Because Latin was a much-used language of great prestige well into modern times, its monumental dictionaries were important and later influenced English lexicography. At least five medieval scholastics-Papias the Lombard, Alexander Neckham, Johannes de Garlandia (John Garland), Hugo of Pisa and Giovanni Balbi of Genoa – turned their attention to dictionaries. It should be noted that the word “dictionary” was firstly used in a manuscript of Latin words by John Garland in 1225. The mammoth work of Ambrogio Calepino, published at Reggio, in 1502, incorporating several other languages besides Latin, was so popular that “calepin” came to be an ordinary word for a dictionary. It was a tendency to call it so that’s why several centuries later cansed people to say “Look in Johnson”, or ‘Look in Webster”.
The history of dictionary making for the English language goes as far back as the
Old English period. According to L.P.Stupin the 1st stage of English lexicography began when bilingual manuscript glossaries appeared (7-14 cc). The earliest manuscript glossaries such as Corpus, Leiden, Epinal, Erurt Glossaries belonged to the 8th –9th centaries. These famous glossaries were called after their keeping place.
The origin of the bilingual lists can be traced to a practice of the early Middle Ages, that of writing interlinear glosses – explanations of difficult words – in manuscripts. Some of these have survived from the 7th and 8th centuries – and in some cases they preserve the earliest recorded forms in English. The first bilingual glossary to find its way into print was a French – English vocabulary for the use of travellers, printed in England by William Caxton, without a title page, in 1480. It consisted of words and expressions appeared in parallel columns on 26 leaves. Next came a Latin-English vocabulary by a noted grammarian, John Stanbridge, published by Richard Pynson in 1496 and reprinted frequently. But far more substantial in character was an English-Latin vocabulary called the Promptorius puerorum (“Storehouse [of words] for Children”) brought out by Pynson in 1499. It was commonly attribute to Geoffrey the Grammarian (Galfridus Grammaticus), a Dominican friar of Norfolk.
It was the 2nd stage of English lexicography which is characterized by creating both manuscript and printed glossaries, including rather simple wordlists(14-15 cc).
The 3-d stage is concerned with printed bilingual glossaries having broaden word lists and versatile characteristics of words (15-16).
The next important dictionary to be published was an English-French one by John (or Jepan) Palsgrave in 1530 “les claircis-sement de la langue francoise 9 (“Education of the French Tongue”) Palsgrave was a tutor of French in London, and a letter has survived shoving that he arranged with his printer that no copy should be sold without his permission. A Welsh-English dictionary by William Salesbury in 1547 brought another language in requisition:
Latin-English dictionary that appeared in 1538 from the hand of Sir Thomas Elyot. It is the first work which took to itself in England what was destined to be the famous name of Dictionary and it was actually in alphabetical order. He was the 1st author who used the word ‘dictionary’to his reference book in English.
The 4th stage of English lexicography is characterized by perfecting and developing of translating dictionaries of new western European languages (16c).
The mainstream of English lexicography is the wordlist explained in English.
The first known English-English glossary grew out of the desire of the 10 supporters of the Reformation that even the most humble Englishman should be able to understand the Scriptures [the Bible]. The schoolmasters also had a strong interest in the development of dictionaries. The notion that an English Dictionary ought to contain all English words had apparently as yet occurred to no one; but this farther step in the evolution of modern dictionary was now about to be made, and the man who made it, was one of most deserving in the annals of English lexicography. Nathaniel Bailey was famous his “Universal Etymological English Dictionary, published in 1721. He aimed at including all English words; yet not for the were boast of “completeness”, but for a practical purpose, pointing out words etymology and pronunciation. So the 6 th stage of El is characterized by preparing an explanatory dictionary of the English national language. During the second quarter of 18th century, the feeling arouse among literary men as well as among the looksellers that the time had come for preparation of a’ StandardDictionary’of English tongue, which should register the proper sense and use of every word and phrase, from which no polite writer henceforth would be expected to deviate. The turning point in the history of English tongue was 1st modern dictionary of English-Latin by Samuel Johnson. It’s full title w as “A Dictionary of the English Language in Which the Words are Deduced from their Originals and Illustrated in their General Significations by Examples from the Best Writes”(1755).
Samuel Johnson set himself the task of making a different kind of dictionary, one that would include all the words in English, not just the difficylt ones. In addition would show how to divide words into syllables and where words came from. He would establish a consistent system of defining words and draw from his own gigantic learning to provide, for the 1st time in any dictionary, illustrative quotations from famous writers. Samuel Johnson, underfunded and working almost alone in a Fleet Street garret room, defined some 43.000 words and illuminated their meanings with more than 114.000 supporting quotations drown from every of literature. This task took nearer nine than three years, but the results more than justified Johnson’s ambitions hopes. The two huge tomes, each the size of a lectern Bible and each of which would fill about five fat volumes today, were an immediate success upon their publication. From Bailey onward and by Johnson himself, the place of the stress-accent had been marked, but no attempt had been made to show how such a group of betters as colonel or enough was actually pronounced. So the end of 18th century was the indication of Pronunciation.
Dr. William Kenrick compiled “A New Dictionary of the English Language” in
1773, later Thomas Sheridan respelled this dictionary in 1780 under the title “A General Dictionary of English Language” and at last John Walker whose authority long remained as supreme in the field of pronunciation as that of Johnson in definition and illustration produced his famous “Critical Pronouncing Dictionary and Expositor of the English Language” in 1791. To sum it up from the 1st quarter of the 19th century the lexicographical supremacy of Johnson’s Dictionary was undisputed, and eminent students busied themselves in trying to supplement and perfect it.