors were reassigned that year to the MED. When confronted with the impersonal printed text of a dictionary, one can easily overlook proximity and personality as factors in lexicography, but the relationship between the EMED and the MED, and the personalities of their editors, greatly influenced the MED, directly during Knott’s tenure, indirectly under Hans Kurath. When Kurath assumed responsibility for the MED in 1945, he reviewed Knott’s work and concluded that Knott’s approach had been

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more or less entirely wrong, that a worthy MED would be of a design more or less exactly the opposite of Knott’s. In a confidential memorandum to the University of Michigan’s Committee on Dictionaries, dated 15 November 1946, Kurath wrote, Knott’s editing plan, though never clearly defined or worked out in detail, marks a radical departure from Moore’s plan … [and] was ill-conceived and unfortunate. It attempted to do what cannot be done well. It did not square well with our resources and failed to take into account the extent of our knowledge in the linguistic field; on the other hand, it did not recognize the as yet insuperable limitations in our knowledge of semantics.5

I suspect that, in rejecting Knott’s lexicographical method explicitly, Kurath was rejecting Fries’ method implicitly, insofar as (and I am suggesting it was pretty far) Knott’s bad practice evolved from contact with Fries’ adventurous, wrong-headed conception of what the EMED and MED should be and do. Kurath’s response was systematic method and laconic expression, founded on a vaguely cognitive semantic “theory”. As he wrote in his editorial manual (January 1948), Giving the Modern English equivalents, i.e., translating into Modern English, will often be the briefest and most effective way of conveying meaning; hence this method should be given preference over definition whenever Modern English has an exact equivalent of the Middle English term. (§12.2)

For Kurath, always, the evidence was more important than editorial interpretation of the evidence: We must (a) choose the most effective method of conveying meaning and (b) accomplish this in the briefest form possible for the sake of saving space for quotations, on which our conception of the meaning is primarily based and which present the evidence to the reader.

In other words, prime the appropriate schema by offering a Modern English equivalent to a Middle English term, do not overgeneralize or

5

Kurath’s memorandum, as well as the editorial manual quoted immediately below, may be found in the MED archives at the Bentley Historical Library of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Materials in these archives are arranged by date, so are easily located and identified.

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overspecify meaning in the course of defining, but allow the user to refine his or her sense of a term’s meaning by studying the quotations. The result of this empiricism is just the signature quality of the MED as published under Kurath’s direction. So, ladanum is defined as “A resin obtained from a plant of the genus Cistus; ? also, an exudation from the beards of goats or from goat’s beard (Tragopogon pratensis) or some other plant.” There is no mention of ladanum’s application as perfume, for instance, which exceeds the evidence; but the quotation paragraph includes several from Chauliac, not included in Knott’s entry, that itemize elements (hyssop, goat’s beard, etc.) with which ladanum is muddled. The coordination of definition and evidence, then, confounds that tendency shared by Fries’ EMED and Knott’s MED to define according to what one thinks one knows, rather than what the evidence certifies. In Knott’s MED, encyclopedic definition takes up as much space as the quotations; in Kurath’s, the ratio of definition to evidence in the entry for ladanum is 1: 6. In the case of ladder, as one expects from the precepts in Kurath’s editorial manual, the core definition of ladder is “A ladder.” The nature and quality of Knott’s work depended on contact with the EMED, even if they weren’t outright determined by the EMED’s method in 1935, when Knott began to work alongside Fries. That method had progressed beyond the excesses of the 1932 sonnet specimen, but the extensive later proofs still exhibited Fries’ unshakeable encyclopedism. Kurath might well have arrived at something like his method without reacting to the MED’s 1937 specimen (or the not much improved 1940 specimen, the last gasp of Knott’s faltering tenure); he had adopted the empiricism that underlay his lexicographical method decades before, as he developed his plans for the Linguistic atlas of the United States and Canada. But it’s fair to say that the EMED figured in the MED’s trial and error. Accidents of history and interplays of personalities configure a lexicographical project and thus help to shape the product, if it’s published, too. If the project’s progress is a halting series of false starts, as was the case in tandem for the MED and EMED, the delay and re-evaluation of principles and practices contributes to the output. That contribution, though played out behind the scenes is, nonetheless, a legacy—of sorts. The EMED’s legacy was not always to stimulate reaction, however. In the case of DARE, the mode of influence was adaptation, instead. Frederic G. Cassidy, who planned DARE for decades and finally saw the first two volumes into print before he died in 2000, had been an assistant on the EMED and occasionally the MED throughout his graduate study at Michigan in the 1930s (he took his Ph.D. in 1938, so helped to prepare the specimens discussed above), and he returned to work on the MED in the

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summer of 1941.6 The question is, “What impression did all those years of immersion in Friesian lexicography make on his sense of what historical lexicography could and ought to be?” Of course, he probably left Michigan for Wisconsin with many ideas about lexicography, but here is a lasting one: he established the practice in DARE of including encyclopedic information in entries to good effect, motivated by the specific purposes and demands of the DARE he had in mind, the DARE that came to fruition. Four examples demonstrate the range of Cassidy’s encyclopedism. First, in the quotation paragraph for care “be willing, to be pleased”, we encounter the following, from the periodical West Virginia history: One of the most baffling expressions our people use ... is “I don’t care to …” To outlanders this seems to mean a definite “No,” whereas in truth it actually means “thank you so much, I’d love to.”

This is not a naturally occurring example of care in context; rather, you might call it a “contemporary comment” on care, one that admits the possibility of “ambiguous instances”. We have seen this sort of encyclopedic material before, in early versions of the EMED. In a case like clabber cheese “cottage cheese”, NONE of the citations is actually an OED or MED-style quotation; what we usually think of as a “quotation paragraph” compiles responses to the DARE questionnaire collected in fieldwork, as well as word lists and linguistic atlases. The “quotation” from the Linguistic atlas of the Upper Midwest (1973), edited by Harold B. Allen who, like Cassidy, had been an assistant on the EMED in the 1930s, reads: “Clabber cheese, a South Midland form and southern Atlantic coastal term, is reflected in the U[pper] M[idwest] with a few instances along the Des Moines River in southern Iowa and near the Missouri River in southwestern Iowa and southeastern Nebraska.” In DARE, it’s a “quotation”, but in the OED or EMED, it would have been a note at the head of the entry, whereas in MED, it would have been boiled down to a laconic “cf. LAUM 1.293.” The Linguistic atlas of the Upper Midwest provides similar evidence in many entries, for instance sv cook in sense 1 “brew coffee”: The dominance of make [coffee] is consistent with its status in New England … But its U[pper] M[idwest] dominance has been challenged by cook, a cognate translation from either the German or Scandinavian population. 6 For Cassidy’s biography generally, see Hall 2001. The date of his summer work at the MED is confirmed in Cassidy 1987, 22.

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These are sentences that clearly did not come from the mouth of what Kurath would have considered a “folk” informant and that, just as clearly, explain a contrastive dialectal phenomenon, rather than exhibiting use of the term encountered in natural speech. In the entry for cowfish, all quotations come from scientific sources: The American naturalist (1870), D. S. Jordan and B. W. Evermann’s The fishes of North and Middle America: A descriptive catalogue (1902), and the American Fisheries Society List of fishes (1960). Other historical dictionaries would be inclined to treat these sources as cross-references, as in the MED’s 1937 specimen entry for ladanum. No one would ever criticize DARE for doing what so obviously works, given its vocabulary, motives, and methods. But why do we praise Cassidy for encyclopedism and criticize Fries and Knott for what, on the face of it, is not only a similar approach to historical lexicography, but arguably an influence on Cassidy’s? Central to the difference between the EMED and MED on one hand and DARE on the other is the vocabulary each attempts to document and explain. The record of regional speech in Modern English is often thinner than that of general vocabulary, because what we used to call “folk speech” belongs to oral culture and is not usually in the way of documentation by others, nor inclined to document itself. Regional vocabulary contrasts with general vocabulary and the terms of contrast (phonology, syntax) are often difficult to describe on the basis of quotations alone; this is especially true if the dictionary doing the contrasting hopes to serve less scholarly audiences, as DARE certainly does. Kurath’s MED presents long paragraph quotations without comment, including “contemporary comments,” assuming that scholars using the dictionary can figure things out from the evidence, perhaps with greater authority even than the dictionary’s editors. Some of the examples I’ve provided here are extreme: generally, contextual illustration of use dominates encyclopedic intrusion in DARE (Adams 2002b, 379). We can assume that, when DARE presents encyclopedic material only, then there aren’t any other quotations in evidence, obviously not the case for the EMED and MED, especially the MED, since we find more quotations and minimal commentary in Kurath’s versions of entries once larded with Knott’s commentary or cross-references. Also, DARE draws on a remarkable variety of sources: the EMED and MED deal exclusively in literature, broadly construed, but DARE incorporates its own questionnaire responses, other material elicited in the field, a wide range of language scholarship, and the usual range of literature, too. Among these many varied threads of evidence, the encyclopedic thread is less visible than it was in either the EMED or the MED, but it nonetheless

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figures in the unique texture of the DARE entry (Adams 2002b, 372–378). Frankly, Cassidy’s presentation is a bit of lexicographical sleight of hand: there are no sections marked out to deal with current comments or ambiguous instances (as in the EMED), no list of learned cross-references (as in Knott’s MED), only encyclopedic material presented unobtrusively as quotations—when encyclopedic features aren’t presented as remarkable, often enough they aren’t remarked. DARE has proved innovative in various ways. Cassidy (1987, 25) explained, As to the use of computers, DARE is something of a pioneer. The project began in 1965—a date which, in computer terms, is virtually prehistoric. The machines were just emerging from their dinosaurian stage, still lumbersome, becoming pretty competent with numerical problems, but not yet at ease with alphabetic ones—and certainly, storage capacity was far behind what it is today. As DARE’s completed questionnaires came back from the field, they were coded by a platoon of student assistants, under the direction of Richard Venezky, so that every question, every response, every informant and the “social” facts about each could be individually recovered, sorted, indexed, and treated statistically.

