Editing Webster's Dictionary (section)

== Other dictionaries with Webster's name ==

Noah Webster's assistant, and later chief competitor, [[Joseph Emerson Worcester]], and Webster's son-in-law Chauncey A. Goodrich, published an [[abridgment]] of Noah Webster's 1828 ''American Dictionary of the English Language'' in 1829, with the same number of words and Webster's full definitions, but with truncated literary references and expanded etymology. Although it was more successful financially than the original 1828 edition and was reprinted many times, Noah Webster was critical of it.<ref name="morton"/> Worcester and Goodrich's abridgment of Noah Webster's dictionary was published in 1841 by White and Sheffield, printed by E. Sanderson in Elizabethtown, N.J. and again in 1844 by publishers Harper and Brothers of New York City, in 1844, with added words as an appendix.

=== ''New and Revised Edition'' 1847 ===
Upon Webster's death in 1843, the unsold books and all rights to the copyright and name "Webster" were purchased by brothers [[George Merriam|George]] and Charles Merriam, who then hired Webster's son-in-law [[Chauncey A. Goodrich]], a professor at [[Yale College]], to oversee revisions. Goodrich's ''New and Revised Edition'' appeared on September 24, 1847, and a ''Revised and Enlarged'' edition in 1859, which added a section of illustrations indexed to the text. His revisions remained close to Webster's work, but removed what later editors referred to as his "excrescences".

=== British influence ===
In 1850, Blackie and Son in Glasgow published the first general dictionary of English that made heavy use of pictorial illustrations integrated with the text, ''The Imperial Dictionary, English, Technological, and Scientific, Adapted to the Present State of Literature, Science, and Art; On the Basis of Webster's English Dictionary''. Editor John Ogilve used Webster's 1841 edition as a base, adding many new, specialized, and British words, increasing the vocabulary from ''Webster''{{'}}s 70,000 to more than 100,000.<ref>Michael Hancher, "Gazing at the Imperial Dictionary", ''Book History'', Volume 1, 1998, pp. 156–181 {{doi|10.1353/bh.1998.0006}}</ref>

=== Unabridged edition 1864 ===
{{more citations needed section|date=October 2013}}
In response to Joseph Worcester's groundbreaking dictionary of 1860, ''A Dictionary of the English Language'', the [[G. & C. Merriam Company]] created a significantly revised edition, ''A Dictionary of the English Language''.<ref>{{cite book|last=Landau|first=Sidney|title=Dictionaries: The Art and Craft of Lexicography|edition=2nd|year=2001|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=0-521-78512-X}}</ref> It was edited by [[Yale University]] professor [[Noah Porter]] and published in 1864, containing 114,000 entries. It was sometimes referred to as the ''Webster–Mahn'' edition, because it featured revisions by [[C. A. F. Mahn]], who replaced unsupportable etymologies which were based on Webster's attempt to conform to Biblical interpretations of the history of language. It was the first edition to largely overhaul Noah Webster's work, and the first to be known as the ''Unabridged''. 

Later printings included additional material: a "Supplement Of Additional Words And Definitions" containing more than 4,600 new words and definitions in 1879, ''A Pronouncing Biographical Dictionary'' containing more than 9,700 names of noteworthy persons in 1879, and a ''Pronouncing Gazetteer'' in 1884. The 1883 printing of the book contained 1,928 pages and was 8½ in (22&nbsp;cm) wide by 11½ in (29&nbsp;cm) tall by 4¼ in (11&nbsp;cm) thick. The 1888 printing (revision?) is similarly sized, with the last printed page number "1935" which has on its back further content (hence, 1936th page), and closes with "Whole number of pages 2012".  This dictionary carries the 1864 Preface by Noah Porter with postscripts of 1879 and 1884.

