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800,000 words in Historical Thesaurus

GLASGOW, Scotland (UPI) -- Britain's Oxford University Press said it is publishing the world's first historical thesaurus after 44 years of work on the project.

The publisher said the Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary is 4,000 pages long and includes more than 800,000 word meanings, along with the earliest recorded use of each word, starting at A.D. 700, when English was first used in Britain, Sky News reported Thursday.

A celebration of the book's publishing in Glasgow, Scotland, Thursday was attended by Professor Michael Samuels, 89, who started work on the reference volume in 1965.

Professor Christian Kay, 69, one of the four editors on the project, said she was surprised to discover the vast array of synonyms for many insults.

"So we have a huge list of words for stupid people, lazy people, contemptible people -- they inspired people to create new words," she said.

Copyright 2009 by United Press International

This news arrived on: 10/23/2009

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