Sharp PW E500 Operation Manual GB User To The C30be585 06ae 4e21 8baa 70b92a676200

User Manual: Sharp PW-E500 to the manual

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Oxford Dictionary of English

New Oxford Thesaurus of English

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

ELECTRONIC DICTIONARY

OPERATION MANUAL

MODEL

PW-E500

Page

• Getting Started ........................................................ 2

• Using the

Oxford Dictionary of English ................

• Using the

New Oxford Thesaurus of English .......

• Using the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations ..........

• Using the Super Jump function ............................ 23

• Using the History function .................................... 25

• Using the Calculator function ............................... 26

• Using the Converter function ................................ 27

• Appendices ........................................................... 29

• Introductions to the Dictionaries ........................... 32

Introduction

Thank you for purchasing the SHARP Electronic Dictionary, model PW-E500.

The PW-E500 contains data based on the following dictionaries (see page 4):

•Oxford Dictionary of English

•New Oxford Thesaurus of English

•Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

After reading this manual, store it in a convenient location for future reference.

NOTICE

•SHARP will not be liable nor responsible for any incidental or consequential economic or property damage caused by misuse and/or malfunction of this product

and its peripherals, unless such liability is acknowledged by law.

•The specification of this product and its accessories, as well as information provided in this manual, is subject to change without prior notice.

CAUTION

•Do not carry the PW-E500 in the back pocket of slacks or trousers.

•Do not apply excessive physical pressure on the LCD panel because the glass material may break.

•Do not drop the PW-E500 or apply excessive force to it. Bending the unit unduly can damage it.

•Do not subject the PW-E500 to extreme temperatures. Do not expose the unit to an extremely humid or dusty environment.

•Do not apply extreme force when pressing the keys.

•Sharp or hard objects can scratch and damage the unit. Make sure it is adequately protected when carried with other objects.

•Since the unit is not waterproof, do not use it or store it where fluids can splash onto it. Raindrops, water spray, juice, coffee, steam, perspiration, etc. will also

cause malfunction.

•Clean only with a soft, dry cloth. Do not use solvents.

•Use only a SHARP approved service facility.

NOTES

•Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries.

•All company and/or product names are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective holders.

CONTENTS

Getting Started

Using the PW-E500 for the first time ............................................................ 2

Layout ...........................................................................................................5

Basic Operation ............................................................................................7

Set-up Menu ............................................................................................... 11

Inputting Characters ...................................................................................12

Using the

Oxford Dictionary of English

Looking up a word (Filter search) ..............................................................14

Phrase search.............................................................................................15

Crossword solver ........................................................................................ 15

Anagram solver ...........................................................................................16

Spellcheck function.....................................................................................16

Further information .....................................................................................17

Using the

New Oxford Thesaurus of English

Looking up a word (Filter search) ..............................................................18

Phrase search.............................................................................................19

Further information .....................................................................................19

Using the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

Searching by an author name (Filter search) ............................................ 20

Keyword search .......................................................................................... 21

Theme search .............................................................................................22

Random quote ............................................................................................22

Further information .....................................................................................22

Using the Super Jump function

How to use the Super Jump function .........................................................23

Using the History function

How to use the History function ................................................................. 25

Using the Calculator function

Prior to initiating calculations .....................................................................26

Calculation examples ................................................................................. 26

Using the Converter function

Currency converter .....................................................................................27

Metric converter ..........................................................................................28

Appendices

Replacing the battery .................................................................................29

Reset procedure if trouble occurs .............................................................. 30

Specifications .............................................................................................30

Troubleshooting ..........................................................................................31

Product support ..........................................................................................31

Introductions to the Dictionaries

Oxford Dictionary of English .......................................................................32

New Oxford Thesaurus of English .............................................................. 45

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations ................................................................. 50

Getting Started

Using the PW-E500 for the first time

Be sure to perform the following operations before using the PW-E500 for the first

time.

1. Set the battery replacement switch on the bottom

of the unit to the ‘REPLACE BATTERY’ position.

2. Remove the battery cover.

3. Insert the one battery. Make sure the battery

polarity is correct.

4. Replace the battery cover.

5. Set the battery replacement switch to the

‘NORMAL OPERATION’ position.

6. Open the unit and press

turn the power on.

The LCD contrast screen will appear.

•Should a different screen appear,

follow the reset procedure on page

30.

•If the power cannot be turned on:

•Make sure the battery replacement switch is placed at the ‘NORMAL

OPERATION’ position, then press

again.

•If the power still cannot be switched on, try following steps 1 through 6 in the

above procedure again.

7. Adjust the LCD contrast by using

[

]

, and press

The key sound on/off screen will

appear.

8. Select

to turn the key sound

on/off.

The main menu screen will appear.

•The LCD contrast and the key sound

settings can be adjusted later in the

Set-up menu.

Turning the power on/off

The power can be switched on by pressing the keys listed below.

To turn off the power, press

Key

Display status upon start-up

Restores the display as it was before the unit was switched off

(Resume function).

The main menu screen appears.

The main display of each dictionary and/or function appears (Direct-

on function)

Auto power off function

To save the battery, the PW-E500 will automatically turn its power off if no key

operations are detected for a set period of time. The activation interval initial setting

is 5 minutes, but it can be adjusted by following the directions on page 12.

Key notation used in this manual

•All keys are framed (

, for instance); exceptions are found in the Calculator

section, where the numeral entries are shown with real numbers.

•Keys are often assigned with more than one function. The appropriate key/

function will be shown according to the input status.

will be shown as either ‘

’, ‘

’ or ‘1’ depending on the input status.

will be shown as either ‘

’ or ‘

’ depending on the input status.

•The functions indicated with green typeface are second functions. Press and

release

, then press an appropriate key.

^ l

directs to press and release

, then press

(

^ w

directs to press and release

, then press

(

Data contained in the PW-E500

The dictionary data contained in this unit is based on the following dictionaries:

•Oxford Dictionary of English 2e © Oxford University Press 2003

•New Oxford Thesaurus of English © Oxford University Press 2000

•Oxford Dictionary of Quotations 5e © Oxford University Press 1999

retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior

permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by

law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organiza-

tion. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should

be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press.

•The data content of each Dictionary is mostly retained faithful to the original.

However, some sections of the dictionary contents have had to be altered due to

the limitations of the LCD display and for other reasons; these modifications have

been implemented under the provisions of the publisher(s). In some rare cases,

misspellings and/or mistypings may be found; these are ‘errors’ that have been

retained unmodified from the source Dictionaries.

Note:

•For full information on the contents of the dictionaries, see Introductions on

pages 32–54.

•This product does not contain the Appendix data found in the book version of the

Oxford Dictionary of English 2e.

Menu key

Clear key

Font size shift key

Page scroll key

Layout

Back space key

Cursor keys

Enter key

Escape key

Power on/off key

Display symbols

(Refer to the next page for details)

Dictionary/function

selection key

2nd function key

Utility keys for Dictionaries

Display

This symbol will be displayed when the battery level is low. Promptly

replace the old battery with a new one.

Indicates that the key sound (beep) is set to ON.

Indicates that

has been pressed.

These arrows suggest that more contents can be browsed by scrolling up/

down the window.

{ }

: Press to scroll up/down per text row.

< >

: Press to scroll up/down per visible window.

Note:

•In this manual, symbols are not shown in the display examples.

•Certain symbols may appear on the display only when the LCD contrast is set to

dark. Please ignore these symbols as they are not used by this product.

Operation guidance message

A brief guidance message may appear at the bottom of the screen to help you

utilise functions more effectively.

:Opens the input screen for the

Oxford Dictionary of English

:Opens the input screen for the

New Oxford Thesaurus of English

:Opens the input screen for the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

:Opens the input screen for the spell checker

:Opens the calculator function screen

:Opens the history list of each Dictionary

:Brings up a ‘digest’ view of descriptions

:Initiates a definition search of a term in a detail view of each Dictionary

:Selects a Note icon in the detail view

:2nd function key

Activates the second function (printed in green) assigned to the next key

pressed.

Key assignments Display symbols

Basic Operation

Inputting words for a dictionary search

In this section, the basic search operation is described. For details, refer to the

manual chapter for each dictionary.

Find definitions of ‘sharpen’ in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

1. Press

to display the input

screen for the

Oxford Dictionary of

English

, then input ‘sharp’. The entries

starting with ‘sharp’ is listed.

2. Enter ‘en’ to complete the spelling. The

list is narrowed down further.

3. While the ‘ ’ indication is visible on the left of ‘sharpen’, press

•Press

to go back to the previous view.

•Press

^ l

to list the headwords in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

Note:

•To learn different searching methods from those above, refer to the manual

chapter for each dictionary.

Selecting a dictionary / function in the main menu

Press

The main menu appears.

•Select an item by its index number

using the number keys (

through

). The initial screen of the selected

item appears.

•The desired item can also be selected by using the

{ }

keys, followed by

pressing the

key.

Filter search view: selecting an item; scrolling

Press

, then type

, and

‘ab’ is entered, and words starting from

‘ab’ listed.

Selecting each entry

Use

} {

to place the cursor (indicated as ‘ ’ on the left of the listed items) at

the desired entry, then press

. The detail view of the entry appears.

Scrolling the view

Refer to the section ‘Scrolling the view’ in the previous section, ‘List view: selecting

an item; scrolling’.

List view: selecting an item; scrolling

Press

to display the initial screen

of the

Oxford Dictionary of English

, then

press

. The list view of the

Oxford

Dictionary of English

appears.

Selecting an item or a word

Use the corresponding number key to the index number on the left of each item, or

use the

{

}

key to place the cursor on the desired item, followed by pressing

the

key.

Scrolling the view

‘’ and/or ‘ ’ may appear on the left side of the screen, indicating that more

information can be browsed by scrolling up/down the view.

1) Press

}

once to scroll down one text row. To scroll back one text row, press

{

once.

2) Press

to scroll down a page. Press

to scroll the page up.

•Press and hold these keys to continuously scroll the lines/pages.

12 dot-based (default) 9 dot-based

Detail view: scrolling

Press

, then type

, and

The detail view with definitions appears.

Browsing contents above/below the screen

‘’ and/or ‘ ’ may appear on the left

side of the screen, indicating that more

information can be browsed by

scrolling up/down the view. Use

}

{

Scrolling up/down to the previous/next entry header

Press

to show the next entry header. To show the previous entry

header, press

Other useful keys

:Restores the previous view

:Shows the input screen of each Dictionary or the initial display of a

function

:Shows the list view starting from the previously displayed header

Shifting the displayed character size (z)

Press the

key to shift the character size to be displayed.

12 dot-based (vertical pixel resolution) or 9 dot-based characters can be selected.

For instance, press

to display the 12 dot characters to 9 dot characters.

Press

again to toggle back the displayed characters to 12 dot-base.

•The character size setting will be retained until the next time

is pressed.

•The

key is functional in the following views:

•The list view, detail view or filter search view of each Dictionary

•The Super Jump window

•The contents of the Note

Recalling the terms previously searched (h)

The history of up to 30 items in each dictionary is automatically stored, and can be

recalled easily by selecting the word in the history list. (For more information, see

page 25.)

Browsing Notes (r)

A Note icon ( ) may appear in the detail view. This indicates that a note can

be selected to view extra information (additional information, usage note, etc.) of

the entry.

Press

to select the icon. If more than one icon is visible, then the topmost

icon will be selected, and use the

} { ] [

keys to select the desired icon if

necessary, then press

to view the contents.

To exit, press

twice. The first push of the

key closes the contents view,

then the second deselects the icon.

Browse the Note contents of ‘earth’ in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

1. Open the detail view of ‘earth’.

2. Use the

key or

}

key to scroll down the view so that a Note icon will be

visible.

3. Press

. The Note icon will be

selected (reversed).

4. Press

. The contents of the

Note is displayed.

Listing a summary of detail view items (q)

The Quick View function suppresses some examples and additional information,

and lists out the main sections and senses (or quotations) from each detail view

entry. Use this function to browse quickly through the summary of an entry.

1. In the detail view shown on page 9,

press

The Quick View screen appears.

2. While the relevant sense or section is on the screen, select the desired item by

the index number. The detail view of the selected sense/section appears.

•Press

in the Quick View to display the detail view.

Searching a word on the screen (v)

A word or jump icon ( ) in the detail view can be selected for searching. (For more

information, see page 23.)

Note:

Using the

key will display the following:

•Oxford Dictionary of English

•Usage notes

•Additional (boxed) information

•New Oxford Thesaurus of English

•Tables (lists of items relevant to particular headwords)

•Awkward synonyms and confusable terms

•Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

•The full set of quotations for the given author (see page 21.)

Set-up Menu

Press

to display the main menu,

then press

. The set-up menu appears.

Select a desired item to change the setting.

•To delete the history list, see page 25.

Setting the key sound on/off

The key sound (a short audible beep when a key is pressed) can be set to on or off.

1. Press

, then

, to toggle the key sound on or off.

A splash message appears to indicate the change of setting, then the main

menu will be displayed.

Setting the Auto power off activation time

This product automatically turns its power off to save the battery. The turn-off time

is set to five minutes by default.

1. Press

, then

The Auto power off setting screen

appears.

2. Use the

{

}

[

and

]

keys to place the check mark on the desired

duration, then press

The time will be set, then the main menu will be displayed.

Adjusting the LCD contrast

Select this menu item to adjust the LCD contrast.

1. Press

, then

2. To adjust the LCD contrast, use the

[

(Lighter) key or

]

(Darker) key, then

press

to return to the main menu.

Starting Auto Demo mode

Activate the Auto demo for a guided tour through the key features of the product.

1. Press

, then

, to start the Auto demo mode.

• Press

to end the Auto demo mode and return to the main

menu.