Venezky, who, like Cassidy, was a member of the English Department at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, became the computing consultant to the DOE after sorting out issues of automation for DARE. It would certainly be a stretch to suggest that the EMED influenced the DOE through Cassidy, who learned nothing of automation while working on the EMED and MED during the 1930s and 1940s. Obviously, one assumes, the line of influence runs from DARE to the DOE. The line, however, is far from straight, and the second iteration of the EMED promoted the rise of automation in historical lexicography during the 1960s and 1970s, and especially the role automation would play in the DOE. “Interest in an Early Modern English Dictionary at Michigan was revived in 1965 when R. C. Alston … proposed to begin work on a Tudor Stuart dictionary” (Bailey et al. 1975, xix). Fries enlisted the help of colleagues in the English department, some of them, like James Downer and Jay Robinson, already established at Michigan, but one of them, Richard W. Bailey, freshly hired. Bailey brought with him an awareness of computing unusual for humanists at the time. He had attended “the Literary Data Processing Conference sponsored by IBM and held at their Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York, in September 1964” (Bailey 1982, 1; see also Bailey and Robinson 1970, 94), a year before he arrived at the University of Michigan. Fries died in

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December 1967, but he must have realized the value of Bailey’s unique interest, because “Exploration of the potential of the computer [for the EMED] was made possible through a research grant from the American Council of Learned Societies and through the hospitality of the RAND Corporation in inviting Richard W. Bailey to spend the summer of 1967 working with the computational research group” (Bailey et al. 1975, ix). In other words, the supernaturally robust Fries was keeping pace with Cassidy, and Cassidy’s attempts to automate aspects of DARE probably influenced Fries. Bailey’s interest in computing clearly antedated both the revived EMED and Cassidy’s role in the revival, but Cassidy undoubtedly supported Fries’ inclination to let Bailey see how far computing would benefit the EMED: “A conference held in Ann Arbor in 1967 gave further impetus to the project; former associates of Fries in the 1930s, including Harold B. Allen and Frederic G. Cassidy, expressed their enthusiasm” (Bailey et al. 1975, xix). Bailey and his colleague Jay Robinson continued to explore the value of computing to the EMED after Fries’ death, having received “a grant for computer-oriented humanistic research supervised by the American Council of Learned Societies (1968)” (Robinson and Bailey 1973, 13). Without overlooking Robinson’s contribution, one must conclude that Bailey was leading the team on the question of computing: besides the experiences mentioned above, a bibliography of statistical stylistics that Bailey published in 1968 with Lubomír Doležal includes a section on “Stylistics and the Computer” (Bailey and Doležal 1968, 80– 87), suggesting Bailey’s prescient investment in the role that automation of various kinds could play in humanities research, including historical lexicography. The Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of Toronto accepted responsibility for the DOE in July 1969, and soon thereafter Angus Cameron of Toronto and C. J. E. Ball of Lincoln College, Oxford, had agreed to serve jointly as editors of the dictionary (Leyerle 1970, 126). Cameron, Ball, and others committed to the project clearly had automation in mind when they organized a conference on “Computers and Old English Concordances” held at Toronto, 21–22 March 1969, but they were behind Cassidy and Bailey in thinking through the application of computers to historical lexicography. Bailey and Robinson attended the conference and presented a paper in which they acknowledged that, unlike DARE, the EMED faced a mountain of material that would be too costly (in 1969, but not necessarily today) to convert to machine-readable form, that automation had its limits (Bailey and Robinson 1970, 96–101). In other words, Bailey and Robinson had already taken DARE’s system of

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automation, insofar as it had been established, into account in their plans for the EMED, in advance of the Toronto conference. At the conclusion of the conference, Fred Robinson, of Yale University, suggested “that before this meeting completely dissolves, there should be some kind of caucus between Professor Bessinger, if he is still here, Professor Venezky, the people from Michigan, and the others to see exactly what form this Old English materials centre should take” (Cameron et al. 1970, 103), more specifically “that, after this meeting Professor [Laurence A.] Cummings [of St. Jerome’s College, Waterloo] and the Michigan people and Venezky and Dr [Philip H.] Smith [of the Institute for Computer Research in the Humanities, New York University] should get together and openly discuss the question of the computer co-ordinating centre and so on” (ibid., 109). In the first instance, the EMED exerted influence on the conception of the DOE at the Toronto conference and in the post-conference conversations called for there. The conversations continued well after the conference: Bailey served on the Modern Language Association’s Old English Computer Advisory Group (1971– 1973), thereby sharing the EMED’s growing experience of lexicographical computing with those responsible for the DOE.7 That experience proved to be more than usually relevant. By March 1972, the EMED had resolved to publish Michigan Early Modern English materials (MEMEM; 1975), a collection of data drawn from the citation file and illustrating the use of selected modal auxiliaries … Dissemination of the material will be in two forms: a collection of computer generated microfiche and a magnetic tape … It is hoped that the fiche collection will be of interest to scholars whose research interests take them beyond the data preselected for published dictionaries, the tape record useful to those interested in a large data base of EMnE for computer processing. (Robinson and Bailey 1973, 8)

The microfiche appeared as promised and are used by lexicographers and cited by historians of English to this day. In the twenty-first century, one can turn to the DOE online, but originally the dictionary text appeared on microfiche (1986– ), as did several ancillary publications, especially concordances, published throughout the 1980s, thus following the EMED’s example. One can trace DARE’s and the EMED’s influence on the DOE with some confidence. When the editors of the DOE held another conference in 7 This service is recorded on Bailey’s curriculum vitae, available at his Web page, .

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September 1970, Bailey and Robinson once again attended, this time joined by Cassidy (Frank and Cameron 1973, 2). In a session on “The state of computer concordances to Old English texts,” Venezky “proposed that a computer centre or archive be set up for the DOE” (ibid, 4), and Cassidy “report[ed] on his experience with computers and lexicography. He described the procedures and progress of the Dictionary of American Regional English” (ibid, 5). In the volume that followed on the conference, A plan for the Dictionary of Old English (1973), the editors, Roberta Frank and Angus Cameron, included Venezky’s account of “Computational Aids to Dictionary Compilation,” which cites Bailey and Robinson (1970), but not Robinson and Bailey (1973). That is, by 1972, the editors of DOE had conceived the role of computers in its production but not in its publication, progress in this regard following step by step the EMED’s announcement of its principles and practices. Fries’ EMED may have set an ultimately constructive bad example for the MED, but the second iteration, led by Bailey, set a very good example for the DOE. One should not overestimate the EMED’s legacy in this regard, for certainly other computer-proficient lexicographers, like Cassidy and A. J. Aitken, editor of the Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue (cited Venezky 1972, 311; see De Tollenaere 1973, 27) also advised Cameron, Ball, and Ashley Crandell Amos on matters of automation in the DOE’s early years. The EMED’s use of computers is undeniably both parallel and prior to the DOE’s, however, and the EMED’s influence is probably the preeminent one. And yet, the EMED’s legacies to historical lexicography are not exhausted. Besides its influence on the principles and practices of other dictionary projects, the EMED, in both iterations, engendered a number of subsidiary products; though there has never been a published EMED, there have nonetheless been many publications associated with the project. Some of these have done little to serve the EMED’s reputation, for instance, Hope Emily Allen’s two-part article (1935–1936) proposing various etymological relations among bug “insect”, bug “object of terror”, bogey “devil, evil thing”, and booger “nose mucus”, essentially all of which are untenable. (One could go into this at length, but a brief examination of the relevant OED entries sufficiently makes the case.) The first part of the article is subtitled, “prepared from the files of the Early Modern English Dictionary”; another article, “The fifteenth-century ‘Associations of beasts, of birds, and of men’: The earliest text with ‘language for carvers’” (1936), is subtitled “a note of the Early Modern English Dictionary.”

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While one could hardly justify the trouble of organizing the EMED or the cost of maintaining it for the sake of such articles, Morris Palmer Tilley’s magnificent, durable Dictionary of the proverbs in England in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (1950) alone nearly does. At 854 pages, Tilley’s dictionary includes nearly 12 000 proverbs recorded in Early Modern English texts, with variants of each illustrated by quotations collected and displayed on historical principles; the bibliography includes more than 2500 items; a “Shakespeare Index” indicates the relation of proverbs in the dictionary to some 3000 passages from the Bard’s work. Tilley was a member of Michigan’s English Department, justly admired for his earlier Elizabethan proverb lore in Lyly’s “Euphues” and in Pettie’s “Petite Palace” with parallels from Shakespeare (1926), and a prodigious collector of proverbs from the preparation of that book to his death in 1947. B. J. Whiting (1953, 30) explained the progress of the 1950 dictionary succinctly in his review of it: Tilley, after making extensive collectanea of his own, was named associate editor in charge of proverbs for the Early Modern English Dictionary, which had added the quotation slips from the NED [later OED] to its own. When it was decided to omit proverbs from the EMED the material was turned over to Tilley, so that the present collection was drawn from the stock of the dictionaries plus Tilley’s own accumulations.

