Encyclopedia
An
encyclopedia (alternatively
encyclopædia) is a written
compendium of human
knowledge.
The term comes from the
Greek words εγκύκλιος παιδεία,
enkyklios paideia ("in a circle of instruction"). From εγκύκλιος,
circuit shaped from κύκλος
circuit and παιδεία, meaning
instruction. See the
Note on spelling below.
Many encyclopaedias are titled
Cyclopaedia and the terms are interchangable.
Encyclopedias can be general, containing articles on topics in many different fields (the English language
Encyclopædia Britannica and German
Brockhaus are well-known examples), or they can specialize in a particular field (such as an encyclopedia of
medicine or
philosophy). There are also encyclopedias that cover a wide variety of topics from a particular cultural or national perspective, such as the
Great Soviet Encyclopedia.
Many dictionaries are encyclopaedic in their range, especially those concerned with a particular field (such as the
Dictionary of National Biography).
Encyclopedic works have been produced throughout much of human history, but the term
encyclopedia was not used to refer to such works until the
16th century.
There are two methods of organising encyclopedias: the alphabetical method (consisting of a number of separate articles, organised in alphabetical order), or organisation by hierarchial categories. The former is the most common by far, especially for general works.
The
Wikipedia is an
on-line encyclopedia.
Early encyclopedic works
The idea of collecting all of the world's knowledge within arm's reach under a single roof goes back to the ancient Library of Alexandria and Pergamon. Many writers of antiquity (such as Aristotle) attempted to write comprehensively about all human knowledge.
The Chinese emperor Cheng-Zu of the Ming Dynasty oversaw the compilation of the Yongle Encyclopedia, one of the largest encyclopedias in history, which was completed in 1408 and comprised over 11,000 handwritten volumes, of which only about 400 now survive.
The early Muslim compilations of knowledge in the middle ages included many comprehensive works, and much development of what we now call scientific method, historical method, and citation. Notable works include Abu Bakr al-Razi's encyclopedia of science, the Mutazilite Al-Kindi's prolific output of 270 books, and Ibn Sina's medical encyclopedia, which was a standard reference work for centuries. Also notable are works of universal history (or sociology) from Asharites, al-Tabri, al-Masudi, Ibn Rustah, al-Athir, and Ibn Khaldun, whose Muqadimmah contains cautions regarding trust in written records that remain wholly applicable today. These people had an incalculable influence on methods of research and editing, due in part to the Islamic practice of isnad which emphasized fidelity to written record, checking sources, and skeptical inquiry.
However, these works were rarely available to more than specialists: they were expensive, and written for those extending knowledge rather than (with some exceptions in medicine) using it.
Modern encyclopaedias
The modern idea of the general purpose widely distributed printed encyclopedia goes back to just a little before Denis Diderot and the 18th century encyclopedists.
Although John Harris is often credited with establishing the now-familiar encyclopedia format in 1704 with his Lexicon technicum the English physician Sir Thomas Browne specifically employed the word encyclopaedia to describe his compendium of refuted Vulgar Errors also known as Pseudodoxia Epidemica as early as 1646 (6th edition 1676).
Ephraim Chambers published his Cyclopaedia in 1723. The French translation of this was the inspiration of the Encyclopedie
The venerable Encyclopædia Britannica had a modest beginning in Scotland: from 1768 to 1797 three editions were published. Perhaps the most famous early encyclopedia was the French Encyclopédie, edited by Jean Baptiste le Rond d'Alembert and Denis Diderot and completed in 1772 (28 volumes, 71,818 articles, 2,885 illustrations)!
The early years of the nineteenth century saw a flowering of encyclopaedia publishing in Britain, Europe and America. In England Rees's Cyclopaedia (1802-1819) contains an enormous amount in information about the industrial and scientific revolutions of the time. A feature of these publications is the high-quality illustrations made by engravers like Wilson Lowry of art work supplied by specialist draftsmen like John Farey, Jr Encyclopaedias were published in Scotland, as a result of the Scottish Enlightenment, for education there was of a higher standard than in the rest of Britain.
Encyclopædia Britannica appeared in various editions throughout the century, and the growth of popular education and the Mechanics Institutes, spearheaded by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge led to the production of the Penny Cyclopaedia, as its title suggests issued in weekly numbers at a penny each like a newspaper.
In the 20th century, Encyclopædia Britannica reached its sixteenth edition, and cheap encyclopaedias such as Harmsworth's Encyclopaedia, and Everyman's Encyclopaedia were common.
Encyclopaedias are essentially derivative from what has gone before, and particularly in the 19th century piracy was common. To make space for modern topics, valuable material of historic use has to be discarded. But old encyclopaedias should not be overlooked, especially for a record of changes in science and technology.
Encyclopaedia making
The encyclopedia's hierarchical structure and evolving nature is particularly adaptable to a disk-based or on-line computer format, and all major printed encyclopedias had moved to this method of delivery by the end of the 20th century. Disk-based (typically CD-ROM format) publications have the advantage of being cheaply produced and extremely portable. Additionally, they can include media which is impossible in the printed format, such as animations, audio, and video. Hyperlinking between conceptually related items is also a significant benefit. On-line encyclopedias offer the additional advantage of being (potentially) dynamic: new information can be presented almost immediately, rather than waiting for the next release of a static format (as with a disk or paper based publication).
