by Alan Townend32. Word story: Dictionary.....................................................
The one way to settle an argument over a word is to «look in a
dictionary» or we «look a word up in a dictionary». If we want to be
very serious, we consult a «dictionary». There are several ways in
which «compilers» of «dictionaries» or makers of a «dictionary» can
approach their task. One way is to make it «descriptive» where you
simply «define» it or you can be «prescriptive» when you comment
on its correct use. One of the best-known compilers of a «dictionary»
was the Scottish philologist, James Augustus Henry Murray who is
famous for having laid the foundations of what is known as the
«Oxford English Dictionary». Someone who creates a «dictionary» is
called a «lexicographer». It was a long process and although he lived
till he was 78, Murray did not see the completion of the work he
started. The plan had been to finish the «dictionary» in 10 years but
it actually took 70 and was first published in 10 volumes in 1928.
Murray put an advertisement in a newspaper and asked members of
the public to send him lists of words with details of where they found
them. Thousands of pieces of paper were kept in his garden shed
which he called the «scriptorum». Murray later met one of his most
regular contributors and discovered that he was an American
murderer who had been writing to him from a lunatic asylum in
Britain.
The «Oxford English Dictionary» is based on what are called
historical principles so that apart from finding the meaning of a word
«definition» you can also see when and where it was first used. Mind
you if you keep on telling everyone how much you know about
words, you could expect this comment: «What's the matter with
you? Have you swallowed a dictionary?»