Dr Johnson's Dictionary
Editor - David Crystal
Penguin
Hardback : 03 Nov 2005
£19.99
Synopsis
Samuel Johnson's Dictionary, published in 1755, marked a milestone in a language in desperate need of standards. No English dictionary before it had devoted so much space to everyday words, been so thorough in its definitions, or illustrated usage by quoting from Shakespeare and other great writers. Johnson's was the dictionary used by Jane Austen and Charles Dickens, Wordsworth and Coleridge, the Brontes and the Brownings, Thomas Hardy and Oscar Wilde.
This new edition, edited by David Crystal, will contain a selection from the original, offering memorable passages on subjects ranging from books and critics to dreams and ethics.
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David Crystal's top twenty fascinating words from Dr Johnson's Dictionary
COMPOTA'TION. n.s. [compotatio, Lat.] The act of drinking or tippling together.
Secrecy to words spoke under the rose, only mean, in compotation, from the ancient custom in symposiack meetings, to wear chaplets of roses.
BROWN’S VULGAR ERROURS.
If thou wilt prolong
Dire compotation, forthwith reason quits
Her empire to confusion and misrule,
And vain debates; then twenty tongues at once
Conspire in senseless jargon; naught is heard
But din and various clamour, and mad rant.
PHILLIPS.
CURTAIN-LECTURE. n.s. [from curtain and lecture.] A reproof given by a wife to her husband in bed.
What endless brawls by wives are bred!
The curtain-lecture makes a mournful bed.
DRYDEN’S JUVEN.
She ought to exert the authority of the curtain-lecture, and, if she finds him of a rebellious disposition, to tame him.
ADDIS.
FO'PDOODLE. n.s. [fop and doodle.] A fool; an insignificant wretch.
Where sturdy butchers broke your noddle,
And handled you like a fopdoodle.
HUDIBRAS, P. II.
FRI'BBLER. n.s. [from the verb.] A trifler.
A fribbler is one who professes rapture for the woman, and dreads her consent.
SPECTATOR, NO. 288.
ME'RRYTHOUGHT. n.s. [merry and thought.] A forked bone on the body of fowls; so called because boys and girls pull in play at the two sides, the longest part broken off betokening priority of marriage.
Let him not be breaking merrythoughts under the table with my cousin.
EACHARD’S CONTEMPT OF THE CLERGY.
NA'PPINESS. n.s. [nappy.] The quality of having a nap.
NULLIBI'ETY. n.s. [from nullibi, Latin.] The state of being nowhere.
OSCI'TANCY. n.s. [oscitantia, Lat.]
1. The act of yawning.
2. Unusual sleepiness; carelessness.
If persons of so circumspect a piety, have been thus overtaken, what security can there be for our wreckless oscitancy?
GOVERNMENT OF THE TONGUE.
It might proceed from the oscitancy of transcribers, who, to dispatch their work the sooner, used to write all numbers in cyphers.
ADDISON’S SPECTATOR, NO. 470.
PERPOTA'TION. n.s. [per and poto, Latin.] The act of drinking largely.
PU'GIL. n.s. [pugille, Fr.] What is taken up between the thumb and two first fingers. Dictionaries.
Take violets, and infuse a good pugil of them in a quart of vinegar.
BACON’S NATURAL HISTORY.
RHABA'RBARATE. adj. [from rhabarbara, Lat.] Impregnated or tinctured with rhubarb.
The salt humours must be evacuated by the sennate, rhabarbarate, and sweet manna purgers, with acids added, or the purging waters.
FLOYER ON THE HUMOURS.
SME'LLFEAST. n.s. [smell and feast.] A parasite; one who haunts good tables.
The ant lives upon her own, honestly gotten; whereas the fly is an intruder, and a common smellfeast that spunges upon other people’s trenchers.
L’ESTRANGE.
STERNUTA'TION. n.s. [sternutatio, Latin.] The act of sneezing.
Sternutation is a convulsive shaking of the nerves and muscles, first occasioned by an irritation of those in the nostrils.
QUINCY.
Concerning sternutation, or sneezing, and the custom of saluting upon that motion, it is generally believed to derive its original from a disease wherein sternutation proved mortal, and such as sneezed died.
BROWN’S VULGAR ERROURS.
STI'RIOUS. adj. [from stiria, Latin.] Resembling icicles.
Chrystal is found sometimes in rocks, and in some places not much unlike the stirious or stillicidious dependencies of ice.
BROWN’S VULGAR ERROURS.
To SU'GGILATE. v.a. [suggillo, Latin.] To beat black and blue; to make livid by a bruise.
The head of the os humeri was bruised, and remained suggilated long after.
WISEMAN’S SURGERY.
TEPEFA'CTION. n.s. [tepefacio, Latin.] The act of warming to a small degree.
TRA'VELTAINTED. adj. [travel and tainted.] Harrassed; fatigued with travel.
I have foundered nine score and odd posts: and here, traveltainted as I am, have, in my pure and immaculate valour, taken Sir John Coleville.
SHAKESPEARE'S HENRY IV. P. II.
VA'TICIDE. n.s. [vates and cædo, Latin.] A murderer of poets.
The caitiff vaticide conceiv’d a prayer.
POPE’S DUNCIAD.
VITE'LLARY. n.s. [from vitellus, Latin.] The place where the yolk of the egg swims in the white.
A greater difficulty in the doctrine of eggs is, how the sperm of the cock attaineth into every egg; since the vitellary, or place of the yolk, is very high.
BROWN’S VULGAR ERROURS.
WO'RLDLING. n.s. [from world.] A mortal set upon profit.
Baseminded wretches! are your thoughts so deeply bemired in the trade of ordinary worldlings, as for respect of gain to let so much time pass.
SIDNEY.
The one sort are nam’d the brethren, the godly; the other worldlings, timeservers, and pleasers of men more than pleasers of God.
HOOKER.
God of the world and worldlings,
Great Mammon! greatest god below the sky.
FAIRY QUEEN.
For his weeping in the needless stream;
Poor deer, quoth he, thou mak’st a testament
As worldlings do, giving thy sum of more
To that which had too much.
SHAKESPEARE'S AS YOU LIKE IT.
That other on his friends his thoughts bestows:
The covetous worldling, in his anxious mind,
Thinks only on the wealth he left behind.
DRYDEN.
If we consider the expectations of futurity, the worldling gives up the argument.
ROGERS.
Product details
Format : Hardback
ISBN: 9780713998870
Size : 129 x 198mm
Pages : 704
Published : 03 Nov 2005
Publisher : Penguin
Dr Johnson's Dictionary
Editor - David Crystal
£19.99
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