[sword-devel] Webster's 1828 Dictionary

[Chris Little]

On Sat, 1 Mar 2003, Don A. Elbourne Jr. wrote:

> I think the 1828 is the original. Its big in the Christian home school
> movement and certain circles of Christian schools. One of the reasons is
> because it uses a lot of scripture references in its definitions and
> shows evidence of strong Christian influence.
> 
> for example: http://www.face.net/Webster's_1828.html
> 
> I've been looking around and the only place I can find it online is
> from: http://www.christiansoup.com/ If I have permission, I will contact
> them on behalf of the Sword Project and see if we can obtain their text.

Marketing by the folks who publish this dictionary has a lot to do with 
why it is gaining such a large following.  If you check the 1913 
dictionary, you will find that it includes vastly more scriptural 
references than the 1828.  This is in part because it simply contains a 
vastly greater number of words, more senses, and longer definitions.  The 
1828 dictionary was a great work for a single man, but it's not an 
especially great dictionary by today's standards.  Nor is it a good 
dictionary of 21st century English.

The publishers seem to believe that "contemporary usage" and "slang" are 
evils that are plaguing America's youth.  Language shift is simply 
unavoidable, though.

For some examples of problems with the 1828 dictionary, consider this 
page: http://www.cin.org/archives/cet/200111/0000.html .  Many of these 
perceived anti-Catholic definitions are really just caused by language 
shift (though some appear genuinely anti-Catholic).  Consider also the 
definition of "gipsey"--other similar examples exist, I'm sure.

If you can get a good source, though, we can do a module.  I've got a copy
that looks to have come from the CGI interface on the publisher's page.  
This is the same source as e-Sword uses and from which an OLB module is
being produced, but it has lots of errors like omitted definitions.

--Chris