Encyclopedias have existed for around 2,000 years[10] and have evolved considerably during that time as regards language (written in a major international or a vernacular language), size (few or many volumes), intent (presentation of a global or a limited range of knowledge), cultural perspective (authoritative, ideological, didactic, utilitarian), authorship (qualifications, style), readership (education level, background, interests, capabilities), and the technologies available for their production and distribution (hand-written manuscripts, small or large print runs, Internet). As a valued source of reliable information compiled by experts, printed versions found a prominent place inlibraries,schools and other educational institutions.[11]
In the 21st century, the appearance ofdigital and open-source versions such asWikipedia (together with thewiki website format) has vastly expanded the accessibility, authorship, readership, and variety of encyclopedia entries.[12]
Etymology
A 15th-century manuscript ofInstitutio Oratoria. The Greek root of the wordencyclopedia is highlighted.
The wordencyclopedia comes from theKoine Greekἐγκύκλιος παιδεία,[13]transliteratedenkúklios paideía'general education', fromenkúklios (ἐγκύκλιος)'circular, recurrent, required regularly, general'[5][14] andpaideía (παιδεία)'education, rearing of a child'; together, the phrase literally translates as'complete instruction, complete knowledge'.[15] However, the two separate words were reduced to a single word due to a scribal error[16] by copyists of aLatin manuscript edition ofQuintillian in 1470.[17] The copyists took this phrase to be a single Greek word,enkuklopaideía, with the same meaning, and this spurious Greek word became theNeo-Latin wordencyclopaedia, which was in turnborrowed into English. Because of this compounded word, readers since the fifteenth century have often, and incorrectly, thought that the Roman authors Quintillian andPliny described an ancient genre.[18] FollowingNoah Webster'sspelling reform,[19] thespelling of the word varies betweenencyclopedia in American English,encyclopaedia in British English (although the spellingencyclopedia is increasingly gaining acceptance), andencyclopædia in certain specialized cases.[20]
Characteristics
The modern encyclopedia evolved from thedictionary in the 18th century; this lineage can be seen in the alphabetical order of print encyclopedias.[21] Historically, both encyclopedias and dictionaries have been compiled by well-educated authors, but they are significantly different in structure. A dictionary is a linguistic work that primarily focuses on an alphabetical listing ofwords and theirdefinitions.Synonymous words and those related by the subject matter are to be found scattered around the dictionary, giving no obvious place for in-depth treatment. Thus, a dictionary typically provides limitedinformation,analysis or background for the word defined.[22][23] While it may offer a definition, it may leave the reader lacking inunderstanding the meaning, significance or limitations of aterm, and how the term relates to a broader field of knowledge.[24]
To address those needs, an encyclopedia article is typically not limited to simple definitions, and is not limited to defining an individual word, but provides a more extensive meaning for asubject ordiscipline. The Merriam-Webster definition of encyclopedia states that it is "a work that contains information on all branches of knowledge or treats comprehensively a particular branch of knowledge usually in articles arranged alphabetically often by subject".[25] In addition to defining and listing synonymous terms for the topic, the article can treat the topic's more extensive meaning in more depth and convey the most relevant accumulated knowledge on that subject. An encyclopedia article also often includes manymaps andillustrations, as well asbibliography andstatistics.[5]
In addition, sometimes books or reading lists are compiled from a compendium of articles (either wholly or partially taken) from a specific encyclopedia.[26]
Four major elements
Four major elements define an encyclopedia: its subject matter, its scope, its method of organization, and its method of production:
Encyclopedias can be general, containing articles on topics in every field[27] (the English-languageEncyclopædia Britannica and GermanBrockhaus are well-known examples).[2] General encyclopedias may contain guides on how to do a variety of things, as well as embedded dictionaries andgazetteers.[27] There are also encyclopedias that cover a wide variety of topics from a particular cultural, ethnic, or national perspective, such as theGreat Soviet Encyclopedia orEncyclopaedia Judaica.[24]
Works of encyclopedic scope aim to convey the important accumulated knowledge for their subject domain, such as an encyclopedia ofmedicine,philosophy orlaw. Works vary in the breadth of material and the depth of discussion, depending on thetarget audience.
Some systematic methods of organization are essential to making an encyclopedia usable for reference. There have historically been two main methods of organizing printed encyclopedias: thealphabetical method (consisting of several separate articles, organized in alphabetical order) and organization byhierarchical categories.[4] The former method is today the more common, especially for general works. The fluidity ofelectronic media, however, allows new possibilities for multiple methods of organization of the same content. Further, electronic media offer new capabilities for search,indexing andcross reference. Theepigraph fromHorace on the title page of the 18th centuryEncyclopédie suggests the importance of the structure of an encyclopedia: "What grace may be added to commonplace matters by the power of order and connection."[28]
As modern multimedia and the information age have evolved, new methods have emerged for the collection, verification, summation, and presentation of information of all kinds.[29] Projects such asInterpedia,Everything2, MicrosoftEncarta,h2g2, andWikipedia are examples of new forms of the encyclopedia asinformation retrieval becomes simpler. The method of production for an encyclopedia historically has been supported in both for-profit and non-profit contexts; such was the case of theGreat Soviet Encyclopedia mentioned above which was entirely state-sponsored,[30] while theBritannica was supported as a for-profit institution.
