The Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, 2 Vols ... by Herbert Coleridge

Furnivall understood the need for an efficient excerpting system, and instituted several prefatory projects. Recruited assistants handled two tons of quotation slips and other materials. Furthermore, many of the slips had been misplaced. Many volunteer readers eventually lost interest in the project as Furnivall failed to keep them motivated. In April 1861, the group published the first sample pages later that month, the thirty-one-year old Coleridge died of tuberculosis.įurnivall then became editor he was enthusiastic and knowledgeable, yet temperamentally ill-suited for the work.

He arrayed 100,000 quotation slips in a 54-pigeon-hole grid. His house was the first editorial office. On, Coleridge's dictionary plan was published, and research started. Richard Chenevix Trench played the key role in the project's first months, but his ecclesiastical career meant that he could not give the dictionary project the time required, easily ten years he withdrew, and Herbert Coleridge became the first editor. In 1858, the Society agreed to the project in principle, with the title 'A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles' (NED). Volunteer readers would be assigned books and copy to quotation slips passages illustrating actual word usages, then post them to the dictionary editor. On January 7, 1858, the Society formally adopted the idea of a comprehensive new dictionary. Trench suggested that a new, truly comprehensive dictionary was needed. The Society eventually shifted their idea from only words that were not already in English dictionaries to a more comprehensive project. The Philological Society, however, ultimately realized that the number of unlisted words would be far more than the number of words in the English dictionaries of the 19th century.

Space wasted on inappropriate or redundant content.

Insufficient use of good illustrative quotations.

History of obsolete senses of words often omitted.

Incorrect dates for earliest use of words.

Inconsistent coverage of families of related words.

In November, Trench's report was not a list of unregistered words instead, it was the study On Some Deficiencies in our English Dictionaries, which identified seven distinct shortcomings in contemporary dictionaries: In June 1857, they formed an 'Unregistered Words Committee' to search for unlisted and undefined words lacking in current dictionaries.

6 Oxford English Dictionary and First SupplementĪt first, the dictionary was unconnected to Oxford University but was the idea of a small group of intellectuals in London it originally was a Philological Society project conceived in London by Richard Chenevix Trench, Herbert Coleridge, and Frederick Furnivall, who were dissatisfied with the current English dictionaries.

The Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, 2 Vols ... by Herbert Coleridge