Word Entry for search

fast food fastfood

weak-kneed weakkneed

let's lets

either/or eitheror

a.m. am

Inputting Characters

Methods of inputting characters are described in this section.

Character entry

A simple example of inputting characters is shown below.

Enter a word ‘clear’ for search.

1. Press

to open the input screen of the

Oxford Dictionary of English

2. Type ‘clear’.

On the keyboard, press

, then

Note:

•While entering characters, exclude characters such as spaces, hyphens,

apostrophes, slashes, and periods.

Word Entry for search

AC ac

UK uk

Word Entry for search

4WD fourwd

A5 afive

•Convert uppercase letters to lowercase.

•Spell out the numbers when applicable.

•Enter ‘and’ instead of ‘&’.

•To enter ‘£’, place ‘l’ instead. Likewise, place ‘a’ for ‘@’ instead.

•When searching for a word with accented characters (such as ‘ü’, ‘á’, etc.), enter

their unaccented equivalents via the keypad (such as ‘u’, ‘a’, etc.).

Modifying entry

Deleting unnecessary characters

1. Press

to open the input screen of the

Oxford Dictionary of English

2. Type ‘external’.

3. While the cursor is at the end of the string, press

(

three times to delete ‘nal’.

4. Next, press

[

three times to move the

cursor under the letter ‘t’.

5. Press

(

once to delete a character on the left of cursor. ‘x’ will be deleted.

Adding characters

6. In the above example, press

insert a letter ‘n’ on the left of the

cursor. The search will be narrowed

with the word ‘enter’.

Note:

•Press

to delete all characters entered.

In this Dictionary, definitions of a word can be found by entering its spelling.

Features such as Phrase search, Crossword solver, and Anagram solver are also

available.

Looking up a word (Filter search)

A definition of a word can be looked up by inputting its spelling.

Find the definition of ‘advance’.

1. Press

to open the

Oxford

Dictionary of English

The input screen appears.

2. Input the spelling of ‘advance’.

As you type, candidates for matching narrow. If the desired word is found, then

there is no need to type any more letters.

3. While ‘ ’ appears on the left of ‘advance’, press

. The detail view of the

word appears.

•To browse contents on the next/previous page, press

} {

> <

. You

may also find the Quick View function useful.

•If a word selected is a close derivative of a headword, it may not have its own

definitions. In these cases, it is helpful to scroll up within the detail view to find

the definitions of the headword itself.

•To search for a word in the detail view, use the Super Jump function.

•Press

to return to the previous screen.

Using the

Oxford Dictionary of

English

•Press

^ l

to list the headwords in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

•To search a different word, simply input a new spelling for the word, or press

to go to the dictionary's input screen.

If there is no match found

As you input the spelling of the desired

word, the dictionary will narrow down the

matching candidates. If the match is

narrowed down to none (i.e. no word starting

with the spelling is found in the Dictionary),

the message ‘similar words’ appears.

In this case, press

to list the

dictionary entries alphabetically after the entered spelling.

Note about entering characters

While entering characters, exclude characters such as spaces, hyphens,

apostrophes, slashes, and periods. See page 12 for details.

Note:

•The wildcard character ‘?’ must not be entered in the input field of the Dictionary.

The wildcard character ‘?’ can be used in the Crossword solver (see page 15)

and Random quote function (see page 22).

•Up to 24 characters can be entered in the input field of the Dictionary. When

searching words containing 25 characters or more, narrow down the search to

select the words from the list manually.

Browsing Notes

When the icons appear in the detail view, a note can be selected and

browsed. For details, refer to page 10–11.

Note:

•

In many cases, the icon only appears at the bottom of an entry, but

contains important information about usage of the headword as a whole. If unsure

about usage, scroll down to the bottom of the entry to access any relevant notes.

Phrase search

To search for idioms or phrasal verbs, enter no more than three words in the input

field. The phrases containing ALL the entered words can be searched for.

Search for a phrase containing ‘take’ and ‘care’.

1. Press

to open the

Oxford Dictionary of English

Press

}

once to place the cursor at the ‘Phrase search’, then press

The input screen of the Phrase search appears.

2. Input ‘take’, press

}

, followed by

‘care’.

To input more than one word, input

each word in the separate input field.

Use the

} {

keys to move the

cursor. Each input field can accommo-

date up to 24 characters.

3. Press

A list of phrases containing the words appears.

If no matching phrase is found, then a message ‘Not Found!’ will momentarily be

displayed.

4. Select the desired index of the phrase using the number key(s). The definition of

the selected phrase is displayed.

•Press

to return to the previous view.

•Press

^ l

to list the index of phrases containing the words.

•To search for a new phrase, simply begin inputting new words, or press

to go back to the input screen to start a new search.

Crossword solver

Use a wildcard character ‘?’ to search for words with ambiguous spellings. Place the

appropriate number of ‘?’ characters in the places of characters yet to be

determined.

Find a matching word for a query ‘ma???n’.

1. Press

to open the

Oxford Dictionary of English

Press the

}

key twice to place the cursor at the ‘Crossword solver’, then press

The Crossword solver's input screen appears.

2. Type ‘ma???n’ into the input field. Press the

key three times to enter ‘???’.

3. Press

to start the search.

A list of the wildcard matches appear.

Up to 100 words may be displayed in

the list.

4. In the list, select a desired word using the number keys.

The detail view with definitions of the selected word appears.

•Press

to return to the previous view.

•Press

^ l

to list the headwords in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

•To initiate another search, simply type in the new spelling or press

return to the input screen of the Crossword solver.

Anagram solver

A word or series of letters can be entered to find any matching anagrams found in

the

Oxford Dictionary of English

Find anagrams for ‘dear’.

1. Press

to open the

Oxford Dictionary of English

Press the

}

three times to place the cursor at the ‘Anagram solver’, then press

. The input screen of the Anagram solver appears.

2. Place ‘dear’ in the input field, then

press

to initiate the search.

Up to 100 words may be displayed in

the list.

3. In the list of matches, use the number keys to select a word.

The detail view with definitions of the selected word appears.

•Press

to return to the previous view.

•Press

^ l

to list the headwords in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

•To initiate another search, simply type in the new spelling or press

return to the input screen of the Anagram solver.

Spellcheck function

The spellcheck function can be helpful when the exact spelling of a query word is

not known.

You are not sure whether ‘liason’ or ‘liaison’ is correct.

1. Press

to open the input screen

of the spellcheck function.

2. Enter ‘liason’.

3. Press

to initiate the spellcheck

function.

Words with similar spellings will be

listed.

•While ‘Searching... Press [ENTER] to

break’ is visible, press

stop the search. Note that if the search is interrupted, the list of possible

results may not include all the closest matches.

•If the word is typed with the correct spelling, it will appear at the top of the

displayed list.

•If two or more words with an identical spelling are found in the list, then the

relevant headword will also be displayed, after an arrow symbol.

4. In the list, select a desired word using the number keys (press

, in this

example). The detail view with descriptions of the word is displayed.

•If a word selected is not in its original form, and cannot be found as a

headword, then the detail view of the word's original form will be displayed. It

may be necessary to scroll down within the detail view to find the desired

word form.

•Press

to go back to the previous view.

•Press

^ l

to list the headwords in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

Note:

•Up to 100 words may be displayed in the list.

If the list of words do not appear as expected:

•Searching words with particular spellings may take more time to complete than

others.

•If no word is given, a message ‘Not Found!’ will momentarily be displayed,

followed by the input screen of the spellcheck function. In this case you may wish

to start the search again with a new spelling for the word.

Further information

For further information on using this dictionary, refer to the Introduction on pages

32-45.

Input a word in this Thesaurus to find its synonyms, as well as antonyms and other

related terms in the detail view.

Looking up a word (Filter search)

Find a set of related words by inputting the spelling of a given word.

Find a set of relative words for ‘make’.

1. Press

to open the

New Oxford

Thesaurus of English

The spelling input screen of the

Thesaurus appears.

2. Input ‘make’.

As you type, options are narrowed. If

the desired word is found, then you do

not need to type any more letters.

3. While ‘ ’ appears on the left of ‘make’,

press

. The detail view of the

word ‘make’ appears.

•To browse contents on the next/

previous page, press

} {

. You may also find the Quick

View function useful.

Using the

New Oxford

Thesaurus of English

•To search a word in the detail view, use the Super Jump function.

•Press

to return to the previous screen.

•Press

^ l

to list the headwords in the

New Oxford Thesaurus of

English

•To search a different word, simply begin inputting a new word, or press

to go to the input screen of the

New Oxford Thesaurus of English

If there is no match found

The same view / message appears as for the

Oxford Dictionary of English

. See

page 14 for details.

Note about entering characters

While entering characters, exclude characters such as spaces, hyphens,

apostrophes, slashes, and periods. See page 12 for details.

Note:

•Up to 24 characters can be entered in the input field. When searching words

containing 25 characters or more, narrow down the search to select the words

from the list manually.

Browsing Notes

When the icons appear in the detail view, a note can be selected and

browsed. For details, refer to page 10-11.

Note:

•In many cases, the icon only appears at the bottom of an entry, but

contains important information about usage of the headword as a whole. If

unsure about usage, scroll down to the bottom of the entry to access any

relevant notes.

Phrase search

To search for idioms or phrasal verbs, enter no more than three words in the input

field. The phrases containing ALL the entered words can be searched for.

Search for a phrase containing ‘make’ and ‘up’, and find its synonyms.

1. Press

to open the

New Oxford Thesaurus of English

Press

}

once to place the cursor at the ‘Phrase search’, then press

The input screen of the Phrase search appears.

2. Input ‘make’, press

}

, followed by

‘up’.

To input more than one word, input

each word in the separate input field.

Use the

} {

keys to move the

cursor. Each input field can accommo-

date up to 24 characters.

3. Press

A list of phrases containing the words appears.

If no matching phrase is found, then a message ‘Not Found!’ will momentarily be

displayed.

4. Select the desired index of the phrase using the number key(s). The detail view

of the selected phrase is displayed.

•Press

to return to the previous view.

•Press

^ l

to list the index of phrases containing the words.

•To search for a new phrase, simply begin inputting new words, or press

to go back to the input screen to start a new search.

Further information

For further information on using this thesaurus, refer to the Introduction on pages

45-50.

Using the

Oxford Dictionary of

Quotations

Input an author’s surname in the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

to find his/her

quotations. A search can also be initiated by keywords and themes, or it is possible

to display quotations at random.

Searching by an author name (Filter search)

Find a set of related quotations by inputting the spelling of an author.

List a set of quotations by ‘William Shakespeare’.

1. Press

to open the

Oxford

Dictionary of Quotations

The name input screen of the

Oxford

Dictionary of Quotations

appears.

2. Start to input the word ‘shakespeare’.

As you type, the match narrows. If the

desired word is found, then you do not

need to type any more letters.

•In this example, the rows headed by

‘’ contain subheadings within the

entry for ‘William Shakespeare’.

3. While ‘ ’ appears to the left of ‘William

Shakespeare’, press

. The

detail view of the entry ‘William

Shakespeare’ appears.

•To browse contents on the next/previous page, press

} {

> <

. You

may also find the Quick View function useful.

•To search a word in the detail view, or to search for an item indicated under

the , use the Super Jump function.

•Press

to return to the previous screen.

•Press

^ l

to list the headings in the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

•To search a different word, simply begin inputting a new spelling for the word,

or press

to go to the input screen of the

Oxford Dictionary

of Quotations

If there is no match found

The matching headers narrows down as you type. If the match is narrowed down to

none, a message ‘similar words’ will be displayed. Press

to list the headers

that alphabetically follow the entered string.

Note about entering characters

While entering characters, exclude characters such as spaces, hyphens,

apostrophes, slashes, and periods. See page 12 for details.

Note:

•The names of collections or compilations, such as the ‘Bible’ or ‘Anonymous’, can

be used for a search.

•Instead of inputting an author's surname, you might wish to try entering his/her

known pseudonym or nickname (See pages 53-54 for details).

•Some authors may appear in a joint entry with a common co-author or associate,

as well as their own individual entry. In these cases, the author's name is listed

twice in search results, ordered according to the first name in the joint entry. The

detail view automatically scrolls down so the search term is at the top - if this is

part of a larger entry, the up arrow will appear top left.

Keyword search

The

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

can accept up to three keywords for a search.

The quotations containing ALL the entered keywords can be searched for.

Find quotations that incorporate ‘man’ and ‘woman’.

1. Press

to open the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

Press the

}

key to place the cursor at the ‘Keyword search’, then press

The input screen of the Keyword search appears.

2. Input ‘man’, press the

}

key, then

input ‘woman’.

Up to 24 characters can be entered in

each input field. To jump the cursor

from one input field to another, use the

{ }

keys.

3. Press

The search results of the

Oxford

Dictionary of Quotations

are listed. If

no match is found, a message ‘Not

Found!’ will momentarily be displayed.

Note:

•The list consists of essential words in the quotations that include the given

keyword. Even if more than two keywords are given, the list will consist of

essential words in the quotations that include the first keyword.

•

Singular and plural nouns must be searched for separately. Words such as ‘man’

and ‘men’, as well as ‘lover’ and ‘lovers’, are to be searched as two different words.

•To search for compound words such as ‘Holy Ghost’, ‘middle class’, and ‘self-

made’, modify the entry by eliminating space and hyphen (i.e. ‘holyghost’,

‘middleclass’, and ‘selfmade’), to form a single keyword.

4. Select the desired quotation using the

number keys (press

, in this

example). The details of the selected

quotation appear.

•The Quick View function cannot be

activated from this screen.

•The name of the author and the Note icon ( ) will appear on the first or

second row.

While the Note icon is visible on the screen, press

and

view the full set of quotations of the author (the same result can be viewed by

initiating the search by entering the name of the author).