Tilley’s dictionary did not exactly depend on his work at the EMED or on the EMED’s collections, for, as F. P. Wilson (1952, 192) noted in his review, it had “been long awaited” and “the labour of thirty years.” Nevertheless, he was allowed to exercise his paroemiological obsession on the EMED’s budget and benefited from continuous access to the EMED quotation slips. The result was, as John Crow (1952, 262) put it, “a Colossus among proverb-dictionaries.” The second EMED generated similar ancillary products, most notably MEMEM (Bailey et al. 1975), not only the collection of microfiche mentioned above, but also the accompanying book, which included a history of the project to that point; an explanation of the primary index, the secondary index, and the forward and reverse word occurrence lists; accounts of the project’s citation style and bibliographical style; and an extensive bibliography.8 Just after the second iteration of the EMED 8

As Bailey, Downer, Robinson, and Lehman (1975, xxxviii) explain, “Michigan Early Modern English Materials is a presentation of selected data illustrating the usages of a large number of words in the period 1475 to 1700. The data are arranged to give users access to the more than 38,000 citations constituting the

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concluded, Bailey added his Early Modern English: Additions and antedatings to the record of English vocabulary 1475–1700 (1978) to the EMED’s legacies. And, of course, there were the various papers on automation published in the course of the project (Bailey and Robinson 1970; Robinson and Bailey 1973; and Bailey and Robinson 1973), as well as contributions to various professional conversations, public and private, some of them described previously. While Tilley’s dictionary was more than an accidental outgrowth of the first EMED, it was not conceived as part of the larger project. By contrast, the second iteration of EMED included what might at first seem mere byproducts in the larger project’s conception: Fearing that the EMED project would once again lapse into long slumber we have sought to reduce high priority tasks to manageable and supportable size, applying the following general principles … The project should be designed in stages, each of which would constitute a satisfying whole yet still approach the goal of a full dictionary of Early Modern English; thus planning would need to remain flexible allowing a maximum range of options … The project should, in so far as possible, give presently active scholars immediate access to a useful portion of the information we have in the collection. (Bailey and Robinson 1973, 7–8; reiterated verbatim in Bailey et al. 1975, xxxii)

Of course, other dictionary projects had operated by versions of these principles: OED, the Dictionary of American English, MED, and the Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue were all published in fascicles, partly to satisfy the second principle above. In addition, the MED published its Plan and bibliography (Kurath et al. 1954), not only in connection to the dictionary but as a separate imprint (without the plan), given the value to scholars of such a comprehensive bibliography of Middle English texts, which made it too important to reserve until the entire dictionary had been completed—roughly fifty years later, as it turned out (Adams 2005, 703–704). Caveats aside, though, the EMED collection. Access to those citations takes four forms: The Primary index, which arranges citations chronologically within an alphabetized set of entry words—the Early Modern English verbs and verbal auxiliaries be, can (could), dare, do, gin, have, may (might), must, need, owe (ought), shall (should), and will (would); The Secondary Index, which provides access to all lexical forms stored in the collection; The Forward Word Occurrence List, which alphabetizes (in traditional order) each occurring lexical item and counts its occurrences; and the Reverse Word Occurrence List, which provides the same inventory but alphabetizes from final letter to first.”

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reconceived the scope of the historical dictionary project to include intermediary publications of the kinds described here. The influence of this example on the DOE, which actually began to act on the principles earlier than the EMED, in publishing the proceedings of the 1969 conference (Cameron et al. 1970), is also evident. The volume published soon after the 1970 conference (Frank and Cameron 1972) included Cameron’s bibliography of Old English texts and thus followed the MED’s example to some extent (see also Cameron et al. 1983). But the DOE never articulated the principles itself, and Robinson and Bailey (1973) had already presented the principles at a conference in March 1972, before the publication of Frank and Cameron (1973), so had conceived them even earlier. Robinson and Bailey (1973) also explained the role of fiche in production of the EMED in March 1972, so had also conceived all of that earlier than the publication of Frank and Cameron (1973), too. What delayed publication in EMED’s case was following up on that plan, which the editors did with MEMEM (1975). Michigan’s plans became Toronto’s plans: MEMEM became the model for all of the fiche-published concordances that developed out of the DOE. That is, the DOE reiterated the EMED’s reconceived scope of the historical lexicographical project and the extent to which it should disseminate lexical and bibliographical knowledge in the course of its work. The tradition thus established is an excellent example to all subsequent historical lexicography. As I have suggested elsewhere, “while the EMED remains in one sense a failed project, it nevertheless directly and indirectly produced significant scholarly by-products and established a culture of historical lexicography in America extending from the OED into the twenty-first century” (Adams 2009, 329). It might be more precise to say that the EMED played a central role in establishing that culture and, in spite of its putative failure, spoke consistently to the point in conversations among North American dictionary projects, not once or twice but, directly and indirectly, for over half a century. Consider the facts: Fries was supervised by two OED editors, William A. Craigie (who was Consulting Editor to the EMED) and C. T. Onions (whose reactions to each specimen of the EMED and MED were sought); Hereward T. Price, the EMED’s senior associate editor, had worked under Murray at the OED; Fries and Price worked alongside Samuel Moore and Thomas A. Knott, the MED’s first two chief editors; Price assumed transitional leadership of MED in 1944. While the EMED may, in some respects, have set a bad example for the MED, Kurath defined his MED in large part against the MED that took that example, after careful consideration of the archives of both projects up to the point, in 1945, at which he assumed the editorship of MED. Cassidy had learned

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his own lessons from Fries and Knott, lessons that distinguished DARE’s practice from that of other historical dictionaries. When Bailey and Robinson revived the EMED, together with Cassidy, and Harold B. Allen, and MED editors, notably John Reidy, who participated in both the 1969 and 1972 Toronto conferences (Cameron et al. 1970, x; Frank and Cameron 1973, x), they influenced DOE, not only with sage advice, nor even as a result of their shared interest in automation, but by the example of their ancillary publications. So, I suggest, “One may object that the EMED’s success was not equal to its influence, but we might reconsider the equation and decide that its influence was, in fact, its success” (Adams 2009, 329). We tend to take a teleological view of lexicography. The EMED’s greatest legacy is, perhaps, the anti-teleological example of its own process, an example noticed by other historical dictionary projects more quickly than by historians of those dictionaries. The EMED’s legacies are notable features of any history of the EMED, that is, of any attempt to understand the value of that project and the reasons for which it has failed twice so far, though we hope that the project will be renewed and finally come to fruition, the once and future dictionary. But my larger point is that a close look at the legacies of the EMED should inform the historiography of historical lexicography: though the EMED’s influence is sometimes barely visible in other projects, whether failed (like the early MED) or successful (like the later MED), the influence is there all the same, and though works published in the course of the project may look incidental in lieu of the major dictionary once imagined and promised, they are, in fact, all parts of the lexicography.

ABBREVIATIONS a C. M. S. Dan. DARE DCB DOE Du. DWB EED EMED Engl. FEW Fr. G Gk Goth. IEW Lat. MDu. MED MEMEM MHG MP ODEE OE OED OHG OI OS OUPA RP TLF WNT

ante Church Missionary Society Danish Dictionary of American Regional English Dictionary of Canadian Biography Dictionary of Old English Dutch Deutsches Wörterbuch Eskimo English Dictionary Early Modern English Dictionary English Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch French German classical Greek Gothic Pokorny, Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch Latin Middle Dutch Middle English Dictionary Michigan Early Modern English materials (Bailey et al. 1975) Middle High German Murray Papers (Bodleian Library, Oxford) Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology Old English Oxford English Dictionary [OED1, OED2, and OED3 refer specifically to the first, second, or current editions respectively] Old High German Old Icelandic Old Saxon Oxford University Press Archives Received Pronunciation Trésor de la langue française Woordenboek der Nederlandsche taal

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CONTRIBUTORS

Michael Adams teaches English language and literature at Indiana University at Bloomington. He is the author of Slayer slang: A “Buffy the vampire slayer” lexicon (Oxford University Press, 2003) and Slang: The people’s poetry (Oxford University Press, 2009), as well as co-author of How English works: A linguistic introduction, 3rd ed. (Pearson Longman, 2011) and co-editor of Contours of English and English language studies (University of Michigan Press, 2011), both with Anne Curzan. For some years editor of Dictionaries: Journal of the Dictionary Society of North America, he is currently editor of the quarterly journal American speech. Antonella Amatuzzi teaches French at the University of Turin, Faculty of Scienze della Formazione. Her research interests include the cultural and linguistic relationships between the old Savoyard states and France in sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and Middle French and pre-classical French. She has published articles on historical French lexicography and on Pierre Borel in particular, such as “Les ‘mots migrateurs’ nel Trésor de Recherches et Antiquitez gauloises et françoises de Pierre Borel (1655)” (Amatuzzi 2008) and “L’ancien et le moyen français au siècle classique: ‘le Tresor de Recherches et Antiquitez Gauloises et Françoises de Pierre Borel’ (1655)” in the Proceedings of the EURALEX Conference 2010. She is a member of AIEMF (Association Internationale pour l’Etude du Moyen Français). Since 2007 she has been a corresponding member of the Académie de Savoie. Sylvia Brown is Associate Professor of English at the University of Alberta, specializing in the literature and culture of the early modern period, especially as these relate to radical or nonconforming Protestants and women. She has a subsidiary interest in the language study of evangelical Anglican missionaries of a much later period in Canada, and in their reactivation of old ideas about language and authority. She has edited Women, gender, and radical religion in early modern Europe (Brill 2007) and has collaborated with John Considine in the editing of The ladies dictionary (Ashgate 2010).

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Julie Coleman is Professor of English Language at the University of Leicester, and the founding chair of the International Society for Historical Lexicography and Lexicology. She co-edited the proceedings of the first ICHLL conference with Anne McDermott, in Historical Dictionaries and Historical Dictionary Research (Niemeyer, 2004). She has published four volumes in her History of Cant and Slang Dictionaries, volumes I: 15671784 (2004); II: 1785-1858 (2004); III: 1859-1936 (2008); IV: 1937-1984 (2010), all with OUP, and is currently working on a history of English slang. John Considine teaches English at the University of Alberta. His monograph Dictionaries in Renaissance Europe: Lexicography and the making of heritage was published in 2008. He is the co-editor with Giovanni Iamartino of Words and dictionaries from the British Isles in historical perspective (2007) and the editor of the present volume and two companion volumes, Current projects in historical lexicography and Webs of words: New studies in historical lexicology, all published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Monique C. Cormier is a Full Professor in the Département de linguistique et de traduction at the Université de Montréal, where she has been teaching terminology since 1988. She is also Associate Dean, Faculty Affairs, with the Faculté des Arts et des Sciences. For the past several years, she has been researching French–English bilingual dictionaries from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries. Her research is funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. Dr. Cormier is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. Fredric Dolezal teaches at the University of Georgia; he has research interests in literary lexicography and the history of semantics and philosophical grammars, especially concerning the dictionary as text. He is on the advisory board of Lexikos, an annual published by the African Association for Lexicography. Most recently he has published articles on lexicography and World Englishes and on the early history of English dictionaries. He co-edited with Thomas B. I. Creamer Lexicography Then and Now: Selected Essays by Ladislav Zgusta (2006). He is currently writing upon Ogden’s Tooke’s Wilkins, a descriptive bibliography and analysis of marginalia written by John Horne Tooke and Charles K. Ogden in John Wilkins’s An essay towards a real character and a philosophical language (1668).

