A Dictionary of the English Language

Okay.

A dictionary of the English language sometimes published as Johnson's Dictionary, was published on f- April 1775.

It is among the most influential dictionaries in the history of the English language.

Um, there was dissatisfaction with the dictionaries of the period.

Okay.

A dictionary of the English language, sometimes published as Johnson's Dictionary, was published on f- April 1775.

It is among the most influential dictionaries in the history of the English language.

Um, there was dissatisfaction with the dictionaries of the period.

For some not clearly defined reason, people have long had less than favorable opinions of geese.

Consider Samuel Johnson's A Dictionary of the English Language and his definition of a goose.

A large waterfowl proverbially noted, I know not why, for foolishness.

We also have the phrase, a silly goose.

My uncle must have spent an incredible time searching for some of the titles he owned.

He had The Dictionary of the English Language by Samuel Johnson from 1755, The History of Tom Jones, a foundling, from 1749, and many other meticulously crafted and iconic library texts, as well as magazines that range the gambit from collector item to, in my opinion, trash.

I found a strange book the third night.

It sat behind a row of similar books on the lowest shelf in the darkest corner of the room.

That choice shows how even early printers were balancing phonetic fidelity with visual economy.

Fast-forward to the eighteenth century, and you see a real push from grammarians like Samuel Johnson, who in his dictionary and later in A Dictionary of the English Language, argued strongly that contractions were a sign of informality that should be avoided in print.

Yet even Johnson himself used 'tis in some entries.

Johnson's own use of 'tis in his dictionary entries demonstrates that the boundary between acceptable and unacceptable was porous.

It listed words alphabetically and provided simple explanations in plain English, sometimes even Latin glosses, so that a layperson could look up a word like catholicus or philology without having to read a whole textbook.

Fast-forward a few decades, and you get Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary in seventeen fifty-five.

This one is the stuff of legend.

He didn’t just list words; he gave them context with witty quotations and moral judgments, turning the dictionary into a cultural touchstone.

This regional variation illustrates how social factors influence language change.

The influence of printed books is clear when we look at early dictionaries, like the 1706 edition of Johnson's Dictionary, which noted that n't was a shortening of not and advised writers to use it sparingly in formal prose.

That entry reflects early attempts to regulate usage.

But even the earliest prescriptive grammarians, think of Randle Cotgrave in 1611, tended to ignore the contraction, treating it as a mere colloquialism rather than a grammatical innovation that would later become entrenched.

Oh, no.

It would be Johnson's Dictionary.

We still have 170.

Oh, no.

Lucky Johnson's Dictionary.

Dictionary, yeah.

Sausage.