•Press

to return to the previous screen.

•Press

^ l

to list the search results.

•To initiate a new search, simply start typing, or press

to go to the input

screen of the keyword search.

Theme search

Quotations organized under a particular theme, such as business, politics or love,

can be searched.

Find a quotation with ‘Age’ as its theme.

1. Press

to open the Oxford

Dictionary of Quotations.

Press

}

twice to set the cursor at

‘Themes’, then press

A list of themes appear. To scroll up/

down the view, use

} {

and/or

2. Use the number key to select ‘Age’.

A list of quotations under the theme

‘Age’ is displayed.

3. Select a desired quotation using the number keys. The details of the selected

quotation appear.

•The Quick View function cannot be activated from this screen.

•The name of the author and the Note icon ( ) will appear on the first or

second row.

While the Note icon is visible on the screen, press

and

view the full set of quotations of the author (the same result can be viewed by

initiating the search by entering the name of the author).

•Press

to return to the previous screen.

•Press

^ l

to view a list of quotations under the theme.

Random quote

Random quote can be requested by pressing the

at the initial screen of the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

or in the detail view of the author.

1. Press

to open the initial screen of the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

2. Press

. A randomly selected

quotation is displayed.

•Press

several times to

sequentially initiate the Random

quotes.

•Press

to return to the initial

screen of the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

•The name of the author and the Note icon ( ) will appear on the first or

second row.

While the Note icon is visible on the screen, press

and

view the full set of quotations of the author (the same result can be viewed by

initiating the search by entering the name of the author).

Further information

For further information on using this dictionary, refer to the Introduction on pages

50-54.

Using the Super Jump function

Use the Super Jump function to select any word in the detail view of each

dictionary, then initiate a search based on the selected word.

How to use the Super Jump function

Initiate a Super Jump search via the

Oxford Dictionary of English

1. In the

Oxford Dictionary of English

, show the detail view of the word ‘function’.

2. Press

. The cursor

appears to select the first word in the

view.

3. Use the

} { ] [

keys to move the cursor (and its selection of word) to a

desired word.

•The pressing of

moves the cursor to the next.

4. While the desired word is selected,

press

The Super Jump window appears to

display selectable items.

•A list of matching words is displayed.

If the selected word is in a variant or

inflected form, the original spelling may be displayed instead.

•If only one match is found, or if an item indicated by the Jump icon ( ) is

selected, then the description of the item will be displayed in the Super Jump

window instead.

5. Use the number keys to select a desired word in the list (Press

in this

example).

The definition of the selected word is displayed in the Super Jump window.

•Press

to go back to the previous view.

•When ‘ ’ and/or ‘ ’ appears on the left side of the window,

} {

can be used to scroll the window.

6. Press

to jump to the definition

of the selected word.

The detail view of the selected word

appears.

•Press

to display the previous

view.

Note:

•A Super Jump search from any of the dictionaries will return matching entries

in the following dictionaries:

• Oxford Dictionary of English

• New Oxford Thesaurus of English

•For items marked with a Jump icon ( ) found in the

Oxford Dictionary of

Quotations

, the Super Jump executes a cross-reference upon selection.

Specifying a Dictionary to jump to

In step 4 above, press

instead of pressing

, to specify the

Dictionary to jump to.

Note icon in the Super Jump window

When the Note icon appears in the Super Jump window, press

and

to view the contents.

About the detail view after the Jump

•The behaviour and function of the detail view is the same as the detail view after

an ordinary search.

•Press

at the detail view to go back to the Dictionary's input screen.

•A chain of multiple Super Jump actions can be backtracked up to 10 times by

pressing the

key.

Use the History function to recall a headword or phrase previously searched in the

Dictionaries.

How to use the History function

Recall the search history in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

1. Press

to open the

Oxford Dictionary of English

2. Press

. The history view

appears, with the most recent search

placed at the top of the list.

When ‘ ’ and/or ‘ ’ appears on the

left side of the window,

} {

can be used to scroll the window.

3. Use the number keys to select a desired word in the list.

The detail view of the selected word appears.

Note:

•Each Dictionary has its own history list. Additionally, phrase search history list of

each of the

Oxford Dictionary of English

and the

New Oxford Thesaurus of

English

is made.

•To view the history list, press

at the initial screen of each Dictionary,

and the initial screen of each phrase search.

•Truncated words in the list are indicated with trailing ‘...’ at the end.

•Each history list can contain up to 30 items.

•The items selected by the Random quote in the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

will also be added in the history.

Using the History function Deleting a history item

1. Display the history list on the screen.

2. Use the

}

{

key to place the cursor on the word to be deleted. The reverse

colour indicates the selected item.

3. Press

(

. A confirmation dialog for deletion appears.

4. Press

. The selected word is deleted.

Deleting the history list of a Dictionary

1. Press

, then

to open the Set-up menu.

2. Press

to select ‘Deleting history’.

3. Use the number keys to select the history list you wish to delete. A confirmation

dialog for deletion appears.

•To delete all history lists, select ‘ALL’.

•Selecting ‘only DICT’ or ‘only THES’ will also delete the history list of each

phrase search.

4. Press

. The selected history is deleted and the main menu appears.

Using the Calculator function

The built-in calculator in the Electronic Dictionary can perform twelve-digit

arithmetic calculations with memory function. To access the Calculator function,

press

Prior to initiating calculations

•Before performing any calculation, press

@ @ b

to clear the

memory and the display.

•To start a calculation with a negative number, place a subtraction sign by

pressing

at the beginning of the calculation.

•If you wish to correct a wrong entry, press

and re-enter the figure.

•In the calculation examples found in this section, indications and icons that may

appear on the screen (‘=’, ‘M+’, ‘M-’, ‘+’, ‘-’, ‘x’, and ‘÷’) are abbreviated or are not

shown. These icons appear to show you the interim result of calculations. For

example, the ‘=’ icon appears on the screen when

is pressed, while

icons such as ‘M+’ and ‘+’ appear after each corresponding key has been

pressed.

•An ‘M’ is shown when a value other than 0 is put in the memory. To clear the

content of the memory, press

twice. Note that the pressing of

also functions as

•Press to enter ‘=’. To input ‘.’ (decimal point), press .

•An error message ‘E’ is displayed if:

•the integer section of a calculation result exceeds 12 digits

•the memory exceeds 12 digits

•an attempt is made to divide a number by zero.

Press

to clear the error condition.

Calculation examples

Example

(–24)

4 – 2 =

34 + 57 =

45 + 57 =

25 =

40 =

What is 10% of 200?

What percentage is 9 of 36?

200 + (200

10 %) =

500 – (500

20 %) =

(43)2 =

1/8

5 =

–) 84

3 =

+) 68 + 17 =

(Total) =

135

(12 + 14) =

(12 + 14)

5 =

123456789098

145 =

Operation

! -

The second figure (57)

becomes the constant.

(Subtraction and division are performed in

the same way as above.)

The first figure (68)

becomes the constant.

200

500

135

@ b

123456789098

145

Display

–8.

91.

102.

1,700.

2,720.

20.

25.

220.

400.

4,096.

0.125

125.

28.

85.

182.

26.

3,510.

5.2

17.9012344192

(17.9012344192

1012 = 17901234419200)

Using the Converter function

The Converter function consists of two converters: the Currency converter, and the

Metric converter.

Currency converter

Setting a currency rate

One conversion rate can be set.

Set the following rate: £1 = C

= 0.7

1. Press

m 4 1

to access the

Currency converter.

2. Press

. The input fields for the

currency name and rate appear.

3. Use the

{ }

keys to place the cursor at the desired input field, then input the

currency name and its rate. In this example, press

}

and input ‘0.7’.

•The currency name field of currency converter is temporarily pre-defined, as

seen in the above example.

•When inputting the desired currency name, press

to clear the input field

and use no more than four letters. Use the

[ ]

keys to set the cursor on

the left/right of the currently selected input field.

•In the left input field, enter the base currency name. In the input field on the

right, place the currency name of which you wish to set the conversion rate.

•Up to 10 digits (excluding the decimal point) can be entered in the currency

rate input field.

4. Press

. The currency name and its rate are set.

Converting currencies

The conversion calculation can be performed using the previously set conversion

rate.

Convert C

= 175 to pounds (£) when setting the rate: £1 = C

= 0.7.

1. Press

m 4 1

to display the currency converter.

2. Input ‘175’. You may input a simple formula, such as ‘35

5 =’, instead.

3. Press

[

to execute the conversion from C

= to £. The converted value of £250 is

displayed.

•Pressing

]

executes a pound-to-euro conversion. In this case, the converted

value of C

= 122.5 will be displayed.

•The and arrows on the screen indicate the direction of conversion.

•To initiate conversion of a different value, just enter the value to be converted,

or press

to clear the value in the input field prior to entering the new

conversion.

•Press

to return to the Converter menu.

Metric converter

Conversions between different units of measurement (length, mass, etc.) can be

performed.

Convert 40 feet to metres.

1. Press

m 4 2

to access the Metric converter.

2. Use

{ }

to select ‘Converter

[length2]’.

3. Input ‘40’. You may input a simple formula, such as ‘25 + 15 =’, instead.

4. Press

]

. The value in feet is converted to the metric value.

•Press

[

to convert from the metric value to feet. In this case, the given value

‘40’ will be taken as the metric value to be converted to feet.

•The and arrows on the screen indicate the direction of conversion.

•To initiate conversion of a different value, just enter the value to be converted,

or press

to clear the value in the input field prior to entering the new

conversion.

•Use the

}

{

key to select one of the other Metric converters.

•Press

to return to the Converter menu.

Units capable of being converted

The following conversion formulae can be utilised.

length1: inch

⇔

length2: feet

⇔

length3: yard

⇔

length4: mile

⇔

weight1: ounce

⇔

weight2: pound

⇔

temperature: °F

⇔

°C

volume: pint

⇔

litre

surface area1: mile2

⇔

km2

surface area2: acre

⇔

hectare

Replacing the battery

Battery used

•Use only the specified alkaline battery.

Appendices

Precautions

•Fluid from a leaking battery accidentally entering an eye could result in serious

injury. Should this occur, wash with clean water and immediately consult a

doctor.

•Should fluid from a leaking battery come in contact with your skin or clothes,

immediately wash with clean water.

•If the product is not to be used for some time, to avoid damage to the unit from a

leaking battery, remove it and store in a safe place.

•Do not leave an exhausted battery inside the product. It may leak and damage

the product.

•Keep batteries out of the reach of children.

•Incorrect handling of batteries may introduce risk of explosion.

•Do not throw batteries into a fire as they may explode.

•Make sure the new battery is the correct type before fitting.

•When installing, orientate the battery correctly as indicated in the unit.

•The battery packaged with this product may be partially exhausted during the

shipment and/or storage period, and may need to be replaced sooner than

expected.

Type

Alkaline battery

Size / Model

Size “AAA” / LR03

Quantity

When to replace the battery

Replace the battery immediately in the following cases:

•When is displayed.

•When the message ‘Replace the battery’ appears upon turning the power on.

Note:

•If the battery replacement cannot be done, then the History list, as well as the

Calculator's memory, and the Currency converter configuration may be cleared

shortly. Also, the Set-up menu configuration may be reset.

Replacement procedure

1. Switch off the power by pressing

2. Set the battery replacement switch located on the

bottom of the unit to the ‘REPLACE BATTERY’

position.

3. Remove the battery cover.

4. Remove the used battery and insert the one new

battery. Make sure the battery polarity is correctly

orientated.

5. Replace the battery cover.

6. Set the battery replacement switch to the ‘NORMAL OPERATION’ position.

7. Open the unit and press

to turn the power on.

The LCD contrast screen appears.

•If the power cannot be switched on, try following steps 2 through 7 in the

above procedure again. Should this fail, then follow the reset procedure on the

following page.

8. Follow the instructions on the screen to adjust the LCD contrast, as well as to set

the key sound on/off configuration (see steps 7 through 8 of the procedure on

page 2.)

Reset procedure if trouble occurs

Exposure to a strong physical shock or powerful electrical fields may render the

keys inoperable, to the point that the power cannot be switched on. If such case is

suspected, try following the procedure below.

Reset procedures

1. Press the RESET switch located on the bottom of

the unit, with the tip of a ball-point pen or similar

object. Do not use an object with a breakable or

sharp tip.

The message ‘Do you want to initialize?’ appears.

2. Press

to initialize the unit.

•A message ‘Initialized!’ is momentarily displayed, followed by the LCD contrast

adjustment screen.

•If

is selected, then the unit will not be initialized.

3. Follow the instructions on the screen to adjust the LCD contrast, as well as to set

the key sound on/off configuration (see steps 7 through 8 of the procedure on

page 2.)

Note:

•The reset procedure will clear the History list, Calculator's memory, and

configuration of the Currency converter, as well as to reset the Set-up

menu configuration. To avoid these, you may press

at step two of the

above.

•Occasionally when corruption of data etc. occurs, the reset procedure may

automatically be initiated upon pressing of the RESET switch or the

key. When this occurs, the message ‘Initialized!’ will be displayed, followed by the

LCD contrast screen. Follow the instructions on the LCD contrast, as well as to

set the key sound on/off configuration.

Specifications

Model: PW-E500

Product name: Electronic Dictionary

Display: 159

80 dot matrix LCD

Number of entries: •Oxford Dictionary of English:

Approx. 355,000 words, phrases, and definitions

•New Oxford Thesaurus of English:

Approx. 600,000 alternative and opposite words

•Oxford Dictionary of Quotations:

Approx. 20,000 quotations, comprehensively indexed

Approx. 3,200 authors

Calculator function: 12-digit calculation of addition, subtraction,

multiplication, division, percentage, memory

calculation, etc.