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Anne Dykstra is a lexicographer at the Fryske Akademy in Leeuwarden (Fryslân, The Netherlands). He was an editor of the scholarly Woordenboek der Friese taal (now available on ). He compiled the Frisian–English Dictionary (2000) and has published on the history of Frisian lexicography. His main interest is Joost Halbertsma’s Lexicon Frisicum (1872). Heberto Fernandez received his Ph.D. in Linguistics (Translation) from the University of Montreal, Canada. He currently works in the Department of Translation Studies at McGill University in Montreal, where he coordinates the translation practicum and teaches courses on Spanish translation, differential history of Spanish, and comparative stylistics. He has published articles on historical lexicography, Spanish and English bilingual lexicography, and translation. His book, Dictionaries in Spanish and English from 1554 to 1740: Their structure and development, will be published this year in the collection of monographs Vertere of the University of Valladolid. Peter Gilliver joined the staff of the Oxford English Dictionary in 1987, and is now an Associate Editor, engaged in the preparation of the Dictionary’s third edition. He is also researching and writing a scholarly history of the project from its inception, to be published by OUP, and has written numerous papers and articles on the Dictionary’s history and its contributors, including two papers in previous ICHLL conference volumes. He is the co-author (with Jeremy Marshall and Edmund Weiner) of The ring of words: Tolkien and the Oxford English Dictionary (2006). Giovanni Iamartino is Professor of English at the University of Milan, where he teaches History of English. His research interests range from English historical linguistics to the history of Anglo-Italian linguistic and cultural relations. He recently edited a collection of state-of-the-art essays on English linguistics. As far as the history of lexicography is concerned, he co-edited with Robert DeMaria Jr. a collection of essays entitled Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary and the eighteenth-century world of words (2006) and with John Considine Words and dictionaries from the British Isles in historical perspective (2007). Anatoly Liberman is a professor of Germanic philology at the University of Minnesota (Minneapolis). His interests include general and historical linguistics (mainly phonology and etymology), medieval literature and folklore, the golden age of Russian poetry, and poetic translation. One of

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Contributors

his long-range projects has been the production of a new etymological dictionary of English. Related to it are his books Word origins... and how we know them (OUP, 2006; paperback edition, 2009), An analytic dictionary of English etymology: An introduction (2008), and A bibliography of English etymology (2009), both by the University of Minnesota Press. R. W. McConchie is a University Lecturer and Docent in English Philology at the University of Helsinki. He published Lexicography and Physicke (Clarendon Press) in 1997. His current research interests include the history of medical dictionaries, the prefix dis- in Middle English, and early modern English lexicography. He is currently editing the sixteenthcentury volume in a series on English lexicographers being produced by Professor Ian Lancashire, and is the organiser of the HEL-LEX conferences. McConchie is compiling a catalogue of the early English printed books in the National Library of Russia in St. Petersburg, as well as a dictionary of Jane Austen’s language. Linda C. Mitchell, a professor of English, teaches Grammar, Early European Literature, History of the English Language, Research and Methods, Survey of the Classics, and Composition at San José State University, California. She is the author of Grammar wars: Language as cultural battleground in 17th- and 18th-century England (Ashgate 2001) and is currently writing A cultural history of English lexicography, 1600– 1800: The authoritative word (Ashgate) and an annotated edition of Milton’s Grammar for The complete works of John Milton (Oxford University Press). She is co-editor of Letter-writing manuals and instruction from Antiquity to the present (University of South Carolina Press 2007) and co-editor of The cultural history of letter writing (University of California Press 2010). She has published articles in the Huntington Library Quarterly, International Journal of Lexicography, Handbook of World Englishes, and Studies in Early Modern Philosophy. Kusujiro Miyoshi received a Ph.D. in Lexicography from the University of Exeter, England, in 2005. He is Full Professor at Soka Women’s College in Tokyo, Japan. His monograph Johnson’s and Webster’s Verbal Examples was published in 2007 by Max Niemeyer. For the past several years, he has been researching early English dictionaries, making presentations at the conferences of the ISHLL, DSNA (USA), and NAAL (Russia). His papers include “Gazophylacium Anglicanum (1689), a

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turning point in the history of the general English dictionary” published in Kernerman Dictionary News, No. 16. Laura Pinnavaia is a tenured researcher in English Language and Linguistics at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Milan. Her research interests in lexicology and lexicography have resulted in the publication of a number of articles, and two monographs: The Italian borrowings in the OED: A lexicographic, linguistic, and cultural analysis (2001), and Sugar and spice … Exploring food and drink idioms in English (2010). She is currently working on compiling an Italian-English dictionary of collocations. Laura Santone is a researcher in French Language and Linguistics at the Faculty of Letters, “Roma Tre” University. She is a member of the “Centre d’Etudes Italo-françaises”, of the University Society of French Language and Literature, of Do.Ri.F, and of the James Joyce Italian Foundation. She has published in the fields of discourse and dialogue analysis, and her interests also include relations between language and the anthropology of language. Another field of research is the investigation of vocal patterns in emotions and attitudes (with reference to the works of Iván Fónagy). She has directed the international conference « Les langages de la voix : Hommage à Iván Fónagy » (Rome, 12 October 2007), and she is currently organising for November 2011 the international conference “Le linguiste et l’anthropologue: modèles et expériences d’écriture”. She is the author of Voci dall’abisso: Nuovi elementi nella genesi del monologo interiore (Bari, 1999) and Variété (Rome, 2004) and the editor of Lingue/Culture/ Identità (Rome, 2007). She has recently published Egger, Dujardin, Joyce: Microscopia della voce nel monologo interiore (Rome, 2009). She is currently completing the collective volume I linguaggi della voce: Omaggio a Iván Fónagy. Thora van Male is a maître de conférences at the Institut d’Études Politiques de Grenoble (France). Her research interests focus mainly on the ornamental letter illustrations in dictionaries, and on matters alphabetical (ART DICO: À la découverte des lettres illustrées du dictionnaire; L’Esprit de la lettre: La vie secrète de l´alphabet, 2005 and 2007, Éditions Alternatives). Recently, she has published a book on the rôle French plays in English: Liaisons généreuses (Arléa).

INDEX

abbreviation (in word-formation) 188, 191 Adams, Michael xi n 3; as contributor xx–xxi, 290–308, 361 Académie française 7– 9, 11–13, 50. See also Dictionnaire de l’académie française Addison, Joseph 112–113 Aetius Amidenus 129 affixation (in word-formation) xviii, 105–107, 173, 177, 191, 203, 207–208, 211, 222–228, 363 Agha, Asif 187 Agricola, Georgius 138 Ainsworth, Robert 116 Aitken, A. J. 304 Akenside, George 130 Albert de Sisteron 46 Alberta, University of xxii, 279, 284, 288, 361–362 Albinus, Bernhard Siegfried 130– 131 Alexander of Tralles 127, 129–130 Allen, Harold B. 299, 302, 308 Allen, Hope Emily 304 Allendy, René Félix Eugène 258 Allot, Thomas 23 alphabetical order in dictionaries xix, 16, 60, 62, 148, 238 n 1, 257, 259 Alpinus, Prosper 141 al-RƗzƯ 127 Alston, Charles 130 Alston, Robin 301 Amatuzzi, Antonella, as contributor xiii, 45–57, 361

ambiguity, treatment of in dictionaries 2, 59–60, 65–66, 114, 122, 292–293, 299, 301 American Council of Learned Societies 302 American Heritage Dictionary 169 Amos, Ashley Crandall 304 Anauta, see Ford, Sarah Elizabeth Andrew, Best, et Leloir (firm of engravers) 161 Anderson, John George 286, 288 Arabic language 181, 241 Aramaic language 181. See also “Chaldaic language” Arbuthnot, John 103 archaisms in dictionaries 5, 11, 13, 16–17, 116 n 20, 119–120 Archer, Edward 287 n 27 Archer, R. H. 285 n 23, 286 Archer, Sarah 272, 284–289 Arderne, John 295 Aretaeus 130 Argyll, George Douglas (Campbell), eighth Duke of 220 Aristotle 82 n 1 Asclepiades 130 Ash, John 218 Austen, Jane 94, 363 Aventinus, Johannes 167 Avicenna 129 Aylwin, Bob 190 n 7 Ayto, John 190 Babelon, Jean 256 Bacon, Francis 59 Bailey, Nathan 96 n 2, 97, 101, 107 n 14, 217–218 Bailey, Richard W. 290, 292, 295, 301–304, 306–308

Adventuring in Dictionaries Baker, George 132 Ball, Christopher 302, 304 Baraga, Frederic 270 n 2 Barber, Charles 20 Barker, Ronnie 194 n 17 Barlow, Frederick 87–88, 91–92 Barnhart, Robert K. 183–184 Baron, Jacques 260 Barrow, John 126, 134, 138 Bart, Lionel 190 Barthes, Roland 160 n 7, 259–262, 264 Basque language 54–55 Bataille, Georges xix–xx, 256–268 Baudoin, Jean 156 Bauhin, Caspar 144, 148 Beal, Joan 23–24, 27, 29, 189 n 5, 198 Beattie, James 116 n 20 Belaney, Archibald 284 Berzé, Hugues de 7 Beaumont, Thomas, first Viscount Beaumont of Swords 26, 37 behaviour guides, dictionaries as 82–93 Bellenden, John 176 Berkenhout, John 128 Bertran de Marseille 46 Bessinger, Jess B. 303 Bible xiii, 60, 82–83, 92, 103, 111, 175, 177, 269–289 passim bilingual dictionaries xi–xiii, xx, 1– 13, 35, 64, 127, 247–248, 269– 289, 362–363 Bisset, Charles 130 Blackrie, Alexander 132 Blackwell, Elizabeth 147–148 Blankaart, Stephen 126 blending 191 Blicke, Sir John 145 Blount, Thomas xiv, 16, 107 n 14, 176, 217 Boas, Franz 274 Boerhaave, Herman 128–129, 140, 142, 146–147 Bompas, Charlotte Selina 285 n 23

