Saturday, June 16, 2007

OED VEY

Q. Do you use the OED ? or do you have another dictionary you prefer ?
Why, I do indeed use the OED. It's sitting open on a tansu in the entryway.

I used it a lot when I was perpetrating my historical novel. You can use the etymologies to see if a concept is anachronistic or not. For example, if you're wondering if "colonialism" is anachronistic in 5th C Britain, it's not: colonia is Latin, and it meant exactly what it does in English.

However if I need a quick definition I Google it.

2 comments:

Jennica said...

I'm just going to assume you kids are talking about an abridged version of the OED... otherwise, that must be some Tansu!

Alex Epstein said...

Completed but compressed OED -- it's in something like 4 pt type!