Converter function: 12-digit conversion of currency and measurement

Power consumption: 0.11 W

Operating temperature: 0°C - 40°C (32°F - 104°F)

Power supply: 1.5 V …

–

(DC): Alkaline battery LR03 (size “AAA”)

Battery life: Approx. 200 hours

If data is continuously displayed at 25°C (77°F)

Note: May vary according to various usage conditions

Weight (including battery): Approx. 148 g (0.33 lb)

Dimensions (when closed): 125 mm (W)

79.4 mm (D)

16.8 mm (H)

4-29/32" (W)

3-1/8" (D)

21/32" (H)

Accessories: Alkaline battery LR03 (size “AAA”)

operation manual

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 . ,

Troubleshooting

Refer to the list of possible symptoms, and solutions may be found here.

The unit cannot be switched on.

•Check if the battery is not drained. See page 29.

•Check the battery replacement switch; it should be set at the ‘NORMAL

OPERATION’ position. See page 2.

•Check the polarity of the battery. See page 2.

•Verify the LCD contrast setting; the power may be switched on, but the

message on the screen may not be visible. See page 12.

•If the above settings appear normal, then press the RESET switch. See page

30.

The screen is dark or light.

•Adjust the LCD contrast. See page 12.

The key sound cannot be heard.

•The key sound may be set to OFF. See page 11.

The unit does not respond to a key press.

•Press the RESET switch. See page 30.

The unit shuts off automatically.

•The Auto power off function is in action. The activation interval of the Auto

power off function can be adjusted. See page 12.

The desired word cannot be found.

•A variant form of the word may have been entered. Enter the original form.

Product support

If you have read this operation manual, but you still require product support, you

can:

Visit our web site

http://www.sharp.co.uk

Or Telephone

08705 274277

Oxford Dictionary of English

Introduction

The

Oxford Dictionary of English

has been compiled according to principles which

are quite different from those of traditional dictionaries. New types of evidence are

now available in sufficient quantity to allow lexicographers to construct a picture of

the language that is more accurate than has been possible before. The approach to

structuring and organizing within individual dictionary entries has been rethought,

as has the approach to the selection and presentation of information in every

aspect of the dictionary: definitions, choice of examples, grammar, word histories,

and every other category. New approaches have been adopted in response to a

reappraisal of the workings of language in general and its relationship to the

presentation of information in a dictionary in particular. The aim of this introduction

is to give the user background information for using this dictionary and, in

particular, to explain some of the thinking behind these new approaches.

Structure: Core Sense and Subsense

The first part of speech is the primary one for that word: thus, for bag and balloon

the senses of the noun are given before those for the verb, while for babble and

bake the senses of the verb are given before those of the noun.

Within each part of speech the first definition given is the core sense. The general

principle on which the senses in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

are organized is

that each word has at least one core meaning, to which a number of subsenses

may be attached. If there is more than one core sense (see below), this is

introduced by a bold sense number. Core meanings represent typical, central uses

of the word in question in modern standard English, as established by research on

and analysis of the Oxford English Corpus and other citation databases. The core

meaning is the one accepted by native speakers as the most literal and central in

ordinary modern usage. This is not necessarily the same as the oldest meaning,

because word meanings change over time. Nor is it necessarily the most frequent

meaning, because sometimes the most frequently used modern sense of a word is

a figurative one.

The core sense also acts as a gateway to other, related subsenses. These

subsenses are grouped under the core sense, each one being introduced by a solid

square symbol.

There is a logical relationship between each subsense and the core sense under

which it appears. The organization of senses according to this logical relationship is

designed to help the user, not only in being able to navigate the entry more easily

and find relevant senses more readily, but also in building up an understanding of

how senses in the language relate to one another and how the language is

constructed on this model. The main types of relationship of core sense to

subsense are as follows:

Introductions to the

Dictionaries

nose

CORE SENSE

the part projecting above the mouth on the face of a person or animal,

containing the nostrils and used for breathing and smelling.

SUBSENSE

the sense of smell,

especially a dog’s ability to

track something by its scent:

a dog with a keen nose.

SUBSENSE

figurative

an instinctive

talent for detecting

something:

he has a nose for a

good script.

SUBSENSE

the aroma of a particular

substance, especially

wine.

elements of the core sense, e.g.

HEADWORD: bamboo

CORE SENSE: [mass noun] a giant woody grass which is grown chiefly in the

tropics.

SUBSENSE: the hollow jointed stem of this plant, used as a cane or to make

furniture and implements.

HEADWORD: management

CORE SENSE: the process of dealing with or controlling things or people.

SUBSENSE: [treated as sing. or pl.] the people managing a company or

organization, regarded collectively:

EXAMPLE: management were extremely cooperative.

HEADWORD: ambassador

CORE SENSE: an accredited diplomat sent by a state as its permanent

representative in a foreign country.

SUBSENSE: a representative or promoter of a specified activity:

EXAMPLE: he is a good ambassador for the industry.

Many entries have just one core sense. However some entries are more complex

and have different strands of meaning, each constituting a core sense. In this case,

each core sense is introduced by a bold sense number, and each potentially has its

own block of subsenses relating to it.

(a) figurative extension of the core sense, e.g.

HEADWORD: logjam

CORE SENSE: a crowded mass of logs blocking a river.

SUBSENSE:

figurative

a situation that seems irresolvable:

EXAMPLE: the president can use his power to break the logjam over

this issue.

SUBSENSE:

figurative

a backlog:

EXAMPLE: keeping a diary may ease the logjam of work.

HEADWORD: bankrupt

CORE SENSE: (of a person or organization) declared in law as unable to pay

their debts:

SUBSENSE:

figurative

completely lacking in a particular good quality:

EXAMPLE: their cause is morally bankrupt.

(b) specialized case of the core sense, e.g.

HEADWORD: ball1

CORE SENSE: a single throw, kick, or hit of the ball in a game, in particular:

SUBSENSE:

Cricket

a delivery of the ball by the bowler to the batsman.

SUBSENSE:

Baseball

a pitch delivered outside the strike zone which the

batter does not attempt to hit.

HEADWORD: basement

CORE SENSE: the floor of a building which is partly or entirely below ground

level.

SUBSENSE:

Geology

the oldest formation of rocks underlying a particular

area.

Specialist Vocabulary

One of the most important uses of a dictionary is to provide explanations of terms

in specialized fields which are unfamiliar to a general user. Yet in many traditional

dictionaries the definitions have been written by specialists as if for other

specialists, and as a result the definitions are often opaque and difficult for the

general user to understand.

One of the primary aims of the

Oxford Dictionary of English

has been to break

down the barriers to understanding specialist vocabulary. The challenge has been,

on the one hand, to give information which is comprehensible, relevant, and

readable, suitable for the general user, while on the other hand maintaining the high

level of technical information and accuracy suitable for the more specialist user.

This has been achieved in some cases, notably entries for plants and animals and

chemical substances, by separating out technical information, eg Latin names,

chemical formulae, from the rest of the definition (shown immediately after a bullet).

For examples, see balloonfish and benzopyrene.

In other cases, it is achieved by giving additional explanatory information within the

definition itself, typically in a separate sentence. For examples, see curling and

cuttlebone.

As elsewhere, the purpose is to give information which is relevant and interesting,

aiming not just to define the word but also to describe and explain its context in the

real world. Additional information of this type, where it is substantial, is given in the

form of separate note ( ). For examples, see earth and Eocene.

An especially important feature of the

Oxford Dictionary of English

is the coverage

of animals and plants. In-depth research and a thorough review have been carried

out for animals and plants throughout the world and, as a result, a large number of

entries have been included which have never before been included in general

dictionaries. The style and presentation of these entries follow the general

principles for specialist vocabulary in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

: the entries

not only give the technical information, but also describe, in everyday English, the

appearance and other characteristics (of behaviour, medicinal or culinary use,

mythological significance, reason for the name, etc.) and the typical habitat and

distribution. For examples, see mesosaur, kowari and hiba.

Encyclopedic Material

Some British dictionaries do not include entries for the names of people and places

and other proper names. The argument for this is based on a distinction between

‘words’ and ‘facts’, by which dictionaries are about ‘words’ while encyclopedias and

other reference works are about ‘facts’. The distinction is an interesting theoretical

one but in practice there is a considerable overlap: names such as

Shakespeare

and

England

are as much part of the language as words such as

drama

language

, and belong in a large dictionary.

The

Oxford Dictionary of English

includes all those terms forming part of the

enduring common knowledge of English speakers, regardless of whether they are

classified as ‘words’ or ‘names’. The information given is the kind of information that

people are likely to need from a dictionary, however that information may be

traditionally classified. Both the style of definitions in the

Oxford Dictionary of

English

and the inclusion of additional material in separate blocks reflect this

approach.

The

Oxford Dictionary of English

includes more than 4,500 place-name entries,

4,000 biographical entries, and just under 3,000 other proper names. The entries

are designed to provide not just the basic facts (such as birth and death dates, full

name, and nationality), but also a brief context giving information about, for

example, a person's life and why he or she is important.

For a few really important encyclopedic entries - for example, countries - a fuller

treatment is given and additional information is given in a separate note ( ).

Grammar

In recent years grammar has begun to enjoy greater prominence than in previous

decades. It is once again being taught explicitly in state schools throughout Britain

and elsewhere. In addition there is a recognition that different meanings of a word

are closely associated with different lexical and syntactic patterns. The

Oxford

Dictionary of English

records and exemplifies the most important of these patterns

at the relevant senses of each word, thus giving guidance on language use as well

as word meaning.

For example, with the word bomb, it is possible to distinguish the main senses of

the verb simply on the basis of the grammar: whether the verb takes a direct object,

no direct object, or no direct object plus an obligatory adverbial:

CORE SENSE: attack *(a place or object)* with a bomb or bombs:

EXAMPLE: they bombed *the city* at dawn.

GRAMMAR: [with obj.]

(the asterisks match the direct object in the example with the bracketed item in

the definition)

CORE SENSE:

Brit. informal

move very quickly:

EXAMPLE: we were bombing *down the motorway* at breakneck speed.

GRAMMAR: [no obj., with adverbial of direction]

(asterisks show adverbial in example)

CORE SENSE:

informal

(of a film, play, or other event) fail badly:

EXAMPLE: it just became another big-budget film that bombed.

GRAMMAR: [no obj.]

This has particular relevance for a dictionary such as the

Oxford Dictionary of

English

, where the aim is to present information in such a way that it helps to

explain the structure of the language itself, not just the meanings of individual

senses. For this reason, special attention has been paid to the grammar of each

word, and grammatical structures are given explicitly.

Where possible, the syntactic behaviour of a word is presented directly: for

example, if a verb is normally found in a particular sense followed by a certain

preposition, this is indicated before the definition, in bold. For an example, see

build (build on).

In other cases, collocations which are typical of the word in use, though not

obligatory, are shown highlighted within the example sentence. For examples, see

cushy (a cushy number) and end (ended up in, end up with).

Great efforts have been made to use a minimum of specialist terminology.

Nevertheless, a small number of terms are essential in explaining the grammar of a

word. The less familiar terms are explained below. All terms are, of course, defined

and explained under their own entries in the dictionary.

Terms relating to nouns

Nouns and senses of nouns are generally categorized in this dictionary as being

either [mass noun] or [count noun]. A mass noun is one which is not ordinarily

found in the plural and is not used in the singular with the indefinite article ‘a’ (it is

normal to talk about ‘bacon’, for example, but not ‘a bacon’ or ‘three bacons’), while

a count noun is one which can be used with the indefinite article ‘a’ and can take a

plural (e.g. shirt, shirts).

For examples of mass nouns, see bacon, badminton and banking. By default all

nouns in this dictionary are to be regarded as count nouns unless stated otherwise.

The label [count noun] is used to mark those nouns and senses of nouns which

can take a plural where this is in contrast with an already stated mass noun. For

examples, compare the core sense and subsenses at ballet and brokerage.

However, there are particular groups of mass noun that can take a plural form in

certain circumstances, for instance when referring to different types of something

such as food (as in

the panel tasted a range of cheeses

). For reasons of space,

such uses are recorded in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

only when they are

particularly important. Some categories of mass noun that can take a plural

(although this may not be explicitly stated in the dictionary) are given below. The

Oxford Dictionary of English

is the official dictionary of the television word game

Countdown

, and the following list may be helpful for people who enjoy the

programme:

1Types or varieties of:

•food and drink, e.g. yogurt/yogurts, pasta/pastas, rum/rums.

•plants: e.g. clover/clovers, barley/barleys.

•fabric: e.g. gingham/ginghams, silk/silks.

•certain languages or subjects: e.g. English/Englishes, music/musics.

•metals and alloys: e.g. steel/steels, solder/solders.

•rocks: e.g. granite/granites, lava/lavas, clay/clays.

•chemical compounds: e.g. fluoride/fluorides, hydride/hydrides.

•other substances or materials: e.g. rind/rinds, soil/soils, sealskin/sealskins,

suncream/suncream.

2Portions or units of something, especially food and drink: e.g. lager (glasses/

bottles of lager = lagers), paella (portions of paella = paellas).

3Shades of colours: e.g. pink/pinks, scarlet/scarlets, grey/greys.

4An instance of:

•an action or process: e.g. completion (an instance of completing a property

sale = completions), genocide (act of genocide = genocides), lambing (an act

of lambing = lambings).

•a surgical operation: e.g. circumcision/circumcisions.

•an emotion, pain, or feeling: e.g. backache/backaches, grief (an instance or

cause of grief = griefs).

5An area of land of a specified type: e.g. bogland/boglands, terrain/terrains.

Other terms relating to nouns

[as modifier]: used to mark a noun which can be placed before another noun in

order to modify its meaning. For examples see boom and bedside.

