Which was the first dictionary that contained illustrative quotations from literature ? Also name its lexicographer?
The first DICTIONARY CONTAINING ILLUSTRATIVE QUOTATIONS from literature was A Dictionary of the English Language, compiled by Dr Samuel Johnson for a syndicate of London booksellers and published in two folio volumes on 15 April 1755.
The significance of Johnson’s Dictionary reaches far beyond his introduction of quotations into lexicography, for it had an immeasurable effect on the standardization of the English language, particularly with regard to spelling. Dr James Murray pointed out in his Romanes Lecture of 1900, how the word `dispatch’, given by Johnson as `despatch’ in his Dictionary (the first time the alternative spelling is noted in print, and probably a slip on Johnson’s part), came to be commonly spelt with an `e’ during the first half of the 19th century, and this on the Dictionary’s authority, though it was never spelt so by the Doctor’s contemporaries.