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Book of rhyming slang 189 Borel, Adrien 258 Borel, Pierre xiii, 45–57, 361 Borges, Jorge Luis 58–60 Bormans, Jan Hendrik 241 borrowing, see loanwords Boswell, James 99 Bosworth, Joseph 245 Boyer, Abel xii, 13 Boyle family 43–44 Boyle, Richard, first Earl of Cork 23–26, 36–37 Braddon, Mary Elizabeth 229 Bradley, Henry 175, 181, 188, 225, 235 n 25, 236 Brouwer, Jelle Hindriks 253 Brown, Sylvia 17–18, 23, 35 n 12; as contributor xx, 269–289, 361 Bruant, Aristide 159 Brugmann, Karl 175, 177, 181 Bruno, Crystle 82 n Buchan, John viii n 1 Buckingham, John (Sheffield), first Duke of 58 n 1 Bullokar family 23 Bullokar, John xii, 14–22, 23, 34– 35, 37 Buma, Wybren 240–241, 244–245, 251, 255 Buñuel, Luis 266 Burchfield, Robert 235 n 25 Butler, Samuel 105, 114 Caesar, Caius Julius 251–252 Calepino, Ambrogio xi Cameron, Angus 302, 304, 307 “Canones lexicographici” 231, 234 Cardenal, Pierre 46 Casaubon, Meric xvi, 168–169 Cassidy, Frederic G. 291, 298–302, 304, 307–308 Castiglioni, Carlo Ottavio 243 Cawdrey, Robert xii–xiii, 14–22, 23, 34–35, 37, 97 Cawdrey, Thomas 35 Cecil, William, second Earl of Exeter 4

368 Celsus 127–129 Celtic languages 181 Century Dictionary 184–186 “Chaldaic language” 170 Chapelain, Jean 53 Chartier, Alain 46 Chaucer, Geoffrey 175–176, 293, 295 Chauliac, Guy de 294, 298 Chesterfield, Philip (Stanhope), fourth Earl of 97–98, 101 Cheyne, Charles 130 Children, John 202 Chrétien de Troyes 45, 48 n 5 Christine de Pisan 46 Cicero 9, 251–252 Clarendon, Edward Hyde, first Earl of 230 Clarke, John 35–36 Clarke, Samuel 24 Clauberg, Johann 165–166 Clifford, James 257, 259 Cnoop Koopmans, Wopko 243 Cocker’s English dictionary 107 n 14 Cockeram or Cockram family 25– 29, 32, 34–41 Cockeram, Henry xii–xiii, 15–16, 21–22, 23–44, 86–87 Coelius Aurelianus 130 Coiterus, Volcherus 131 Coleman, Julie, xxii; as contributor xvi, 187–196, 362 Coleridge, Hartley xvii, 231 Coleridge, Samuel Taylor xvii, 198, 201 Collier, Mary 101 n 8 Colmjon, Gerben 252 Comenius, Johann Amos 90–91 compounds and compounding 74, 168, 191, 203, 205, 207–208, 211, 214, 225–227 comprehensiveness of dictionaries ix, 12, 64, 77, 124, 178–179, 186, 190, 198, 214, 216

Index computing and lexicography 301– 304, 306 Concise Oxford Dictionary 180, 184–185 Considine, John 270, 361, 363; as contributor ix–xxii, 23–44, 362 Cooper, Thomas 28, 36 Coote, Edmund 16, 35 Coquillart, Guillaume 48, 56 Cormier, Monique, as contributor xi–xiii, 1–13, 362 Corominas, Joan 54 Corrozet, Gilles 46 Cotgrave, Robert xii, 1, 4–13, 54, 107 n 14, 173, 176 Cotter, James Laurence 277–278, 285 Coward, William 131 Cowie, A. P. xxi Crawford, Joan xx, 266 Craigie, William xx, 225 n 17, 292, 296, 307 Creamer, Thomas B. I. 362 Cree language 270 n 2, 274, 279 Crooke, Andrew 23 Crow, John 305 Crugge or Crudge family 33–34 Crugge or Crudge, John 33–34 Cuba, Jehan 49 n 6 Cummings, Laurence A. 303 Curzan, Anne 361 Czech language 170 Dale, Samuel 130 d’Alembert, Jean Le Rond 149, 152, 159 Dali, Salvador xx, 266 Dalzell, Tom 191 Dandieu, Arnaud 260 Danish language 168, 175, 177. See also Old Danish language Dark, Bodmin 194–195 Day, John 32–34, 37 definitions, brevity of 20–21, 50, 225–228, 248–253, 255, 266, 297; copied or adapted from one dictionary to another 15, 19–22,

Adventuring in Dictionaries 50, 132–144, 218, 246, 278; cultural or ideological material in 82, 92, 95–96, 99, 102, 111– 123 passim; encyclopedic matter in 19, 45, 120–121, 205, 248, 292–295, 298–301; glosses in another language variety instead of 52, 166, 239–255, 297–298; in Wilkins–Loyd “Alphabetical dictionary” 61– 78; juxtaposition of 260; “laboured and often laughable” 295; multiple meanings in single definition 6, 199, 207, 227; principles of 242, 247–255, 297–298; search for 59. See also meaning Dekker, Thomas 33, 209 Del Rosal, Francisco 165 DeMaria, Robert, Jr. 363 derivation (in word-formation) see affixation Desnos, Robert 260 d’Espezel, Pierre 256 de St Yves, Charles 131 Deutsches Wörterbuch xvii, 238– 239, 241–245. See also Grimm, Jacob De Vries, Matthias xix, 241–242, 244, 249, 254–255 dictionaries, analytic and dogmatic 169–170, 178; as museums 257, 259–260; as texts 362; bulk of xiv, 165, 182, 216–218, 221, 225–228; collaborative labour in making 183–184, 260, 271–272, 281–282, 289; “copious and careful record of the language” 210; consultants xii; escape the notice of literary critics 60; European tradition of 243; explanatory 239; “faisceau de plusieurs mots, peu de sentences, et moins de proverbes” 3; general and specialized 210; gesamtsprach-

369

bezogen 238; illustrations in xix–xx, 258–259, 266–267; interleaved xii, 12, 277–279, 285–286; lists of sources 45; “machine à rêver” or “à perturber” 259; no “new garment” 211; publication in fascicles 306; purpose of 164– 165; tediousness of making 58; wordlists and 275; words derived from proper nouns in xviii, 222–225; words only attested in xviii, 37, 106, 216– 218; written and spoken language in 100–101 Dictionary of American English 306 Dictionary of American Regional English xx, 291, 298–304, 308 Dictionary of Old English xx, 291, 301–304, 307 Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue 304, 306 Dictionary Society of North America 361, 364 Dictionnaire de l’académie française xii, 54–55, 257 Dictionnaire de l’ethnologie et de l’anthropologie 267 Diderot, Denis 149, 152, 159 Diefenbach, Lorenz 170–171, 174 Diensberg, Bernhard 184 Diez, Friedrich 176 Dioscorides 129, 138, 141 Dobson, Eric 184 Documents 256–268 Dodson, Moe 190 n 7 Dolezal, Fredric, xx, 198; as contributor xiii–xiv, 58–71, 362 Doležal, Lubomir 302 Donne, John 30 Doria, Perceval 48 Douceur, David 47 Downer, James W. 290, 301 Dryden, John 106, 112, 114, 122– 123 Du Bartas, Guillaume de Salluste 46

370 Du Bellay, Joachim 46 Ducange Anglicus 188 du Cange, Charles 176 Du Chesne, André 46 Dudley, Paul 136–137 Dujardin, Edouard 365 Dunglison, Robley 126 Dunton, John xiv–xv, 83–85, 91, 104 n 10, 361 Dupleix, Scipion 46 Dupuys, Jacques 47 n Dutch language xix, 53, 166–169, 173–174, 179, 238–255 passim. See also Middle Dutch language; Woordenboek der Nederlandsche taal Dyche, Thomas 101, 107 n 14 Dykstra, Anne, as contributor xix, 238–255, 363 Early English Books Online 1 Early Modern English dictionary xx, 290–308 Edmonton, Canada, lexicography conference at xxii Eekhoff, Wopke 240, 245, 247 Egger, Victor 365 Eighteenth Century Collections Online 101 n 8 Einstein, Carl 257, 260, 262 Encyclopedia metropolitana xvii, 198 encyclopedias and encyclopedism xiii–xiv, 45, 83, 91–92, 127, 205; see also definitions (encyclopedic matter in) Encyclopédie xv–xvi, 149–163 English dialect dictionary 176, 237 English language passim; and French, dictionaries of 1–13, 362; and Inuktitut, dictionaries of 270–290; and philosophical language, dictionary of 58–81; “central Anglo-Saxon patch which is the nucleus of” 178; “circle of the English language” 214; copiousness of 211; etym-

Index ological dictionaries of 165– 187, 363; “false Englishing” 3; Frisian roots of 244; general dictionaries of 94–125, 198– 212, 213–238; “genteeler part of” 97–98; German or Scandinavian influence on 299; growth of lexicon 200–206, 214; hard-word dictionaries of 14–23, 24–44; historical dictionaries of 291–309; ideal of lexicon totius Anglicitatis 214; in America 184, 196; international language xix, 255; medical vocabulary, dictionaries of 126–149, 202, 221, 363; mistakes to be avoided in 86; particles 35; phrases and idioms 35, 58–71, 209–211; pronunciation of 6–7, 11; role of French in 365; slang, dictionaries of 188–197; spoken standard 196; “true foundations of” 244; words “English in form” 219– 220. See also Old English language Epimenides 142 eponymy 191 Erasmus, Desiderius 270 n 1 Erdmann, Friedrich 272, 276–281, 284–287, 289 Erlebach, Alfred 228 Eskimo–English dictionary 269–289 Estienne, Henri 46, 270 Estienne, Robert 46 n 2, 47 n Estonian language 172 ethnography and ethnology 256– 260, 263, 265, 267, 274 Ettmüller, Ludwig 174 Ettmüller, Michael 139 etymology 45, 56, 304; American patriotism and 183; dictionaries of xiii, xvi, 22, 164–186, 198, 363 (see also Franzöziches Etymologisches Wörterbuch; Indogermanisches Etymo-