[treated as sing.]: used to mark a noun which is plural in form but is used with a

singular verb, e.g. ‘mumps’ in

mumps is one of the major childhood diseases

‘genetics’ in

genetics has played a major role in this work

[treated as sing. or pl.]: used to mark a noun which can be used with either a

singular or a plural verb without any change in meaning or in the form of the

headword (often called

collective nouns

, because they typically denote groups of

people considered collectively), e.g.

the government are committed to this policy

the government is trying to gag its critics

[in sing.]: used to mark a noun which is used as a count noun but is never or rarely

found in the plural, e.g. ear in

an ear for rhythm and melody

Terms relating to verbs

[with obj.]: used to mark a verb which takes a direct object, i.e. is transitive (the

type of direct object being shown in brackets in the definition). For example, see

belabour.

[no obj.]: used to mark a verb which takes no direct object, i.e. is intransitive. For

example, see bristle.

[with adverbial]: used to mark a verb which takes an obligatory adverbial, typically

a prepositional phrase, without which the sentence in which the verb occurs would

sound unnatural or odd, e.g. barge into under barge.

Terms relating to adjectives

[attrib.]: used to mark an adjective which is normally used attributively, i.e. comes

before the noun which it modifies, e.g. certain in

a certain man

(not

the man is

certain

, which means something very different). Note that attributive use is

standard for many adjectives, especially those in specialist or technical fields: the

[attrib.] label is not used in such cases.

[predic.]: used to mark an adjective which is normally used predicatively, i.e. comes

after the verb, e.g. ajar in

the door was ajar

(not

the ajar door

[postpositive]: used to mark an adjective which is used postpositively, i.e. it

typically comes immediately after the noun which it modifies. Such uses are

unusual in English and generally arise because the adjective has been adopted

from a language where postpositive use is standard, e.g. galore in

there were

prizes galore for everything

Terms relating to adverbs

[sentence adverb]: used to mark an adverb which stands outside a sentence or

clause, providing commentary on it as a whole or showing the speaker’s or writer’s

attitude to what is being said, rather than the manner in which something was done.

Sentence adverbs most frequently express the speaker's or writer's point of view,

although they may also be used to set a context by stating a field of reference, e.g.

certainly.

[as submodifier]: used to mark an adverb which is used to modify an adjective or

another adverb, e.g. comparatively.

Evidence and Illustrative Examples

The information presented in the dictionary about individual words is based on

close analysis of how words behave in real, natural language. Behind every

dictionary entry are examples of the word in use - often hundreds and thousands of

them - which have been analysed to give information about typical usage, about

distribution (whether typically British or typically US, for example), about register

(whether informal or derogatory, for example), about currency (whether archaic or

dated, for example), and about subject field (whether used only in Medicine,

Finance, Chemistry, or Sport, for example).

1. Oxford English Corpus

The

Oxford Dictionary of English

was compiled using the Oxford English Corpus,

and new material added to this second edition has been derived from this source.

The Oxford English Corpus is the name for the Oxford University Press holdings of

language databases amounting to hundreds of million words of written and spoken

English in machine-readable form, available for computational analysis. Among

these language resources are the British National Corpus (100 million words), a

new corpus of comparable size, and the database of the Oxford Reading

Programme (see below). By using concordancing techniques, each word can be

viewed almost instantaneously in the immediate contexts in which it is used.

Whereas compilers of previous dictionaries were able to base their work on only a

limited selection of citations, lexicographers on the

Oxford Dictionary of English

analysed hundreds of real examples of each word to see how real language

behaves today.

Concordances show at a glance that some combinations of words (called

‘collocations’) occur together much more often than others. For example,

concordance entries might show that ‘end in’, ‘end the’, and ‘end up’ all occur quite

often. But are any of these combinations important enough to be given special

treatment in the dictionary?

Recent research has focused on identifying combinations that are not merely

frequent but also statistically significant. In the Oxford English Corpus, the two

words ‘end the’ occur very frequently together but they do not form a statistically

significant unit, since the word ‘the’ is the commonest in the language. The

combinations end up and end in, on the other hand, are shown to be more

significant and tell the lexicographer something about the way the verb end

behaves in normal use. Of course, a dictionary for general use cannot go into

detailed statistical analysis of word combinations, but it can present examples that

are typical of normal usage. In the

Oxford Dictionary of English

particularly

significant or important patterns are highlighted, in bold, e.g. end in, end up under

end.

For further details, see the section on Grammar.

2. Oxford Reading Programme

The citation database created by the Oxford Reading Programme is an ongoing

research project in which readers around the world select citations from a huge

variety of specialist and non-specialist sources in all varieties of English. This

database currently stands at around 77 million words and is growing at a rate of 7

million words a year.

Word Histories

The etymologies in standard dictionaries explain the language from which a word

was brought into English, the period at which it is first recorded in English, and the

development of modern word forms. While the

Oxford Dictionary of English

does

this, it also goes further. It explains sense development as well as morphological (or

form) development. Information is presented clearly and with a minimum of

technical terminology, and the perspective taken is that of the general user who

would like to know about word origins but who is not a philological specialist. In this

context, the history of how and why a particular meaning developed from an

apparently quite different older meaning is likely to be at least as interesting as, for

example, what the original form was in Latin or Greek.

For example, the word history for the word oaf shows how the present meaning

developed from the meaning ‘elf’, while the entry for conker shows how the word

may be related both to ‘conch’ and ‘conquer’ (explaining how the original game of

conkers was played with snail shells rather than the nut of the horse chestnut).

Additional special features of the

Oxford Dictionary of English

include ‘internal

etymologies’ and ‘folk etymologies’. Internal etymologies are given within entries to

explain the origin of particular senses, phrases, or idioms. For example, how did the

figurative use of red herring come about? Why do we call something a flash in the

pan? See the internal etymologies under red herring and flash.

The

Oxford Dictionary of English

presents the information in a straightforward,

user-friendly fashion immediately following the relevant definition.

In a similar vein, folk etymologies - those explanations which are unfounded but

nevertheless well known to many people - have traditionally simply been ignored in

dictionaries. The

Oxford Dictionary of English

gives an account of widely held but

often erroneous folk etymologies for the benefit of the general user, explaining

competing theories and assessing their relative merits where applicable. See the

folk etymologies at posh and snob.

Researching word histories is similar in some respects to archaeology: the

evidence is often partial or not there at all, and etymologists must make informed

decisions using the evidence available, however inadequate it may be. From time to

time new evidence becomes available, and the known history of a word may need

to be reconsidered. In this, the

Oxford Dictionary of English

has been able to draw

on the extensive expertise and ongoing research of the

Oxford English Dictionary

3. Specialist reading

A general corpus does not, by definition, contain large quantities of specialized

terminology. For this reason, a directed reading programme was set up specially

for the

Oxford Dictionary of English

, enabling additional research and collection of

citations in a number of neglected fields, for example food and cooking, health and

fitness, boats and sailing, photography, genetics, martial arts, and complementary

medicine.

4. Examples

The

Oxford Dictionary of English

contains many more examples of words in use

than any other comparable dictionary. Generally, they are there to show typical uses

of the word or sense. All examples are authentic, in that they represent actual

usage. In the past, dictionaries have used made-up examples, partly because not

enough authentic text was available and partly through an assumption that invented

examples were somehow better in that they could be tailored to the precise needs

of the dictionary entry. Such a view finds little favour today, and it is now generally

recognized that the ‘naturalness’ provided by authentic examples is of the utmost

importance in providing an accurate picture of language in use.

Usage Notes ( )

Interest in questions of good usage is widespread among English speakers

everywhere, and many issues are hotly debated. In the

Oxford Dictionary of

English

, traditional issues have been reappraised, and guidance is given on various

points, old and new. The aim is to help people to use the language more

accurately, more clearly, and more elegantly, and to give information and offer

reassurance in the face of some of the more baffling assertions about ‘correctness’

that are sometimes made.

This reappraisal has involved looking carefully at evidence of actual usage (in the

Oxford English Corpus, the citations collected by the Oxford Reading Programme,

and other sources) in order to find out where mistakes are actually being made,

and where confusion and ambiguity actually arise. The issues on which journalists

and others tend to comment have been reassessed and a judgement made about

whether their comments are justified.

From the 15th century onwards, traditionalists have been objecting to particular

senses of certain English words and phrases, for example ‘aggravate’, ‘due to’, and

‘hopefully’. Certain grammatical structures, too, have been singled out for adverse

comment, notably the split infinitive and the use of a preposition at the end of a

clause. Some of these objections are founded on very dubious arguments, for

example the notion that English grammatical structures should precisely parallel

those of Latin or that meaning change of any kind is inherently suspect. For

examples of notes on such issues, see preposition, due and aggravate.

The usage notes in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

take the view that English is

English, not Latin, and that English is, like all languages, subject to change. Good

usage is usage that gets the writer's message across, not usage that conforms to

some arbitrary rules that fly in the face of historical fact or current evidence. The

editors of the

Oxford Dictionary of English

are well aware that the prescriptions of

pundits in the past have had remarkably little practical effect on the way the

language is actually used. A good dictionary reports the language as it is, not as

the editors (or anyone else) would wish it to be, and the usage notes must give

guidance that accords with observed facts about present-day usage.

This is not to imply that the issues are straightforward or that there are simple

solutions, however. Much of the debate about use of language is highly political and

controversy is, occasionally, inevitable. Changing social attitudes have stigmatized

long-established uses such as the word ‘man’ to denote the human race in general,

for example, and have highlighted the absence of a gender-neutral singular

pronoun meaning both ‘he’ and ‘she’ (for which purpose ‘they’ is increasingly being

used). Similarly, words such as ‘race’ and ‘native’ are now associated with particular

problems of sensitivity in use, and the ways that disability is referred to have come

under close examination. The usage notes in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

offer

information and practical advice on such issues. For examples, see man, native

and disabled.

Standard English

Unless otherwise stated, the words and senses recorded in this dictionary are all

part of standard English; that is, they are in normal use in both speech and writing

everywhere in the world, at many different levels of formality, ranging from official

documents to casual conversation. Some words, however, are appropriate only in

particular contexts, and these are labelled accordingly. The technical term for a

particular level of use in language is register.

The

Oxford Dictionary of English

uses the following register labels:

formal:normally used only in writing, in contexts such as official documents.

informal:normally used only in contexts such as conversations or letters

among friends.

dated:no longer used by the majority of English speakers, but still

encountered occasionally, especially among the older generation.

archaic:very old-fashioned language, not in ordinary use at all today, but

sometimes used to give a deliberately old-fashioned effect or found

in works of the past that are still widely read.

historical:still used today, but only to refer to some practice or artefact that is

no longer part of the modern world, e.g. baldric and almoner.

literary:found only or mainly in literature written in an ‘elevated' style.

technical:normally used only in technical and specialist language, though not

necessarily restricted to any specific subject field.

rare: not in normal use.

humorous: used with the intention of sounding funny or playful.

dialect: not used in the standard language, but still widely used in certain

local regions of the English-speaking world. A distinction is made

between traditional dialect, which is generally to do with rural society

and agricultural practices which have mostly died out, and

contemporary dialect, where speakers may not even be aware that

the term is in fact a regionalism. The

Oxford Dictionary of English

aims to include the main contemporary dialect terms, but does not

set out to record traditional dialect.

offensive:language that is likely to cause offence, particularly racial offence,

whether the speaker intends it or not.

derogatory:language intended to convey a low opinion or cause personal

offence.

euphemistic:mild or indirect language used to avoid making direct reference to

something unpleasant or taboo.

vulgar slang:informal language that may cause offence, often because it refers to

the bodily functions of sexual activity or excretion, which are still

widely regarded as taboo.

World English

English is spoken as a first language by more than 300 million people throughout

the world, and used as a second language by many millions more. It is the

language of international communication in trade, diplomacy, sport, science,

technology, and countless other fields.

The main regional standards are British, US and Canadian, Australian and New

Zealand, South African, Indian, West Indian, and SE Asian. Within each of these

regional varieties, a number of highly differentiated local dialects may be found. For

example, within British English, Scottish and Irish English have a long history and a

number of distinctive features, which have in turn influenced particular North

American and other varieties.

The scope of a dictionary such as the

Oxford Dictionary of English

, given the

breadth of material it aims to cover, must be limited in the main to the vocabulary of

the standard language throughout the world rather than local dialectal variation.

Nevertheless, the

Oxford Dictionary of English

includes thousands of regionalisms

encountered in standard contexts in the different English-speaking areas of the

world. For examples, see bakkie, larrikin, ale, history-sheeter, sufferation.

The underlying approach has been to get away from the traditional, parochial

notion that ‘correct’ English is spoken only in England and more particularly only in

Oxford or London. A network of consultants in all parts of the English-speaking

world has assisted in this by giving information and answering queries - by email,

on a regular, often daily basis - on all aspects of the language in a particular region.

Often, the aim has been to find out whether a particular word, sense, or expression,

well known and standard in British English, is used anywhere else. The picture that

emerges is one of complex interactions among an overlapping set of regional

standards.

The vast majority of words and senses in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

are

common to all the major regional standard varieties of English, but where important

local differences exist, the

Oxford Dictionary of English

records them. There are

more than 14,000 geographical labels on words and senses in this dictionary, but

this contrasts with more than ten times that number which are not labelled at all.

The complexity of the overall picture has necessarily been simplified, principally for

reasons of space and clarity of presentation. For example, a label such as ‘chiefly

Brit.’ implies but does not state that a term is not standard in American English,

though it may nevertheless be found in some local varieties in the US. In addition,

the label ‘US’ implies that the use is typically US (and probably originated in the

US) and is not standard in British English, but it might be found in other varieties

such as Australian or South African English. The label ‘Brit.’, on the other hand,

implies that the use is found typically in standard British English but is not found in

standard American English, though it may be found elsewhere.

