R. W. McConchie Book order

Discovery in Haste is the first book to survey the English printed medical dictionary, a greatly under-researched area, from Andrew Boorde's Breviary of Helthe of 1547 to Benjamin Lara’s surgical dictionary of 1796. The book begins with Andrew Boorde’s Breviary of Helthe of 1547, moves on to medical glossaries, which were produced through the whole period, the ‘physical dictionaries’ of the mid-seventeenth century which first employed ‘dictionary’ in the title, the translation into English of Steven Blancard’s dictionary, Latin medical dictionaries of the late seventeenth century by Thomas Burnet and John Cruso, the influential dictionary by John Quincy which dominated the eighteenth century, surgical dictionaries through to that by Benjamin Lara, Robert James’s massive encyclopaedic dictionary and the work derived from it by John Barrow, as well as George Motherby’s dictionary of 1775. The characteristics of each are discussed and their inter-relationships explored. Attention is also paid to the printing history and the way the publishers influenced the works and, where appropriate, to the influence each had on succeeding dictionaries. This book is the first to locate medical dictionaries within the history of lexicography.

Both dictionary and paratext research have emerged recently as widely-recognised research areas of intrinsic interest. This collection represents an attempt to place dictionaries within the paratextual context for the first time. This volume covers paratextual concerns, including dictionary production and use, questions concerning compilers, publishers, patrons and subscribers, and their cultural embedding generally. This book raises questions such as who compiled dictionaries and what cultural, linguistic and scientific notions drove this process. What influence did the professional interests, life experience, and social connexions of the lexicographer have? Who published dictionaries and why, and what do the forematter, backmatter, and supplements tell us? Lexicographers edited, adapted and improved earlier works, leaving copies with marginalia which illuminate working methods. Individual copies offer a history of ownership through marginalia, signatures, dates, places, and library stamps. Further questions concern how dictionaries were sold, who patronised them, subscribed to them, and how they came to various libraries.