Adventuring in Dictionaries logisches Wörterbuch; Klein; Ménage; Partridge; Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology); etymological superstition 185; relation to subsequent sense of words 52, 54, 165, 199, 206–208, 231–232, 236; information about in general dictionaries 17, 46 n 2, 112, 128, 191, 226–228, 231–233, 250; of slang words 188 n 3, 191–192 EURALEX conferences 361 Evans, James 271 n 4, 279 Evelyn, John 64 n 9 Evermann, B. W. 300 Eyssonius, Henricus 131 Fauchet, Claude 49 n 6, 53 Fenning, Daniel 88 Féraud, Jean-François 45 n 1 Fernandez, Heberto, as contributor xi–xiii, 1–13, 363 Ferréol, Gilles 267 n 13 Ferrières, Henri de 49 n 6 Finnish language 171–172 Firumbras 295 Flamel, Nicolas 49 n 6 Fleming, Archibald 284, 286 n 26, 287–288 Fleming, Juliet 97 n 4 Flint, Maurice 271 n 3 Florio, John 12, 95–96 “folk linguistics” 292 Fónagy, Iván 268, 365 Forby, Robert 176 Ford family of eastern Canada and Newfoundland 282–283 Ford family of Devonshire 30 Ford, John 30–31, 33–34, 37 Ford, Sarah Elizabeth 282–284 Fordyce, George 130, 132 foreign words, see loanwords Forman, Simon 32 Foucault, Michel 58–59 Fowler, Rowena 198 Fracastorius, Hieronymus 144–145

371

Frank, Marion 249–250 Frank, Roberta 304 Frankenberg / Franklyn family 195 Franklyn, Julian 190, 195–196 Franzözisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch 52–54, 56 nn 13 and 14 Fraser, Edward 188–189 French language 166–167, 173, 175–176, 180, 203, 232–233, 244, 248, 252, 278, 361, 365; dictionaries of xi–xiii, xix, 1– 13, 45–57, 256–268, 361–362. See also Trésor de la langue française Fries, Charles Carpenter 290, 292, 295–302, 304, 307–308 Friesch Woordenboek 246, 251–252 Frisian language xix, 185, 238–255 Froissart, Jean 46 Fryske Akademy 363 functional shift (in word-formation) 191 Furetière, Antoine 45 n 1, 54–55, 257 Furnivall, Frederick 227, 232 Galen 127–129, 138 Gargnano sul Garda, lexicography conference at xxii Garth, Samuel 124 Gazophylacium anglicanum 364– 365 Géliot, Louvan 49 n 6 Georgia, University of 362 Gerard, John 148 German language xv, xix, xx, 164, 166–168, 170, 172–174, 176– 177, 179, 182, 185, 248, 255, 278 n 9; dictionaries of 164– 165, 174, 248. See also Deutsches Wörterbuch; Erdmann, Friedrich; Grimm, Jacob and Wilhelm; Middle High German language; Old High German language

372 Germanic language varieties 171, 181, 243, 251; medieval 52 n 8, 53 n 9, 56 n 13, 166–169, 177, 179, 184–185, 251 Gibbons, John 188–189 Gibbs, Henry Hucks 214 Giffard, William 130 Gillies, Donald 286 n 26 Gilliver, Peter, as contributor xiv, xviii, 212–237, 363 Girling, Herbert 275 n 7, 281–282 Glossographia anglicana nova 107 n 14 Godefroy, Frédéric-Eugène 176 Gooch, Benjamin 130, 132 Gothic language 166, 168, 170, 175, 186, 243, 249 n 9 grammatical topics in dictionaries xviii, 2–7, 10, 86, 228–231 Grand Robert 261–266 Graunt, John 103 Greek language, ancient xxi, 165– 169, 172–173, 177, 181–182, 186, 202, 226, 235, 243 Green, Jonathon 168, 187 n 1, 189 n 4, 192 n 12 Green, Rayna 284 Grein, Christian 175, 177 Grenville family 30 Griaule, Marcel 258, 260–261, 265– 266 Grieve, Michael viii Griffiths, Leon 194 n 17 Grimm, Jacob xviii–xix, xxi, 165, 169–170, 174, 181, 241–245, 247–250, 254–255 Grimm, Wilhelm xviii–xix, 241– 242 Gringore, Pierre 46 Grosart, A. B. 26 Grudé, François 46 Guez de Balzac, Jean-Louis 46 Guichard, Estienne 166 Gwilt, Joseph 216 Halbertsma, Joost Hiddes xix, 238– 255, 363

Index Halbertsma, Tjalling 238, 240, 246, 251–253, 255 Haller, Albrecht von 129–130 Halliwell-Phillipps, James Orchard 172 “hard words” in early modern dictionaries 3, 13, 16–17, 37, 62, 97 n 4 Harrington family 35, 37 Harrison, Lucas 2 n 2, 3 n 3 Harrison, Stephen 33 Haß, Ulrike 243 Haughton, William 32 Hausmann, Franz Josef xxi Hayman, Robert 30–31 Hebrew language 165–167, 171, 181, 241 Heister, Lorenz 128–129, 131 HEL-LEX conferences 191 n 11, 363 Helsinki, University of 363 Helvigius, Andreas 165–167 Henne, Helmut 249 Henry, Louis 159 Henshaw, Thomas 169 Hettema, Buitenrust 246, 251 Heyne, Moritz 241 Heywood, Thomas 33 Hill, Thomas 146 Hillersdon family 27 Hilman family 32 n 11 Hippocrates 127–129 Hirzel, Salomon 241 n 5 Hittite language 181, 186 Hoad, T. F. 180 Hoffmann, Friedrich 129, 131 Holland, Philemon 37 Hollier, Denis 258 n 6, 260–261, 267 Holthausen, Ferdinand 180, 182– 183 Holyband, Claudius xi, 1–6, 13 Holyoke, Francis 12, 64 Honnorat, Simon-Jude 52 Hooper, Robert 202

Adventuring in Dictionaries Horden, John 271 n 4, 276–279, 283 n 20, 285–287 Hore, Bartholomew 32–34, 36–37 Hore family 32 Hotten, John Camden 188 Houlston, Thomas 145 Howell, James xii, 1, 7–13 Howse, Joseph 279 Hull family 25–26, 42–44 Hull, Sir William 23–26, 30, 37 Hungarian language 171 Hunter, Alexander 132 Hunter, John 128, 146–147 Hunter, Robert 218, 224 Hutton, Charles 202 Iamartino, Giovanni 362; as contributor xiv–xv, 94–125, 363 Icelandic language 174–175, 177, 185, 249 n 9. See also Old Icelandic iconophor xv–xvi, 149–163, 365 idioms, see multi-word expressions Ihre, Johan 177 IJsewijn, Jozef xix “Indian” (i.e. Algonquian) languages 278 Indiana University 361 Indo-European languages 171 Indo-European protolanguage 169– 170, 177 Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch 169, 181 Institut d’Études Politiques de Grenoble 365 International Conferences on Historical Lexicography and Lexicology xxii, 362–364 Inuktitut language xx, 269–289 Irish language 174 Isidore of Seville 165 Italian language 9, 166–167, 365 James VI of Scotland and I of England 5 n 5 James, Robert 126, 137, 139, 141 Jameson, Robert 202 Jamieson, John viii–ix, 176

373

Jamin, Jean 258 n 6 Japanese language xi Japix, Gysbert 243, 250 Jenness, Diamond 286 n 26 Jensma, Goffe 246 n 7 Jenty, Nicholas 147 Johnson, Samuel xiv–xv, xvii–xviii, xx, 67 n 11, 92, 94–125, 126, 168, 197–200, 204–211, 216– 218, 270–271, 363–364 Jones, Jack 190 n 7 Jongsma, Pieter Anne 245 Jonson, Ben 122, 209 Jordan, D. S. 300 Jowett, Benjamin 213, 229 Joyce, James viii–ix, 365 Jucquois, Guy 267 n 13 Junius, Franciscus 167–169, 183 Kaltschmidt, Jakob Heinrich 170, 174 Keaton, Buster xix Kemble, John Mitchell 244 Kemmerer, K. N. 99, 109 n 16, 124 Kendall, Sydney 190 n 7 Kerckringius, Theodorus 131 Kersey, John 97 Kiliaan, Cornelius 165, 247–248, 249 n 9, 252–253 Kipling, Rudyard 193 n 16 Kirkland, Thomas 130, 132–134 Kirkpatrick, Betty 190 n 9 Kirwan, Richard 202 Kishimoto, Emi xi Klein, Ernest 180–183 Kluge, Friedrich 171, 174, 182 Knappe, Gabriele 63–64, 72 Knott, Thomas 290 n 1, 294–298, 300, 307–308 Kurath, Hans 291, 296–298, 300, 307 Labov, William 193 n 15 La Buigne, Gace de 49 n 6 Lacombe, Albert 270 n 2 Lacroix, Christian 158, 160, 162 Lagneau, David 49 n 6 Lancashire, Ian 363