Spelling

It is often said that English spelling is both irregular and illogical, and it is certainly

true that it is only indirectly related to contemporary pronunciation. English spelling

reflects not modern pronunciation but the pronunciation of the 14th century, as

used by Chaucer. This traditional spelling was reinforced in the 16th and 17th

centuries, in particular through the influence of the works of Shakespeare and the

Authorized Version of the Bible. However, in the two centuries between Chaucer

and Shakespeare English pronunciation had undergone huge changes, but spelling

had failed to follow.

In the 18th century, standard spelling became almost completely fixed. The

dictionaries written in this period, particularly Samuel Johnson's

Dictionary of the

English Language

(1755), helped establish this national standard, which, with only

minor change and variation, is the standard accepted in English today. The complex

history of the English language, together with the absence of any ruling body

imposing ‘spelling reform’, has ensured that many idiosyncrasies and anomalies in

standard spelling have not only arisen but have also been preserved.

The

Oxford Dictionary of English

gives advice and information on spelling,

particularly those cases which are irregular or which otherwise cause difficulty for

native speakers. The main categories are summarized below.

Variant spellings

The main form of each word given in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

is always the

standard British spelling. If there is a standard variant, e.g. a standard US spelling

variant, this is indicated at the top of the entry and is cross-referred if its alphabeti-

cal position is more than three entries distant from the main entry. For examples,

compare filo/phyllo and aluminium/aluminum.

Other variants, such as archaic, old-fashioned, or informal spellings, are cross-

referred to the main entry, but are not themselves listed at the parent entry. For

example, compare Esquimau/Eskimo.

-ise or ize?

Many verbs end with the suffix –ize or ise. The form –ize has been in use in

English since the 16th century, and, despite what some people think, is not an

Americanism. The alternative form –ise is found more commonly in British than in

American English. For most verbs of this class either –ize or –ise is acceptable; this

dictionary has used –ize spellings, with –ise given as an equally correct, alternative

spelling. For some words, however, -ise is obligatory: first, where it forms part of a

larger word element, such as –mise (= sending) in compromise, and –prise (=

taking) in surprise; and second, in verbs corresponding to nouns with –s- in the

stem, such as advertise and televise.

Hyphenation

Although standard spelling in English is fixed, the use of hyphenation is not. In

standard English a few general rules are followed, and these are outlined below.

Hyphenation of noun compounds: There is no hard-and-fast rule saying whether,

for example, airstream, air stream, or air-stream is correct. All forms are found in

use: all are recorded in the Oxford English Corpus and other standard texts.

However, there is a broad tendency to avoid hyphenation for noun compounds in

modern English (except when used to show grammatical function: see below). Thus

there is, for example, a preference for airstream rather than air-stream and for air

raid rather than air-raid. Although this is a tendency in both British and US English

there is an additional preference in US English for the form to be one word and in

British English for the form to be two words, e.g. buck tooth tends to be the

commonest form in British English, while bucktooth tends to be the commonest

form in US English. To save space and avoid confusion, only one of the three

potential forms of each noun compound (the standard British one) is used as the

headword form in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

. This does not, however, imply

that other forms are incorrect or not used.

Grammatical function: Hyphens are also used to perform certain grammatical

functions. When a noun compound made up of two separate words (e.g. credit

card) is placed before another noun and used to modify it, the general rule is that

the noun compound becomes hyphenated, e.g.

I used my credit card

but

credit-card

debt

. This sort of regular alternation is seen in example sentences in the

Oxford

Dictionary of English

but is not otherwise explicitly mentioned in the dictionary

entries.

A similar alternation is found in compound adjectives such as well intentioned.

When used predicatively (i.e. after the verb), such adjectives are unhyphenated, but

when used attributively (i.e. before the noun), they are hyphenated:

his remarks

were well intentioned

but

a well-intentioned remark

A general rule governing verb compounds means that, where a noun compound is

two words (e.g. beta test), any verb derived from it is normally hyphenated (to

beta-test:

the system was beta-tested

). Similarly, verbal nouns and adjectives are

more often hyphenated than ordinary noun or adjective compounds (e.g. glass-

making, nation-building).

Phrasal verbs such as ‘take off’, ‘take over’, and ‘set up’ are not hyphenated, but

nouns formed from phrasal verbs are hyphenated, or, increasingly, written as one

word:

the plane accelerated for take-off

;

a hostile takeover

;

he didn’t die

it was a

set-up

. There is an increasing tendency to hyphenate the verb form as well (

food

available to take-away

) but this is not good writing style and should be avoided.

Inflection

Compared with other European languages, English has comparatively few

inflections, and those that exist are remarkably regular. We add an -

to most nouns

to make a plural; we add

-ed

to most verbs to make a past tense or a past

participle, and

-ing

to make a present participle.

Occasionally, a difficulty arises: for example, a single consonant after a short

stressed vowel is doubled before adding

-ed

-ing

(hum, hums, humming,

hummed). In addition, words borrowed from other languages generally bring their

foreign inflections with them, causing problems for English speakers who are not

proficient in those languages.

In all such cases, guidance is given in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

. The main

areas covered are outlined below.

Verbs

The following forms are regarded as regular and are therefore not shown in the

dictionary:

•third person singular present forms adding -

to the stem (or

-es

to stems ending

-s

-x

-z

-sh

, or soft

-ch

), e.g. find

→

finds or change

→

changes

•past tenses and past participles dropping a final silent

and adding

-ed

to the

stem, e.g. change

→

changed or dance

→

danced

•present participles dropping a final silent

and adding

-ing

to the stem, e.g.

change

→

changing or dance

→

dancing

Other forms are given in the dictionary, notably for:

•verbs which inflect by doubling a consonant, e.g. bat

→

batting, batted

•verbs ending in

-y

which inflect by changing

-y

-i

, e.g. try

→

tries, tried

•verbs in which past tense and past participle do not follow the regular

-ed

pattern, e.g. feel

→

past and past participle felt; awake

→

past awoke; past

participle awoken

•present participles which add

-ing

but retain a final

(in order to make clear that

the pronunciation of

remains soft), e.g. singe

→

singeing

Nouns

Plurals formed by adding

-s

(or

-es

when they end in

-s

-x

-z

-sh

, or soft

-ch

) are

regarded as regular and are not shown.

Other plural forms are given in the dictionary, notably for:

•nouns ending in

-i

-o

, e.g. agouti

→

agoutis; albino

→

albinos

•nouns ending in

-a

-um

, or

-us

which are or appear to be Latinate forms, e.g.

alumna

→

alumnae; spectrum

→

spectra; alveolus

→

alveoli

•nouns ending in

-y

, e.g. fly

→

flies

•nouns with more than one plural form, e.g. storey

→

storeys or stories

•nouns with plurals showing a change in the stem, e.g. foot

→

feet

•nouns with plurals unchanged from the singular form, e.g. sheep

→

sheep

Adjectives

The following forms for comparative and superlative are regarded as regular and

are not shown in the dictionary:

•words of one syllable adding

-er

and

-est

, e.g. great

→

greater, greatest

•words of one syllable ending in silent

, which drop the

-e

and add

-er

and

-est

e.g. brave

→

braver, bravest

•words which form the comparative and superlative by adding ‘more’ and ‘most’

Other forms are given in the dictionary, notably for:

•adjectives which form the comparative and superlative by doubling a final

consonant, e.g. hot

→

hotter, hottest

•two-syllable adjectives which form the comparative and superlative with

-er

and

est

(typically adjectives ending in

-y

and their negative forms), e.g. happy

→

happier, happiest; unhappy

→

unhappier, unhappiest

Pronunciations

Generally speaking, native speakers of English do not need information about the

pronunciation for ordinary, everyday words such as bake, baby, beach, bewilder,

boastful, or budget. For this reason, no pronunciations are given for such words

(or their compounds and derivatives) in the

Oxford Dictionary of English

. Words

such as baba ganoush, baccalaureate, beatific, bijouterie, bucolic, and

buddleia, on the other hand, are less familiar and may give problems. Similarly,

difficulties are often encountered in pronouncing names of people and places,

especially foreign ones, such as Chechnya, Kieslowski, and Althusser.

In the

Oxford Dictionary of English

, the principle followed is that pronunciations are

given where they are likely to cause problems for the native speaker of English, in

particular for foreign words, foreign names, scientific and other specialist terms,

rare words, words with unusual stress patterns, and words where there are

alternative pronunciations or where there is a dispute about the standard

pronunciation.

The

Oxford Dictionary of English

uses the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) to

represent the standard accent of English as spoken in the south of England

(sometimes called Received Pronunciation or RP). The transcriptions reflect

pronunciation as it actually is in modern English, unlike some longer-established

systems, which reflect the standard pronunciation of broadcasters and public

schools in the 1930s. It is recognized that, although the English of southern

England is the pronunciation given, many variations are heard in standard speech

in other parts of the English-speaking world.

The symbols used for English words, with their values, are given below. In multi-

syllable words the symbol ' is used to show that the following syllable is stressed

(as in

k@"bal

); the symbol

indicates a secondary stress (as in

%kal@"bri;s

Consonants:

, and

have their usual English

values. Other symbols are used as follows:

get

loch

this

yes

chip

ring

she

jar

thin

decision

Vowels

short vowels long vowels diphthongs triphthongs

(

;

indicates length

)

cat

arm

VI@

fire

bed

hair

how

aU@

sour

ago

her

day

sit

see

cosy

saw

near

hot

too

boy

run

poor

put

(

) before /l/, /m/, or /n/ indicates that the syllable may be realized with a syllabic l,

m, or n, rather than with a vowel and consonant, e.g. /

"bVt

(

)

/ rather than /

"bVt@n

(

) indicates an r that is sometimes sounded when a vowel follows, as in drawer,

cha-chaing.

Foreign pronunciations

Foreign words and phrases, whether naturalized or not, are always given an

anglicized pronunciation. The anglicized pronunciation represents the normal

pronunciation used by native speakers of standard English (who may not be

speakers of other languages) when using the word in an English context. A foreign

pronunciation is also given for words taken from other languages (principally

French, Dutch, German, Italian, Russian, and Spanish) where this is appreciably

different from the anglicized form and where the other language is familiar to a

reasonable number of English speakers.

Where the native form of a foreign place name is given in addition to the anglicized

form, only the foreign pronunciation of this form is given.

Foreign-language transcriptions are based on current national standards. Regional

variations have not been given, except in the case of Spanish transcriptions, where

both Castilian and American Spanish variants are given (if distinct). Transcriptions

are broad, and many symbols, identical to those used for transcribing English, have

similar values to those of RP. In a few cases, where there is no English equivalent

to a foreign sound, a symbol has been added to the inventory. The additional

symbols used to represent foreign pronunciations are given on the right.

Consonants

(German)

(French)

(Italian)

(Portuguese)

(Spanish)

(Italian)

(Hungarian)

French ‘r’

all other values of ‘r’ in

other featured languages.

Ehrlich, gemütlich

Monseigneur, Auvergne, Daubigny

Emilia-Romagna

Minho

España, Buñuel

Bilbao

Burgos

Cagliari

Magyarország

Anvers, Arles

(German) Braunschweig

(Italian) Alberti

(Russian) Grozny

(Spanish) Algeciras, zarzuela

Vowels

Short vowels

(German) Abitur

(Dutch) Nederland

(French) abbé

(Italian) Croce

(Spanish) Albacete

(French) auberge

(Italian) Palio

(Spanish) Cortes

(French) Bonnard

(German) durchkomponiert

(Greek) Dhílos

(Hungarian) Brassó

(Italian) Borgia

(French) Pasteur

{

(French) Montreux

(French) Anjou

(Italian) Duccio

(Spanish) Asunción

long vowels

(

;

indicates length

)

(Dutch) Den Haag

(German) Aachen

(German) Wehrmacht

(Dutch) Nederland

(Irish) Gaeltacht

(German) verboten

(Hungarian) Brassó

{;

(German) Gasthöfe

(French) cru

(German) München

(Irish) Dáil

(Russian) Arkhangelsk

(French) Horta

(German) gemütlich

nasalized vowels diphthongs

(

indicates nasality

)

pincette

(German) Gleichschaltung

cordon bleu

(French) Danton, Lac Leman

(French) Amiens, Rodin

(French) Verdun

(French) arrondissement

used for anglicized

French pronunciations

}

New Oxford Thesaurus of English

Introduction

The

New Oxford Thesaurus of English (NOTE)

has been compiled using new

evidence in new ways, in order to create an original work of reference that will be

most useful to a wide range of users for many different purposes. It is an indepen-

dent work of reference in its own right, but may also be viewed as a companion title

to the

Oxford Dictionary of English (ODE)

. Where

ODE

presented a new, more

accurate picture of the language than had previously been possible,

NOTE

elaborates the theme, with lists of words grouped together according to their

similarity in meaning and checked against the evidence for actual usage, as found

in the British National Corpus and the database of the Oxford Reading Programme.

It is an essential companion for anyone who wants to expand their vocabulary and

improve their creative writing skills, and for aficionados of word games.

The word

thesaurus

comes from a Greek word meaning 'treasure house'. All

thesauruses contain lists of words that are linked by having a similar meaning, but

this thesaurus goes much further: it also contains antonyms (words with opposite

meanings), related terms, noun lists, detailed studies of closely related synonyms,

advice on confusable words, and other features. A common everyday use for a

thesaurus is as an aid in solving crossword puzzles, and such users will find that

the coverage in this title is fuller and more focused than most. But this is by no

means the only function of an alphabetical thesaurus. Some people will use this

title to look up a familiar word, in order to find a less familiar word which may be on

the tip of their tongue. Others will use it for guidance in choosing

le mot juste

, to

help improve the communicative power and accuracy of their writing, in an essay or

report for example. Whatever the purpose, the user can be assured of finding a rich

and varied selection of words with similar meaning, a selection that has been

systematically enhanced by computerized checking and cross-checking.