James A.H. Murray, the editor of the ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (1879–1928) says Webster's unabridged edition of 1864 "acquired an international fame. It was held to be superior to every other dictionary and taken as the leading authority on the meaning of words, not only in America and England, but also throughout the Far East."<ref>K. M. Elisabeth Murray, ''Caught in the Web of Words: James Murray and the Oxford English Dictionary'' (1977), p. 133</ref>

=== ''Webster's International Dictionary'' (1890 and 1900) ===
[[File:1896 Merriam ad BradleyHisBook v2 no1.png|thumb|1896 advertisement for the 1890 ''International'' edition]]
Porter also edited the succeeding edition, ''Webster's International Dictionary of the English Language'' (1890), which was an expansion of the ''American Dictionary''. It contained about 175,000 entries. In 1900, ''Webster's International'' was republished with a supplement that added 25,000 entries to it. It was reprinted again in 1913. Being in the public domain and having been scanned and [[optical character recognition|OCRd]] in 1996, this edition has had substantial influence on [[Wiktionary]].

In 1898, the ''Collegiate Dictionary'' also was introduced (see below).

=== ''Webster's New International Dictionary'' 1909 ===
[[File:WebstersDictionaryAdvertisement1910.jpg|thumb|Advertisement for the New International Dictionary from the October 8, 1910, issue of ''[[The Saturday Evening Post]]'']]
The Merriam Company issued a complete revision in 1909, ''Webster's New International Dictionary'', edited by [[William Torrey Harris]] and [[F. Sturges Allen]]. Vastly expanded, it covered more than 400,000 entries, and double the number of illustrations. A new format feature, the ''divided page'', was designed to save space by including a section of ''words below the line'' at the bottom of each page: six columns of very fine print, devoted to such items as rarely used, obsolete, and foreign words, abbreviations, and variant spellings. Notable improvement was made in the treatment and number of ''[[discriminated synonyms]]'', comparisons of subtle shades of meaning. Also added was a twenty-page chart comparing the Webster's pronunciations with those offered by six other major dictionaries.

==={{anchor|W2NID}}<!--There are several redirects to here --> ''Webster's New International Dictionary'' (second edition, 1934) ===
{{Redirect|Webster's Second|Daniel Webster's "Second Reply to Hayne"|Webster–Hayne debate}}

In 1934, the ''New International Dictionary'' was revised and expanded for a second edition, which is popularly known as ''Webster's Second'' or ''W2'', although it was not published under that title. It was edited by [[William Allan Neilson]] and [[Thomas A. Knott]]. It contained 3,350 pages and sold for $39.50 (adjusted for inflation: $755.77). Some versions added a 400-page supplement called ''A Reference History of the World'', which provided [[Chronology|chronologies]] "from earliest times to the present". The editors claimed more than 600,000 entries, more than any other dictionary at that time, but that number included many proper names and newly added lists of undefined "[[combination word]]s". Multiple definitions of words are listed in chronological order, with the oldest, and often obsolete, usages listed first. For example, the first definition of ''starve'' includes dying of exposure to the elements as well as from lack of food.

The numerous picture plates added to the book's appeal and usefulness, particularly when pertaining to things found in nature. Conversely, the plate showing the coins of the world's important nations quickly proved to be ephemeral. Numerous gold coins from various important countries were included, including American eagles, at a time when it had recently become illegal for Americans to own them, and when most other countries had withdrawn gold from active circulation as well.

Early printings of this dictionary contained the erroneous [[ghost word]] ''[[dord]]''.

Because of its style and word coverage, ''Webster's Second'' is still a popular dictionary. For example, in the case of ''Miller Brewing Co. v. G. Heileman Brewing Co., Inc''., 561 F.2d 75 (7th Cir. 1977)<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://ftp.resource.org/courts.gov/c/F2/561/561.F2d.75.77-1246.html|title=United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100725161217/https://ftp.resource.org/courts.gov/c/F2/561/561.F2d.75.77-1246.html |access-date=September 13, 2010|archive-date=July 25, 2010 }}</ref> – a trademark dispute in which the terms "lite" and "light" were held to be generic for light beer and therefore available for use by anyone – the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, after considering a definition from ''Webster's Third New International Dictionary'', wrote that "[T]he comparable definition in the previous, and for many the classic, edition of the same dictionary is as follows:..."