International Journal of Lexicography Advance Access originally published online on May 19, 2008
International Journal of Lexicography 2008 21(2):153-171; doi:10.1093/ijl/ecn013
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Usage Labels in The Royal Dictionary (1699) by Abel Boyer1
Département de linguistique et de traduction, Université de Montréal (P. O. Box 6128, Station Centre-ville, Montréal (Québec) H3C 3J7 Canada)
(monique.cormier{at}umontreal.ca)
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Abstract |
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When Abel Boyer published his Royal Dictionary. In Two Parts. First, French and English. Secondly, English and French in 1699, labelling practices in dictionaries were not yet widespread and, when labels were used, they were not standardized. A review of 17th-century bilingual French-English dictionaries reveals an embryonic practice. Abel Boyer, however, introduced a set of usage labels in his dictionary that appear to be new and relatively well-organized for the time. In his dictionary, Boyer used four types of labels: typographical symbols, abbreviations, a combination of an abbreviation and a typographical symbol, and explicit textual annotations. The typographical symbols and abbreviations used are the same for both the French-English part and the English-French part. Only the textual annotations vary depending on the language. Boyer's labelling system included subject-field labels, stylistic labels, temporal labels, sociolinguistic labels and connotative labels. Was Boyer's labelling system truly innovative? How did Boyer structure his system? What method did he employ in his dictionary to show how readers should use words? For what parts of speech did he provide usage labels? Did he treat both parts of his dictionary in the same way? These are the questions that this paper attempts to answer.