Selection of entries

The primary purpose of the thesaurus is to give lists of synonyms for the common

everyday words of English: words with roughly the same meaning as the entry word

or 'headword'. Not every word has synonyms. Some words, especially terms

denoting kinds of animals, plants, and physical objects, have no synonyms, so they

do not get entries in a thesaurus. The user will look in vain for synonyms of

gerbil

and

geranium

. There is an entry for

squirrel

, but it is not there for the noun denoting

the animal, which has no synonym. The entry is there in order to give synonyms for

the phrasal verb

squirrel something away

, and as a reference point for a table

() of different kinds of squirrels and related rodents.

The words selected as entries are general words that non-specialists are likely to

want to look up. It is the job of a dictionary, not a thesaurus, to explain the

meanings of unusual words, such as

supererogatory

, so such words do not get an

alphabetical entry here. However,

supererogatory

is given as a synonym at entries

for the more familiar words

inessential

needless

, and

unnecessary

. A thesaurus

can thus lead the user from the familiar to the unfamiliar, improving his or her word

power.

Tables (A table is displayed as a in this model.)

A special feature of the

New Oxford Thesaurus of English

is its 480 tables ( ),

which are included throughout to give additional information relevant to particular

headwords. They range from lists of different breeds or kinds of animals, birds, and

plants to lists of famous artists, architects, and scientists. For example, at the entry

for

actor/actress

there is a selection of synonyms for the words themselves,

together with a comprehensive list of well-known actors and actresses of both

stage and screen.

Certain headwords are included despite the fact that they have no synonyms, in

order to direct the user to a table ( ). For example, at the entry for

volcano

the user will find no synonyms but instead a pointer to a list of major volcanoes,

together with their location and the date of their most recent eruption. Tables

() covering the essential vocabulary of such fields as art, economics,

computing, and cricket are also included. The provision of these tables ( )

makes this thesaurus an invaluable aid to crossword-solving and a fascinating

source of encyclopedic information on subjects as diverse as marsupials and

military leaders.

Homonyms

Homonyms are words that are written the same but which have completely different

and unrelated meanings. For example, the

bark

of a dog is a completely different

word from the

bark

of a tree. There are three different words spelled

bay

, and four

spelled

sound

. Some words that are written with the same spelling are pronounced

differently. In such cases, a note on pronunciation is given, either by giving a word

that rhymes with the headword, e.g.

wind1 (rhymes with 'tinned') noun

wind2 (rhymes with 'mind') verb

or by stating where the stress falls, e.g.

defect1 (stress on first syllable) noun

defect2 (stress on second syllable) verb

Synonyms

It is sometimes argued that no two words have exactly the same meaning. Even

words as similar in meaning as

and

shut

may have slightly different nuances.

Closing

a shop implies that the shop is no longer open for business, so no one can

come in. On the other hand,

shutting

a shop implies that the shop is being made

secure, so nothing can be taken out. A similar distinction is found between

strong

and

powerful

powerful enemies

may threaten from outside, but a

strong defence

the inside will deter them from attacking. However, these are unusually subtle

distinctions. For most practical purposes,

and

shut

have the same meaning,

as do

strong

and

powerful

. Other synonyms are more distant, or emphasize

different aspects of the meaning. For example, another close synonym of strong is

muscular

, but it places much more emphasis on physical strength. By contrast,

stalwart

and

staunch

are synonyms that emphasize more abstract aspects of this

meaning of

strong

Forceful

secure

durable

loud

intense

bright

, and

alcoholic

are

other close synonyms of

strong

, but all in quite different senses. They are not, of

course, synonyms of each other.

In this title, the broadest possible definition of the term 'synonym' has been

adopted, as being the one that will be most useful to users. Even words whose

meaning is quite distantly related to that of the headword are listed if they can be

used to get the same message across in appropriate contexts. Synonyms are not

restricted to single words, and some expressions can be quite colourful: for

example, the synonyms for

tinker

include not only

fiddle (with)

and

try to mend

, but

also

rearrange the deckchairs on the Titanic

The synonyms in each entry are grouped together in synonym sets. Major synonym

sets correspond roughly to different senses of a word in a dictionary. Each major

synonym set is numbered, and many have more delicate subdivisions, which are

separated by semicolons. At the start of almost every synonym set is a 'core

synonym': the term which is closest in meaning to the headword in that particular

sense. Core synonyms are displayed in BOLD CAPITALS. Only a very few words

have no core synonym. Some synonym sets have more than one core synonym; for

example at

avant-garde

(adjective), both

innovative

and

advanced

are very close in

meaning to the headword, so both are given as core synonyms. Two different core

synonyms within the same sense group may emphasize slightly different aspects of

the meaning of the headword. For example, at

dutiful

, the first core synonym given

conscientious

, followed by a group of words closely related to this aspect of its

meaning. Then, after a semicolon, a second core synonym,

obedient

, is given, with

a further group of synonyms grouped around that aspect of the meaning.

Synonyms whose usage is restricted in some way, for example regionalisms or very

formal or informal words, are placed at the end of each major synonym set and

labelled accordingly. See Register below.

Illustrative examples

Almost every synonym set in

NOTE

is illustrated with a carefully chosen example of

the word in use in the relevant sense. These are authentic examples of natural

usage taken from the British National Corpus and the files of the Oxford Reading

Programme (see Linguistic evidence below). They have occasionally been lightly

edited to make the sense more apparent or to eliminate digressions. The examples

can therefore be trusted for guidance on using unfamiliar words in an idiomatic way.

Where part of an example is displayed in bold type, this indicates that some or all

of the synonyms can be substituted for that particular phrase, not just for the

headword alone. Thus at

attached

, the example given is:

she was very attached to her brother.

In this case the synonyms are all equivalent to

attached to

FOND OF, devoted to, full of regard for, full of admiration for; affectionate

towards, tender towards, caring towards; <informal> mad about, crazy

about, nuts about.

In the entry for

impute

, the example given is:

he imputes selfish views to me.

This is followed by the synonym set:

ATTRIBUTE, ascribe, assign, credit, accredit, chalk up; connect with,

associate with, lay on, lay at the door of; <informal> pin on, stick on.

The synonyms up to the first semicolon are synonyms for

impute

, and those after it

are synonyms for

impute to

Linguistic evidence

The compilers of

NOTE

have had access to two major linguistic resources, the

British National Corpus and the files of the Oxford Reading Programme. The British

National Corpus is a body of 100 million words of English books, newspapers, and

transcribed speech in machine-readable form, used for linguistic and lexicographi-

cal research. The Oxford Reading Programme is a database of citations collected

by Oxford's international network of readers, currently amounting to over 77 million

words and increasing by about 7 million words every year.

In both these resources, the context of every occurrence of a given word can be

viewed in a few seconds, making it possible to see more clearly than ever before

how words are actually used. This method was used not only to confirm whether a

word has senses for which there are suitable synonyms and to check the sense of

words being selected as synonyms but also to actively find synonyms which have

not previously been recorded. The British National Corpus, in particular, was also

used to obtain the sentences and phrases given as examples of usage.

Phrasal verbs and idiomatic phrases

English is full of idiomatic expressions-phrases whose meaning is more than the

sum of their parts. For example,

a shot in the dark

means 'a guess', while

a shot in

the arm

means 'a boost'. Neither of these meanings has very much to do with more

literal meanings of

shot

. In this thesaurus, particular care has been given to make a

full selection of idiomatic expressions and to give synonyms for them. If a word is

used as both a noun and a verb, the idiomatic expressions are listed as subentries

under the part of speech in which the word is used. Thus

by the book

is given under

the noun senses of

book

, while

book in

is given under the verb senses.

Full coverage is also given to phrasal verbs in this thesaurus. Phrasal verbs are

expressions such as

book in

and

turn out

, consisting of a verb plus a particle. The

meaning of a phrasal verb is often very different from that of the basic verb; for

example, the meanings of

take off

are quite distinct from the meanings of

take

Phrasal verbs are listed as idiomatic expressions under the main verb entry.

Informal usage is more prevalent than it was a few years ago. Even in quite formal

contexts, people may be heard using slang expressions, while the use of swear

words and taboo words is on the increase. Taboos generally are weakening, though

more so in Australia, where

bastard

is almost equivalent to British

chap

, and less so

in the USA, where taboos are still strong in southern States such as Texas. This

thesaurus contains a rich selection of informal and rude synonyms for more formal

expressions. Users who wish to avoid offensive words may treat the restrictive

labels as warning notices.

Most of the synonyms given are, of course, part of standard English; that is, they

are in normal use in both speech and writing everywhere in the world, at many

different levels of formality, ranging from official documents to casual conversation.

These general synonyms are given first in each synonym set. Some words,

however, are appropriate only in particular contexts, and these are placed after the

standard expressions and labelled accordingly. The technical term for these

differences in levels of usage is 'register'. The main register labels used in this

thesaurus are the following:

informal:normally only used in contexts such as conversations or letters

between friends, e.g.

swig

as a synonym for

drink

vulgar slang:informal language that may cause offence, usually because it refers

to bodily functions.

formal:normally only used in writing, in contexts such as official

documents, e.g.

dwelling

as a synonym for

home

technical:normally only used in technical and specialist language, though not

necessarily restricted to any specific field, e.g.

littoral

as a synonym

for

beach

. Words used in specific fields are given appropriate

labels, e.g.

medicine

Christianity

poetic/literary:found only or mainly in poetry or in literature written in an 'elevated'

style, e.g.

ambrosial

as a synonym for

delicious

dated:still used, but normally only by the older generation, e.g.

measure

one's length

as a synonym

for fall down

historical:still used today, but only to refer to some practice or article that is

no longer part of the modern world, e.g.

crinoline

as a synonym for

petticoat

humorous:used with the intention of sounding funny or playful, e.g.

termino-

logical inexactitude

as a synonym for

lie

archaic:very old-fashioned language, not in ordinary use at all today, but

sometimes used to give a deliberately old-fashioned effect or found

in works of the past that are still widely read, e.g.

aliment

as a

synonym for

food

rare:not in common use, e.g.

acclivitous

as a synonym for

steep

World English

It is an oft-repeated truism that English is now a world language. In this thesaurus,

particular care has been taken to include synonyms from every variety of English,

not just British, and when these are exclusively or very strongly associated with a

region of the world they are labelled as such.

The main regional standards are British (abbreviated to <Brit.>), North American

(<N. Amer.>), Australian and New Zealand (<Austral./NZ>), South African (<S.

African>), Indian (in the sense of the variety of English found throughout the

subcontinent), and West Indian (<W. Indian>). Only if the distinction is very clear is

any finer labelling used, as with

beer parlour

, a Canadian synonym for

bar

Scottish, Irish, and Northern English are varieties within the British Isles containing

distinctive vocabulary items of their own. The main synonyms found as regional

terms of this kind are listed here and labelled accordingly.

The term for something found mainly or only in a particular country or region

(although it may be mentioned in any variety of English) is identified by an

indication such as '<<in France>>'. An example is

gîte

(as a synonym for

cottage

Many regionally restricted terms are informal, rather than being part of the standard

language. Writers in the northern hemisphere in search of local colour may be

delighted to learn that an Australian synonym for

sordid

scungy

, while Australian

writers may find it equally useful to be given the equivalent terms in Britain,

manky

and

grotty

Opposites

Many synonym sets are followed by one or more words that have the opposite

meaning from the headword, often called 'antonyms'. There are several different

kinds of antonym.

Tr u e

and

false

are absolute antonyms, with no middle ground.

Logically, a statement is either true or false, but cannot be slightly true or rather

false.

Hot

and

cold

, on the other hand, are antonyms with gradations of meaning: it

makes perfectly good sense to say that something is rather hot or very cold, and

there are a number of words (

warm

tepid

cool

) which represent intermediate

stages. It makes sense to ask about something "How hot is it?" but that commits

the speaker to the notion that it is hot at least to some extent. So

hot

and

cold

are

at opposite ends of a continuum, rather than being absolutes.

For many words, there is no single word that counts as an antonym, but there may

be a phrase that gets the opposite meaning across. For example, what is the

opposite of

senile

? There is no exact antonym, but the phrase

in the prime of life

gets the opposite meaning across. In this title the broadest possible definition has

been adopted, giving the maximum amount of information to the user. In some

cases, a phrasal antonym is given for a phrasal subentry, e.g.

bottle things up

as an

antonym for

let off steam

The antonyms given in this thesaurus are not the only possible opposites, but they

are usually the furthest in meaning from the headword. By looking up the 'opposite'

word as an entry in its own right, the user will generally find a much larger range of

antonyms to choose from. For example, at the entry for

delete

the user will find:

-OPPOSITE(S) add, insert.

Both

add

and

insert are

entries in their own right.

Related terms

A special feature of

NOTE

is that it gives not only synonyms and opposites but also

other related terms, especially for concrete nouns such as

milk

(where

lactic

is not

a synonym, but a word with a related meaning) and

town

(

municipal

urban

, and

oppidan

). There are two types of related words: the first are adjectives which

usually mean 'relating to' the headword but have a different origin (e.g.

lactic

for

milk

) and which may therefore not spring to mind as quickly as a straightforward

derivative such as

milky

. The second type is typically a word very closely associated

with the headword, but with a different meaning. For example, a related word may

denote a part of the thing denoted by the headword, or it may denote a particular

form of this thing. Thus, at

barrel

, the related words given are

cooper

stave

, and

hoop

- a maker of barrels, and two important components of a barrel.