Information in a printed encyclopedia necessarily needs some form of hierarchical structure, and traditionally the method employed is to present the information ordered alphabetically by the article title. However with the advent of dynamic electronic formats the need to impose a pre-determined structure is unnecessary. Nonetheless, most electronic encyclopedias still offer a range of organisational strategies for the articles, such as by subject area or alphabetically.
Recent encyclopedias
\nMore recently encyclopedias are also being published online.
Traditional encyclopedias are written by a number of employed text writers, usually people with an academic degree. This is not the case with Wikipedia, a project started in 2001 with the goal to create a free encyclopedia. Anyone can add or improve text, image and sounds. The contents are licensed under a free copyleft license (the GFDL).
By 2004 the project has managed to produce over half a million articles in over 80 languages.
Note on spelling
None of the spellings -- encyclopedia, encyclopaedia, or encyclopædia -- are formally misspellings. Historically, however, the latter two represent a very old spelling mistake. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the spelling with the ae or æ is "pseudo-Greek" and "an erroneous form (said to be a false reading) occurring in MSS of Quintilian, Pliny, and Galen". The Oxford English Dictionary notes that the æ is not found in the original Greek enkyklios paideia for "encyclical education", described as "the circle of arts and sciences considered by the Greeks as essential to a liberal education".
The digraph ae or æ is a common rendering of the Greek diphthong ai, for example in other words from the root paid- such as "paediatrician."
The Oxford English Dictionary asserts that the spelling with æ "has been preserved from becoming obsolete by the fact that many of the works so called have Latin titles, as Encyclopædia Britannica". That particular encyclopedia includes the ligature form æ in its official name.
At least half the citations in the Oxford English Dictionary are for the so-called "incorrect" spelling. Neither the Oxford English Dictionary nor Webster's Third New International Dictionary states a preference, although the British Oxford English Dictionary puts the æ form first, and the American Webster's puts it second.
See list of encyclopedias for links to articles about specific encyclopedias.
See also: History of Science and Technology, Encyclopedist, Library and Information Science, Literature, Lexicography, dictionary, Reference work, book series Encyclopedia Brown
Notable encyclopedias and encyclopedists before 1700
\n*Suda\n*Vincent of Beauvais\n*Bartholomeus de Glanvilla (Bartholomew of England)\n*John Henry Alsted\n*Louis Moréri\n*John Jacob Hoffman\n*Pierre Bayle\n*Vincenzo Coronelli\n*Theodor Zwinger (1533-1588)\n* Sir Thomas Browne (1605-82)\n*Pliny the Elder\n*St Isidore of Seville\n*Hrabanus Maurus\n*Yongle Encyclopedia
Encyclopaedias published 1700-1800
French encyclopaedias\n*Encyclopédie 1751-72\n*''Encyclopédie Méthodique
German Encyclopaedias\n*Grosses vollständiges Universal-Lexicon 1751-54\n*Conversations Lexikon mit vorzüglicher Rücksicht auf die gegenwärtigen Zeiten 1796-1808 (see Brockhaus)
Encyclopaedias published 1800-1900
Specialist Encyclopaedias\n*Engineer's and Mechanic's Encyclopaedia 1836/37, 2nd ed. 1849; often cited as Hebert's Encyclopaedia\n*Cyclopaedia of Useful Arts and Manufactures 1852; often cited as Tomlinson's Cyclopaedia
American Encyclopaedias\n*New American Encyclopaedia 1858-63 and annual supplements to 1902\n*American Encyclopaededia 1873-76\n*New Universal Encyclopaedia 1875-77\n*Johnson's Universal Encyclopaedia 1893-95\n*Encyclopedia Americana1839-47\n*International Encyclopaedia 1884-98
German Encyclopaedias\n*Brockhaus eds. 1-14 by 1900
Encyclopaedias published 1900-2000
American Encyclopaedias\n*''New International Encyclopaedia 1902
German Encyclopaedias\n*Brockhaus eds. 15-20 by 2000
Religious Encyclopaedias\n*Jewish Encyclopedia 1901-1906\n*Catholic Encyclopedia 1913\n*Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge 1914\n*Encyclopedia of Mormonism 1992
Russian Encyclopaedias\n*Great Soviet Encyclopedia
Encyclopaedias published 2000 onwards
External links
\n*An enormous list of links to dictionaries and encyclopedias (last updated Nov. 1999)\n*CNET's encyclopedia meta-search (includes Wikipedia)\n*Encyclopedia Meta Search (search nearly 20 online encyclopedias at once, includes Wikipedia)
Category:Encyclopedias\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nnds:Nokieksel\n\n\n\n\nsimple:Encyclopedia\n\n\n\n\nzh-cn:百科全书\nzh-tw:百科全書\n