374 Landais, Napoléon 156, 161 Landau, Sidney xxi–xxii Lanfranc of Milan 295 language, change in 8–9, 13, 31, 47, 49, 66, 200, 202; natural and philosophical 58–78; standard 8–9, 11, 13, 124, 188, 196, 239 Lantier, Raymond 256 Lares, Jameela 82 n Larousse, Pierre 161. See also Petit Larousse Latin language 166–167, 181; dictionaries of xi, xiii–xiv, 12, 15, 35, 64, 127, 165, 186, 250; “die bekannteste und sicherste aller sprachen” 241; difficulty or ease of understanding 239, 241 n 5, 242–243; difficulty of writing 246–247, 251–252; history of 9; international xix, 255; influence on vocabularies of English and other vernaculars 32, 121, 127, 165–166, 169, 181–182, 184, 202–203, 216, 232–234; learned and scientific language 127, 131–132, 144, 200, 239–241, 244; metalanguage xix, 52, 166–167, 238–255; readers of Latin literature xi; teaching medium 35 Laugrand, Frédéric 271 Lawrence, John 190 n 7 Le Dran, Henri François 130 Leerssen, Joep 241 Leicester, University of xxii, 362 Leiden, University of xxii, 247 Leiris, Michel 257–258, 260, 265, 267 Lemon, George 169 Lennox, Ludovick (Stuart), second Duke of 31 Leonardi, Natascia 59, 73 n 15 Léry, Jean de 54 Leroy-Turcan, Isabelle 50 Lespleigny, Thibaud 49 n 6

Index L’Estrange, Sir Roger 112, 121 Lévi-Strauss, Claude 258 Lévy-Bruhl, Lucien 256 Lewis, Arthur 273 Lewis, William 128–129, 131, 134– 144, 146 lexicographers, adventurous 292; and society 96, 124; Augustan and Victorian 199, 209; boring definitions by 241; constantly fighting ghosts 170; deserve to be generously rewarded xviii; full-time and part-time xiii, 5; heroic xx, 270, 289; innovative 209; must draw the line somewhere 214; myth of missionary 269–289; promise of superiority 85; propaganda by 82, 92; romantic 269; sense of personal identity xvi, 195–196; Sprachgefühl of 101; willpower of 296 Liberman, Anatoly xii n 4; as contributor, xvi, 164–186, 363 Liddell, Henry 213 n 3, 235 n 24 Linguistic atlas of the United States and Canada 298 Linguistic atlas of the Upper Midwest 299 Linnaeus, Carl 130, 145 Lloyd, George Exton 284–285 Lloyd, William xiii–xiv, xx, 58–71 loanwords 164, 175, 182, 191; treatment in dictionaries xviii, 17, 214–216, 232, 365 Locke, John 59, 102, 113, 208 Lofthouse, Joseph 278 n 12 Lommius, Jodocus 130 Lorris, Guillaume de 7 Loutett, David 274 Lübben, August 186, 244, 251–252 Lubbock, Sir John 228 Lucy, Adam 273–274, 276 Lulofs, Barthold Hendrik 245 Lye, Edward 169 Lyly, John 305

Adventuring in Dictionaries MacDiarmid, Hugh viii–xi Macmillan, Donald B. 282 Macquer, Pierre Joseph 129, 138 Malkiel, Yakov 164 Malone, Kemp 294–296 Manningham, Sir Richard 143 Marca, Pierre de 46 Marggraf, Andreas Siegmund 137 Marot, Clément 46 Marriott, Charles 87–90 Marshall, Jeremy 363 Martial d’Auvergne 46 Martin, Benjamin 101, 107 n 14, 126 Marx, Karl 260 Masnau, Guillaume de 48 Mason, William 279 Masson, André 257, 266 n 12 Mätzner, Eduard 174 Maubon, Cahterine 257 n 4 Maupas, Charles 10, 12 Maurer, David 190 n 8 Mauss, Marcel 256, 258, 265–266 Mauzi, Robert 160 n 7 Mayhew, Henry 188 McConchie, Roderick, as contributor xv, 126–148, 363 McDermott, Anne 99, 362 McGill University 363 McKay, J. A. 270 n 2 McNab, John 270 Mead, Richard 130 meaning, connotations 90, 108–109, 114, 120–122, 207, 264, 266; nuances of 248; primary and secondary 6, 113, 123, 199, 207–209, 234, 248; task and meaning of words 256–268. See also ambiguity; definition; etymology (relation to subsequent sense of words); polysemy; semantic change Meech, Sanford 294–296 Meillet, Antoine 181 Ménage, Gilles xiii, 46–57, 165

375

Mesue (Yuhanna ibn Masawaiyh) 130 Métraux, Alfred 258 Michigan, University of xx, 290– 307 passim Michigan Early Modern English Materials xx, 291, 303, 305, 306 n, 307 Micmac language 271 n Middle Dutch language 168 Middle English Dictionary xx, 290 n 1, 291, 294–301, 306–308 Middle English language 174–177, 179, 184–185, 187, 294, 297, 306 Middle High German language 168, 171, 175, 177, 186 Middle Swedish language 176–177 Miège, Guy xii, 8 n 7, 13 Milan, University of 363, 365 Miller, Joseph 147–148 Miller, Philip 128–129, 135, 146– 147 Milne, Colin 147 Milroy, Lesley 196 Milton, John 123, 224, 364 Minnesota, University of 363 Minsheu, John xvi, 165–170, 183 missionary lexicography xi, xx, 269–289, 361 Mitchell, Linda, as contributor xiii– xiv, 82–93, 363 Mitchell, Sue 287 n 27 Miyoshi, Kusujiro, as contributor xii–xiii, 14–22, 364 Molbech, Christian xxi Molucto, John 273–274 Monck family 30 Mone, Franz Joseph 241 Monet, Philibert 49 n 7, 56 Monro, Alexander 131 Montaigne, Michel de 46 Montreal, University of 362–363 Mooijaart, Marijke xxii Moon, Rosamund 66 n 10 Moore, Samuel 297, 307

376 Moréri, Louis 157 Morhof, Daniel Georg xxi Motherby, George xv, 126–148 Motherby, Robert xv Mounin, Georges 262 n 9 Mueller, Eduard 171, 174–175, 183 Müller, Friedrich Max 220 Muller, Jacob 241 multi-word units in dictionaries xiv, 35, 61–78 passim, 207–211, 250 Munday, Anthony 33 Murray, James ix, xviii, xxi, 174– 175, 181, 184, 212–237, 307 Murray Bakker, Lucius Columba 252 Muset, Colin 46 Naylor, John 26 neologisms in dictionaries 8, 12, 37, 97–98, 200–205, 208, 210–211 Neumann, Caspar 128–129, 131– 132, 136, 138, 143, 146 Newbery, John 86 New Sydenham Society’s lexicon 126–127, 221 New York University 303 Nicaise, Edouard 294 Nicol, Henry 233 Nicot, Jean xiii, 46–54, 57 Nind, Tom 190 n 9 Nisbet (alias Nesbit), Robert 131 Norman, Frank 189–190 Norwegian language 177 Nouveau Larousse (1949) 154 Noyes, Gertrude xxi, 14–20, 22, 24 Occitan language 46, 52 Ogden, Charles K. 362 Ogilvie, John 224 Ojibwa language 270 n 2 Old Danish language 166 Old English language 167–168, 174–175, 177, 185, 244, 249 n 9, 250. See also Dictionary of Old English. Old French language 45–57, 174, 179, 184

Index Old High German language 168– 169, 175, 185–186, 249 n 9 Old Icelandic language 166, 168– 169 Old Prussian language 177 Old Saxon language 168, 186 Old Swedish language 166 Onions, C. T. 181, 225 n 17, 307 onomatopoeia 171 Oribasius 130 orthography 7, 10, 46 n 2 Orwell, George 188–189 Otfrid of Weissenburg 169 Ovid 48 Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology xvi, 168, 173, 180– 181, 183–184 Oxford Dictionary of National Biography 23 Oxford English Dictionary 63, 69– 70, 173, 176, 178–180, 184, 186, 187, 188 n 3, 198–201, 203–204, 211, 238–239, 307, 365; 1933 Supplement 219 n 12; 1972–1986 Supplement 235 n 25; Additions Series 219 n 12; comprehensiveness 216, 231 n 16; condensed entries 225–228; current revision of xx, 201, 235, 293–294, 363; definitions of material objects 295; historical method of xvii–xviii, 231–235; making of ix, xviii, 171–172, 175, 212–237; medical vocabulary in 221–222; “Mod” quotations in 230, 231 n 20, 299, 305; need for new terminology 235–236; publication in fascicles 306; sources 201–202; treatment of derivatives of proper nouns 222–225; treatment of “dictionary words” 216–218; treatment of grammatical problems 228–231; treatment of incompletely naturalized words

Adventuring in Dictionaries 214–216; treatment of multiword units 67 n 11; treatment of technical and scientific words 218–222 Oxford history of English lexicography xxi Oxford, University of 182, 302 Oxford University Press 184, 212, 293, 296; archives 213 n 2 and 3, 215, 217 n 9, 224, 232 n 22, 290 n 1, 294 n 4 Palladius 177 Palsgrave, John 176 Papillon, Jean-Michel Baptiste xvi, 160 Paracelsus 49 n 6, 129 Pardon, William 101, 107 n 14 Parker, Joseph 275, 279 Parkinson, John 148 Partridge, Eric 180, 182–183, 189 Pasquier, Etienne xii, 7–8, 46 Patin, Gui 56 patriotism and lexicography 183, 248 patronage xi–xii, 3–4, 23–24 Paulus Ægineta 127–129 Peck, Edmund xx, 269–289 Peck, Sarah 288 pedagogical dictionaries xi, xiii, 1– 6, 10–11, 34–37, 82–93 Percival, Thomas 129, 132 Perriman, Thomas 36 Perrot d’Ablancourt, Nicolas 46 Peter, William 30–31 Petit Larousse (1910) 155 Petit Larousse (2005) 158, 162 Pettie, George 305 Phillips, Edward xii, 16 Phillips, I. 187–189 Philological Society of London xxi, 171–172, 212, 214, 220, 222, 231–233, 235, 237, 292 phraseology, see multi-word units Physical dictionary (1657) 126 Picasso, Pablo 258 Picken, Ebenezer xv