Combining forms

Combining forms are given after related terms. These are very similar to the first

kind of related terms, but in the form of a prefix or suffix that is used in combination

with other elements, e.g.

oeno

- with the sense 'wine', as in

oenology

, or

-vorous

with the sense 'eat', as in

carnivorous

Awkward synonyms and confusables ( )

One thing a plain list of synonyms cannot do is help the user choose between them

by describing their nuances and connotations. For instance, the words

blunt

candid

forthright

frank

, and

outspoken

are all given as synonyms of each other,

because they all have roughly the same meaning. But there are subtle differences.

This set comprises one of the 120 studies of 'Awkward Synonyms' in the

New

Oxford Thesaurus of English

, devoted to explaining the differences in meaning

between close synonyms. The distinctions are based on careful analysis of actual

usage as recorded in the British National Corpus, and examples of typical usage

are given, selected from the British National Corpus and the citation collection of

the Oxford Reading Programme.

The other type of article displayed as a note ( ), 'Confusables', compares words

which may cause difficulty for the opposite reason to 'awkward synonyms': they are

usually similar in form, as are

militate

and

mitigate

, and sometimes even pronounced

the same, as are

principal

and

principle

, but are very different in meaning.

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

Introduction

Since 1953, all updated editions of the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

have built

on their predecessors, and the fifth edition is no exception to this rule. The

character of the

Dictionary

, responding to its users, changes with each new edition,

but without the work of earlier editors it would not have been possible to compile

what is the most comprehensive, as well as the most extensive, version of the

Dictionary

The dictionary now runs to well over 20,000 quotations, and represents over 3,000

authors: over 2,000 quotations are completely new additions, and we have also

drawn on our other recent dictionaries, in particular the

Oxford Dictionary of

Twentieth Century Quotations

published in print in 1998. Certain categories of

material have, after a gap of many years, been restored: proverbs and nursery

rhymes will now be found here. (It has been clear from correspondents over the

years that many of our users expect to be able to find this material in the

Dictionary

For the first time, the

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

gives proper place to the

sacred texts of world religions. This is of course appropriate to a multicultural age,

but it has also been fascinating to see how words and phrases from these sources

are already permeating the English language. When the American physicist Robert

Oppenheimer witnessed the explosion of the first atomic bomb in New Mexico in

1945, he commented, `I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the

Bhagavad Gita

, "I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.”' We now have the

relevant verse from the

Bhagavadgita

: `I [Krishna] am all-powerful Time which

destroys all things.' The closing words of Eliot's

The Waste Land

, `Shantih, shantih,

shantih', are cross-referred to their sources, the

Upanishads

, with the translation:

'Peace! Peace! Peace!'

In 1992, Brian Keenan's account of his time as a hostage,

An Evil Cradling

received wide publicity. It may however be less well known that the title of the book

was taken from a verse of the Koran: `You shall be...mustered into Gehenna - an

evil cradling!' The heroine of an earlier book, Nevil

Shute's A Town Like Alice

(first

published in 1950, and subsequently twice filmed) quotes directly from the Koran:

`if ye be kind towards women and fear to wrong them, God is well acquainted with

what ye do.'

Sometimes the relationship is an echo rather than a direct borrowing. Confucius

tells us that `A ruler who governs his state by virtue is like the north polar star,

which remains in its place while all the other stars revolve around it,' and we are at

once reminded of the assertion of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar: `I am constant as

the northern star.' At other times, we are made aware of a common tradition: the

12th-century rabbi Eleazar of Worms states that `The highest sacrifice is a broken

and a contrite heart,' and we recall the words of the psalm, `a broken and a contrite

heart, O God, thou shalt not despise.'

Oxford dictionaries draw their strength from a constant monitoring of the language,

and it is appropriate that the most up-to-date quotations in the news can be found

here, with politicians as always to the fore. Bill Clinton reflects on the relationship

that should not have occurred (`[It] was not appropriate. In fact, it was wrong'), and

his wife Hillary on the nature of marriage (`the only people who count...are the two

that are in it'). George Mitchell looks forward somewhat ruefully to the peace

negotiations in Northern Ireland (`Nobody ever said it would be easy - and that was

an understatement'), and Bertie Ahern celebrates his achievement (`It is a day we

should treasure'). Tony Benn, whose entry spans 30 years, comments crisply,

`When I think of Cool Britannia, I think of old people dying of hypothermia.' Barbara

Castle gives her recipe for longevity, `I will fight for what I believe in until I drop

dead. And that's what keeps you alive.' Seamus Heaney, in his funeral address,

reflects movingly on the death of Ted Hughes: `No death outside my immediate

family has left me more bereft. No death in my lifetime has hurt poets more.'

Jeremy Paxman takes a firm line on conformity to an official line: `Speaking for

myself, if there is a message I want to be off it.'

While it is important that we cover the up to date, the

Oxford Dictionary of

Quotations

should also be the source in which references in older writers likely to

be encountered today can be checked. Two books recently published in the Oxford

World's Classics editions make the point. Robert Fraser's abridgement of Fraser's

The Golden Bough

, published in 1994, carried the original epigraph from

Macaulay's The Battle of Lake Regillus

, and the often-quoted lines

The priest who slew the slayer,

And shall himself be slain

can now be found in this dictionary.

In another book now available in the World's Classics, Rider Haggard's

King

Solomon's Mines

, an allusion is made to the figure of `Hamilton Tighe'. The origin,

and explanation, of this reference can now be found in quotations from `The

Legend of Hamilton Tighe' by Richard Barham. The growth in popularity of audio

cassettes is another trend of which we have taken note, since through this medium

our users may well come into contact with the prose and poetry of an earlier age.

It is pleasing that in some cases we have been able to improve on the information

provided in the last edition, as for example for the quotation then attributed to

Robert Burton: `Every thing, saith Epictetus, hath two handles, the one to be held

by, the other not.' We now have an entry for the Stoic philosopher, where the

original quotation is to be found. The

Dictionary

can also provide the origin of what

are now established phrases in our language: `cruel and unusual punishment' and

the `the sins of the fathers' are both for the first time found here.

Chronologically the

Dictionary

spans the ages, and it is exciting that we have been

able to enrich the dictionary with quotations from earlier centuries which bring the

speakers vividly to life. `Everybody's quick to blame the alien,' says Aeschylus, and

Plutarch comments on Cicero's ability `to see beneath the surface of Caesar's

public policy and to fear it, as one might fear the smiling surface of the sea.' The

historian Thucydides reflects that `Happiness depends on being free, and freedom

depends on being courageous.' Pliny the Elder is concerned about standards of

scholarship: `I have found that the most professedly reliable and modern writers

have copied the old authors word for word, without acknowledgement.'

New quotations are spread through the centuries. The 16th-century merchant and

writer Robert Thorne gives his view on exploration: `There is no land unhabitable,

nor sea innavigable.' Francis Bacon looks nearer home, to his garden: `Nothing is

more pleasant to the eye than green grass kept finely shorn.' William Wycherley

has a sardonic view of the law: `A man without money needs no more fear a crowd

of lawyers than a crowd of pickpockets.' Edward Gibbon, considering the Roman

penal system, gives the view that:

Whenever the offence inspires less horror than the punishment, the

rigour of penal law is obliged to give way to the common feelings of

mankind.

Some quotations signal moments of technological and cultural change. `Mr Watson,

come here, I want you!' says Alexander Graham Bell to his assistant in the next

room; the first words spoken on the telephone. Towards the end of his life Walt

Disney reflects wryly, `Fancy being remembered around the world for the invention

of a mouse!' There are some highly individual indications of personal sources of

pleasure: `There is nothing worth living for but Christian architecture and a boat',

asserts the architect Augustus Welby Pugin in 1852, while two centuries earlier the

Puritan Margaret Hoby reflects ruefully that she has spent too long in the garden

`to the detriment of spiritual exercise'. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, in a letter to her

daughter, describes herself as `a rake in reading'. Some older quotations surprise

us with their topicality: the statement `I want the whole of Europe to have one

currency' is attributable not to a current Europhile but to Napoleon.

Quotations have always clustered around royal figures. `My dear firstborn is...the

greatest beast in the whole world,' says Caroline of Ansbach of her son, Frederick,

Prince of Wales. A later Prince of Wales, George, the Prince Regent, inspires Leigh

Hunt's regretful comment, `This Adonis in loveliness was a corpulent man of fifty.'

The Prince Regent (in view of his marital troubles) was looked on less kindly by

Jane Austen, who found her sympathies with Caroline of Brunswick: `Poor woman, I

shall support her as long as I can, because she is a woman and because I hate her

husband.' There are however indications of happier relationships, as when Queen

Victoria records her first meeting with her future husband: `It was with some

emotion...that I beheld Albert - who is beautiful.' It is their eldest daughter Vicky, on

her marriage to Prince Frederick William of Prussia, who inspires Bismarck's

cautious comment, `If the Princess can leave the Englishwoman at home and

become a Prussian, then she may be a blessing to the country.' In our own time,

the present Princess Royal comments briskly on the way in which she works for

children's charities: `The very idea that all children want to be cuddled by a

complete stranger, I find completely amazing.'

Some notable figures appear for the first time. `Let no man write my epitaph,' runs

Robert Emmet's speech from the dock, and a later Irish nationalist, Eamonn de

Valera, asserts that `Whenever I wanted to know what the Irish people wanted, I

had only to examine my own heart.' The American labour activist Mary Harris

`Mother' Jones advises, `Pray for the dead, and fight like hell for the living.' The

blind and deaf Helen Keller recalls the moment when language became a mode of

communication for her:

The mystery of language was revealed to me. I knew then that

`w-a-t-e-r' meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing

over my hand.

It has been an object to provide users with as much access as possible to the

riches of the

Dictionary

, and we have thus followed the pattern set by the

Oxford

Dictionary of Twentieth Century Quotations

(1998) in providing a number of special

category sections integrated into the main author sequence. Advertising slogans

span a chronological range from 1859 (`Worth a guinea a box' - Beecham's pills) to

1998 (`Maybe, just maybe' - the British national lottery). Borrowed titles gives the

origins of, among others,

The Golden Bough

(Virgil) and

Ring of Bright Water

(Kathleen Raine). Film lines make their usual strong showing, with some new

additions (`And call off Christmas!' snarls Alan Rickman in

Robin Hood

). Last

words range from Socrates to Timothy Leary, by way of the martyred William

Tyndale (`Lord, open the king of England's eyes'). Newspaper headlines and

leaders now include the sentence from which the Times derived its nickname of

`The Thunderer': `Unless the people...come forward and petition, ay, thunder for

reform!'

We have also improved the accessibility of information by including a selective

thematic index (Theme search function), through which can be found the best

quotations on given topics such as Age (`Although I am 92, my brain is 30 years

old', says the photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt). At America (`God's crucible',

`From sea to shining sea') the Puritan John Winthrop sees the new settlement as `a

city upon a hill'; three centuries later, the Sioux leader Sitting Bull says simply, `the

Black Hills belong to me.' Diane Arbus and Robert Capa give their views on

Photography: `a secret about a secret', `if your pictures aren't good enough, you

aren't close enough'. The Press (`the men with the muck-rakes' - Theodore

Roosevelt) have always elicited strong views (`ferocious, it forgives nothing' - Diana,

Princess of Wales), but the importance of journalism is stated, with dignity, by Amy

Goodman: `Go to where the silence is, and say something.' Views of the Present

range from Cicero (`O tempora! O mores!') to Tom Wolfe (`We are now in the Me

decade').

As well as author descriptions, we have included biographical cross-references

(accessible using the Super Jump): directions to quotations about that author

elsewhere within the

Dictionary

, so that anyone consulting the entry for Richard

Crossman can also find Hugh Dalton's assessment of him: `loyal to his own career

but only incidentally to anything or anyone else'. Authors mentioned in source notes

who have their own entries appear in bold type, further to facilitate movement

sideways through the dictionary.

In compiling this title we have as always drawn on the substantial resources of

Oxford Quotations Dictionaries: our existing published texts, and our growing bank

of new quotations. Fed by our reading programme, this is constantly enhanced by

the generosity of those who write to us with questions, comments, and suggestions,

a practice which we continue to welcome. Among those who have contributed

particularly to our resources and replied to specific questions, thanks are due to

Pauline Adams, Ralph Bates, Archie Burnett, Glynnis Chantrell, Margot Charlton,

Mike Clark, Robert Franklin, Peter Hennessy, Simon Hornblower, Antony Jay,

Richard Judd, Peter Kemp, John McNeill, Bernard O'Donoghue, Nigel Rees,

Brenda Richardson, Ned Sherrin, Robin Sawers, Hilary Spurling, and Norman

Vance. Colleagues in the Dictionary Department have, as always, supplied us with

quotations that they have come across. We hope once more that our contributors,

as well as those who use the dictionary, will share in the pleasure and interest felt

by the editorial staff in working on it.

Elizabeth Knowles

Oxford 1999

How to use the Dictionary

The sequence of entries is by alphabetical order of author, usually by surname but

with occasional exceptions such as members of royal families (e.g. Diana,

Princess of Wales and Elizabeth II) and Popes (John Paul II), or authors known

by a pseudonym (‘Saki’) or a nickname (Caligula). In general authors’ names are

given in the form by which they are best known, so that we have Harold Macmillan

(not Lord Stockton), George Eliot (not Mary Ann Evans), and H.G.Wells (not

Herbert George Wells). Collections such as Anonymous, the Bible, the Book of

Common Prayer, the Missal, and so forth, are included in the alphabetical

sequence. Some Anonymous quotations may be included in one of the special

category sections (see below).

Author names are followed by dates of birth and death (where known) and brief

descriptions; where appropriate, cross-references ( ) are then given to quotations

about that author elsewhere in the text (

on Byron

see

Lamb). Cross-references

are also made to other entries in which the author appears, e.g. ‘

Sharp PW E500 Operation Manual GB User To The C30be585 06ae 4e21 8baa 70b92a676200

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