Dictionaries: older than the printed word ¦ source: Pixabay - wilheiĪccording to Wikipedia, the earliest English dictionaries were compilations of words from Latinate languages and their translations into English, however, entries were not listed in alphabetical order until later on in Robert Cawdrey’s A Table Alphabeticall, an English monolingual dictionary which was written in 1604. Both monolingual and bilingual dictionaries and word lists became popular across the world for a range of different purposes. In medieval Europe, Latin glossaries were among the first books to be printed and became widely adopted as a tool to aid in the interpretation of the bible. This is because such word lists which were used to help readers translate and understand texts in the same ways that modern dictionaries are used in English today, until the publication of the world’s first formal dictionaries thousands of years later. These tablets were, in fact, bilingual word lists, but they are nevertheless classed as dictionaries. The first ever dictionaries are thought to have come about in what is now Syria, in around 2300 BC. Let's go The History of English Dictionaries So here is a guide to English dictionaries: their history, their uses, and how each type may be useful to you as a learner of English as a second language. Of course, the type of dictionary you choose to use will likely be different to those of other English learners, as your choice will depend on your needs and goals. This will help you move away from learning new words as translations, and broaden your understanding of the English language in the target language. Some dictionaries are purely for checking spellings and whether words exist, and so, they don’t feature any kind of definition alongside the featured words, whereas others show a detailed definition with examples of usage.Īs you learn English, it may be helpful to use a monolingual English dictionary alongside as a bilingual one. There are also several types of dictionary, which are compiled according to a certain purpose. English dictionaries, in particular, have a rich history from their origins as glossaries or ‘word lists’ which were used by churchgoers to translate biblical texts from Latin into English, to their more recent history concerning regional variations in vocabulary and the entry of new words and phrases. But there is so much more to the world of dictionaries than meets the eye. You can use them to check your spelling, look up a definition, and verify etymological variations of a word, as well as find out the equivalent term in another language. Dictionaries are a fundamental tool in learning a language, whether it be your native tongue or you're learning English as a foreign language.
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