377

Pinkster, Harm 250 Pinnavaia, Laura, as contributor xvii–xviii, 197–211, 365 Pierre de Provence 46 Pisteolak, Peter 283 Pitcairn, William 130–131 plagiarism xv, 148, 218 Plantijn, Christoffel 248 Pliny the elder 130, 294 polysemy 9, 66, 76, 100–124 passim, 168, 207–208, 227, 230–237, 249–250, 280–281, 292 Pope, Alexander xv, 100 Popham, Sir John 30 Portuguese language 166–167 Pott, Percival 130 Powell, Henry 127 Prellwitz, Walther 177 prescriptivism 5, 10–11, 13, 96, 199, 210, 293 Price, Bartholomew 215 n 6, 215 n 8 Price, Hereward T. 296, 307 Pringle, Sir John 130 Promptorium parvulorum 176 pronunciation, Received 193, 196; treatment in dictionaries 2–3, 5– 7, 11, 13, 213 n 1, 215, 223, 227, 279 proverbs 3–4, 12, 35, 105, 172, 305 Przedlacka, Joanna 196 n 20 Puxley, Ray 191 n 10, 195–196 Pythagoras 142 Quincy, John 103, 126, 131, 134, 144 Quintilian 82 n 1 quotations in dictionaries xiv–xv, 52, 92, 101–124 passim, 127, 169–170, 172, 180, 197, 199, 206–211, 214–237 passim, 292– 305 passim Rabelais, François 46 Raleigh, Sir Walter 111 Ralph’s miscellany 120 Rand, Isaac 147

378 Rand, S. T. 271 n Rask, Rasmus 165, 169–170 Ray, John 128–129, 135, 141, 145– 148 regionalisms in dictionaries 5, 13, 45, 53, 55–56, 172–173, 176– 177, 204, 250, 280, 282. See also Dictionary of American Regional English Reg Kray’s book of slang 195 Reich, Zdenko 260 Reichmann, Oskar xxi, 248–249 Reidy, John 308 respelling 191 Rettger, James F. 296 revisions of dictionaries xx, 1, 7, 22, 24, 95, 104, 174–175, 180, 182, 198, 201, 235, 246, 294 rhyming slang 187–196 Richelet, Pierre 45 n 1, 54 n 10, 257 Richelieu, Armand Jean du Plessis de 10, 12 Richardson, Charles xvii–xviii, 197–211 Richardson, Samuel 101 n 8, 104 Rider, John 12, 64 Rietz, Johan Ernst 177 Ripa, Cesare 155–156 Riverius, Lazarus 131 Rivet, Paul 256 Rivière, Georges-Henri 256 Robert of Gloucester 112 Robinson, Fred 303 Robinson, Jay L. 290, 301–302, 304, 307–308 Roe, Sir John 30 Roelevink, Joke 239 “Roma Tre” University 365 Romance languages 164, 167, 178– 179, 181 Ronsard, Pierre de 46 Roorda, Taco 241 Roquefort, Jean Baptiste Bonaventure de 176 Rowe, Nicholas 108 Royal Society 61, 78, 131

Index Rulandus, Martinus 129 Russian language 164, 186, 363 Rutebeuf, 46 Ruysch, Frederik 131 Sacerdoti Mariani, Gigliola 198 Saczek, Russell 190 n 7 Saint Amant, Antoine Girard de 46 St Jerome’s College, Waterloo 303 Sallust 9 Salmon, William 147 Sanders, Daniel 172 San José State University 363 Sanskrit language 170, 175 Santone, Laura, as contributor xix– xx, 256–268, 365 Saussure, Ferdinand de 264 Scandinavian languages 171, 175– 176, 179, 185 Schäfer, Jürgen xvi Schaffner, André 258 Schwenck, Konrad 170–171, 174 scientific terms, see technical and scientific terms Scots language viii, xv, 176. See also Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue Scott, Charles P. G. 186 Scott, Derek 192–193 Scott, Joseph Nicol 101 Scott, Sir Walter 201 Scudery, Georges de 12 Sedgwick, Leonard 127 Seguin, Pierre 160 n 7 semantic change 8–9, 65, 105, 107, 114, 120–123, 164–186 passim, 191–192, 199, 231–235 Semitic languages 181 Severinus, Marcus Aurelius 130 Shakespeare, William 105, 111– 113, 115, 117, 121, 123 n 27, 176, 202, 209, 216, 305 Sharp, Samuel 129 Shebbeare, John 130 Shelley, Percy 229 Sherwood, Robert xii, 1, 4–7, 11, 13

Adventuring in Dictionaries Shorter Oxford English Dictionary 184 Sibbald, James 176 Sidney family 26, 37 Sidney, Sir Philip 25, 113 Sievers, Eduard 174 Simpson, George 278 Simpson, John 18 Sisam, Kenneth 290 n 1 Skeat, W. W. xvi, 171, 174–178, 180, 182–185 Skinner, Stephen 165, 167–170, 183 slang xvi, 159, 172, 187–196, 361– 362 Slavic languages, dictionaries of 164 Slofstra, Bouke 239 n 1 Smellie, William 130 Smith, Andrea T. 82 n Smith family 30 Smith, Sir Nicholas 29–31, 33–34 Smith, Philip H. 303 Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada xxii, 362 Soka Women’s College, Tokyo 364 Somner, William 167–169 Southey, Robert 201, 236 Spanish language 9, 55 n 12, 166– 167; dictionaries of 54, 165, 363 spelling dictionaries xiv, 86 Spenser, Edmund 106 n 13, 116 n 20 Spicer family 31 Spicer, Thomas 31–34, 36–37 Sprat, Thomas 102 Starnes, DeWitt T. xxi, 14–20, 22, 24 Stein, Gabriele xxi, 14–15 Steinmetz, Sol 183–184 Stone, Lawrence 110 n 17 Strashley, Elizabeth 23, 29 Strashley family 29 Stratmann, Francis Henry 175 Stuart, Bérault 49 n 6 Stubbs, Michael 75–76

379

substrates 183 Swan, John 131 n 1 Swedish language 170, 175. See also Middle Swedish language and Old Swedish language Swift, Jonathan xv, 100, 104, 109, 114 Sybrandy, Sybren 239 n 1, 240, 244, 247, 251–253 Sydenham, Thomas 128–129, 131 n 1 Sykes, William 221 Tabourot des Accords, Etienne 46 Tatian 169 Taylor, Jeremy 117 technical and scientific terms in dictionaries xviii, 12, 48, 181, 183, 202, 205, 210–211, 214– 215, 218–222, 225–226, 300 Telting family 246 thesauruses 165, 169 Thibaut de Champagne 46 Thomas, Thomas 15–16 Thomson, John 170–171 Tibball, Geoff 194 Tilley, Morris Palmer xx, 305–306 Tocharian language 181 Todd, H. J. 204 Tolkien, J. R. R. 363 Tooke, John Horne 207, 362 topical order in dictionaries 7, 11, 35, 61 n 5, 67; topical index to dictionary 287 Topsell, Edward 224 Toronto, University of 302 Torriano, Giovanni 12 Tournefort, Joseph Pitton de 129, 141, 148 Tourval, Jean de L’Oiseau de 4–5, 7, 10 Trench, Richard Chenevix 198, 211, 219–220 Trésor de la langue française 55 n 12, 261–266 Trevisa, John 295 Turin, University of 361

380 Turkish language 54 Tutchone language 271 n Twain, Mark 183 typographical features of dictionaries xiv, 11, 149, 157– 158, 215–216, 286–287 Uc de Saint Circ 46 users and readers of dictionaries viii, xi, xiii–xiv, xvi, 5–6, 11, 62, 68, 73–74, 97, 115, 127, 165, 174, 179, 192, 195, 207, 248–251, 260–261, 298 Valladolid, University of 363 Van der Myl, Abraham 166 Van der Sijs, Nicoline 241, 247 Van der Wal, Marijke xxii Van Leeuwen, Jacob 240 Van Loon, Jacobus 246, 251 Van Male, Thora, as contributor xv– xvi, 149–163, 365 Varro, Marcus Terentius 165 Venezky, Richard 301, 303–304 Venn, Henry 272 Verdier, Antoine du 46 Verstegan, Richard 121, 169 Verwijs, Eelco 245 Victor, Terry 191 Villehardouin, Geoffroy de 7, 46 Villon, François 48 Vocabolario degli accademici della Crusca 9, 243–244 Vocabulary or pocket dictionary (1765) 85 Voiture, Vincent 46 von Schneidemesser, Luanne 187 n 2 Vossius, Gerardus Joannes 169 Wace 176, 179 Walker, William 35–36 Walshe, Maurice O’Connell 182 Walton, Stuart 284 n 22 Walton, William Gladstone 284 n 22 Ward, Seth 77 Warner, Joseph 130 Wase, Christopher 64, 69 n 13, 80 Watkins, E. A. 270 n 2, 271 n 4, 283 n 20

Index Way, Albert 176 Webster, John 23, 33–34, 37 Webster, Noah, and early Webster dictionaries xviii, 170, 180, 184, 198, 215–216, 218, 222, 224, 364 Webster’s collegiate dictionary 180 Webster’s new explorer dictionary of word origins 164 Wedgwood, Hensleigh 171–174, 176, 183, 222 Weekley, Ernest 174, 178–180, 182–183 Weiland, Petrus 240 Weiner, Edmund 229 n 18, 363 West, Ed 194 Westcote, Thomas 27 Wheatley, Henry xxi Whitehall, Harold 296 Whiting, Bartlett Jere 305 Whitney, William Dwight 174 Wiegand, Herbert Ernst xxi Wildenstein, Georges 256 Wilkins, John xiii–xiv, xx, 58–71, 362 Willis, Thomas 128 Wilson, F. P. 305 Wilson, Thomas xiv, 87 Winslow, Jacques-Bénigne 130 Wisconsin, University of 299, 301 Wittgenstein, Ludwig 264 Woolley, Hannah 83 n 2 Woordenboek der Friese taal 363 Woordenboek der Nederlandsche taal xix, 238–239, 242, 252 Worcester, Joseph 198 Wright, Joseph 175 Wyatt, Sir Thomas 293 Wycherly, William 121 Wyld, H. C. xvi, 185–186 Yale University 303 Yonge family 27 Zgusta, Ladislav xxi, 198, 362 Zouche, Edward la, eleventh Baron Zouche xii n 4, 3