具体描述
《世纪词典》（The Century Dictionary）
“世纪公司”是19世纪末美国财雄势大的出版社之一。该公司很欣赏安纳戴尔改编的四卷本百科性词典【即《帝国词典》（The Imperial Dictinary）这是一部英国百科性词典，由英国人约翰·奥吉尔维Joh n Ogilvie编撰，于1850年出版。据编撰者称，他的这部词典是以韦伯斯特的词典为基础的；但与“韦氏词典”不同，他编撰的是一部“科技词典”（technological and scientific dictionary）。这部词典受到读者的欢迎。值得注意的奥吉尔维在编撰他的科技词典时，约翰逊的词典还在英国继续再版发行，而美国出版的词典也正在向英国读者推荐。奥吉尔维采用美国出版的“韦氏词典”作为基础，也许是他认为韦伯斯特在他的词典中所收录的词条要比约翰逊的词典中的词条实用一点吧。奥吉尔维的《帝国词典》曾修订过几次，接连再版发行。查尔士·安纳戴尔(Charles Annandale)对这部词典很感兴趣：他先是把《帝国词典》加以删节，出版了节本；后来，又把这部词典增编为一部四卷本的百科性词典，获得很大的成功】，就将它在美国重印发行。过了几年，该公司决定自己编一部与之相当的美国的百科性词典。领导编写工作的是著名的语言学家耶鲁大 学教授威廉·D.惠特尼，（William D. Whitney, 1827-1894）。就这样，人们通称的《世纪词典》（The Century Dictionary）于1889-1891年问世了。它的全名应是《世纪词典：英语百科词汇》（The Century Dictionary: an Encyclopedic Lexicon of the English Language）。它是美国第一部正式的语词兼百科词典。初版时，全书计六卷，七千多页，附有精致的插图。后来增补到八千五百页，分十卷印行。（另有Atlas一卷，Proper names一卷，共计12卷）编者对不少词条，特别是科技词语，作了简略的百科性解释。书内引例丰富，释义准确、清楚。出版后受到高度赞赏。遗憾的是，该书问世后很少作修订，又加上是多卷本，销路日趋狭小，无法与别的词典竞争。
The first edition of The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia was published from 1889 to 1891 by The Century Company of New York. It was e dited by Sanskrit scholar and linguist William Dwight Whitney, with Benjamin Eli Smith's assistance. After Whitney's death in 1894, supplementary volumes were published under Smith's supervision, including, The Century Cyclopedia of Names (1894) and The Century Atlas (1897). A two-volume Supplement of new vocabulary, published in 1909, completed the dictionary. The completed dictionary contained over 500,000 entries, more than Webster's New International or Funk and Wagnalls New Standard, the largest other dictionaries of the period. Each form of a word was treated separately, and liberal numbers of quotations and additional information were included to support the definitions. The Century Dictionary was admired for the quality of its entries, the craftsmanship in its design, typography, and binding, and its excellent illustrations. It has been used as an information source for the makers of many later dictionaries, including editors of the Oxford English Dictionary, who cited it over 2,000 times in the first edition.
