Cawdrey's Table Alphabeticall

Robert Cawdrey's Table Alphabeticall, published in 1604, was the first single-language English dictionary ever published. With 130 pages, it presents a selection of 2,543 words and their first-ever definitions. Cawdrey subtitled his dictionary “for the benefit of Ladies, Gentlewomen, and other unskilled folk”: his aim was to create an in-depth guide for the lesser educated who might not know the “hard usual English wordes, borrowed from the Hebrew, Greeke, Latine, or French.”

The title page to the "Table Alphabeticall" (click to enlarge). Its full title was: "A table alphabeticall conteyning and teaching the true writing, and understanding of hard vsuall English wordes, borrowed from the Hebrew, Greeke, Latine, or French, &c. With the interpretation thereof by plaine English words, gathered for the benefit & helpe of ladies, gentlewomen, or any other unskilfull persons. Whereby they may the more easilie and better vnderstand many hard English wordes, vvhich they shall heare or read in scriptures, sermons, or elswhere, and also be made able to vse the same aptly themselues."

The definitions provided by Cawdrey are very concise and he focuses on the “hard words” that English borrowed from other languages. “While small and unsophisticated by today's standards, the Table was the largest dictionary of its type at the time and, when viewed in the full context of Early Modern English lexicography, it exemplifies the movement from words lists and glosses to dictionaries which more closely resemble those of today”, writes R. G. Siemens, from the University of British Columbia.

The entries in Cawdrey’s book came from a number of diverse sources, like Latin-English dictionaries, popular didactic texts of the time and glosses of religious, legal, scientific, and literary texts.

Samuel Johnson's dictionary is better known when it comes to the beginning of English lexicography, but Cawdrey's work also gets its deserved recognition from the Academic community. For instance, the Table was published in a new edition by the Bodleian Library, from the University of Oxford, in 2007 (click here to learn more about this new edition). And Raymond G. Siemens, from the Department of English at University of British Columbia, edited an online version of Cawdrey's Table, with a transcription of the 1604 edition. It is possible to find it at the University of Toronto Library’s site: http://www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/ret/cawdrey/cawdrey0.html

Some examples of entries taken from the site:

societie, fellowship, company
sodomitrie, when one man lyeth filthylie with another man
[fr] soiourne, remaine in a place
solace, comfort
solemnize, to doe a thing with great pompe, reuerence, or deuotion