Differences between encyclopedias and dictionaries
There are some broad differences between encyclopedias and dictionaries. Most noticeably, encyclopedia articles are longer, fuller and more thorough than entries in most general-purpose dictionaries.[3][31] There are differences in content as well. Generally speaking, dictionaries providelinguistic information about words themselves, while encyclopedias focus more on the things for which those words stand.[6][7][8][9] Thus, while dictionary entries are inextricably fixed to the word described, encyclopedia articles can be given a different entry name. As such, dictionary entries are not fully translatable into other languages, but encyclopedia articles can be.[6]
In practice, however, the distinction is not concrete, as there is no clear-cut difference between factual, "encyclopedic" information and linguistic information such as appear in dictionaries.[8][31][32] Thus encyclopedias may contain material that is also found in dictionaries, and vice versa.[32] In particular, dictionary entries often contain factual information about the thing named by the word.[31][32]
The earliest encyclopedic work to have survived to modern times is theNatural History ofPliny the Elder, aRoman statesman living in the 1st century AD,[5][33][34][35] a work indebted toVarro (1st century BCE).[36] He compiled a work of 37 chapters coveringnatural history, architecture, medicine,geography, geology, and all aspects of the world around him.[35] This work became very popular inantiquity, was one of the first classical manuscripts to be printed in 1470, and has remained popular ever since as a source of information on theRoman world, and especiallyRoman art,Roman technology andRoman engineering.
Another Christian encyclopedia was theInstitutiones divinarum et saecularium litterarum ofCassiodorus (543–560) dedicated to the Christian divinity and the seven liberal arts.[34][5] The encyclopedia ofSuda, a massive 10th-century Byzantine encyclopedia, had 30,000 entries (broadly alphabetically arranged), many drawing from ancient sources that have since been lost, and often derived from medievalChristian compilers.[34]
From India, theSiribhoovalaya (Kannada: ಸಿರಿಭೂವಲಯ), variously dated to c. 800 AD, the 15th century,[39] or an even more recent time, is a work ofKannada literature written byKumudendu Muni, a Jain monk.[40] It is unique because rather than employing alphabets, it is composed entirely inKannada numerals. Many philosophies which existed in the Jain classics are eloquently and skillfully interpreted in the work.
The 2nd century BC reference workShiben has been described as a Chinese encyclopedia of genealogies, while theHuanglan, completed in the 220s, was an earlyleishu encyclopedia. TheYiwen Leiju, completed in 624, was a landmark literature encyclopedia of the earlyTang dynasty. The enormous encyclopedic works of theFour Great Books of Song, compiled by the 11th century during the earlySong dynasty (960–1279), was a massive literary undertaking for the time. The last encyclopedia of the four, thePrime Tortoise of the Record Bureau, amounted to 9.4 millionChinese characters in 1,000 written volumes. TheYongle Encyclopedia (completed 1408) comprised 11,095 volumes, making it the largest paper encyclopedia in world history.[41][42]
There were many great encyclopedists throughout Chinese history, including the scientist and statesmanShen Kuo (1031–1095) with hisDream Pool Essays of 1088; the statesman, inventor, and agronomistWang Zhen (active 1290–1333) with hisNong Shu of 1313; andSong Yingxing (1587–1666) with hisTiangong Kaiwu. Song Yingxing was termed the "Diderot of China" by British historianJoseph Needham.[43]
Britannica 15th edition printed encyclopedias, 2002
Before the advent of the printing press, encyclopedic works were all hand-copied and thus rarely available, beyond wealthy patrons or monastic men of learning: they were expensive, and usually written for those extending knowledge rather than those using it. The introduction ofprinting from Asia allowed a wider diffusion of encyclopedias and every scholar could have his or her copy.Nuremberg Chronicle from 1493 is one of the best-documented early printed books—anincunabulum—and one of the first to successfully integrate illustrations and text. Both Latin and German editions were printed byAnton Koberger in Nuremberg.[44] TheDe expetendis et fugiendis rebus byGiorgio Valla was posthumously printed in 1501 byAldo Manuzio inVenice. This work followed the traditional scheme of liberal arts. However, Valla added the translation of ancient Greek works on mathematics (firstly byArchimedes), newly discovered and translated. TheMargarita Philosophica byGregor Reisch, printed in 1503, was a complete encyclopedia explaining theseven liberal arts.
Financial, commercial, legal, and intellectual factors changed the size of encyclopedias. Middle classes had more time to read and encyclopedias helped them to learn more. Publishers wanted to increase their output so some countries like Germany started selling books missing alphabetical sections, to publish faster. Also, publishers could not afford all the resources by themselves, so multiple publishers would come together with their resources to create better encyclopedias. Later, rivalry grew, causing copyright to occur due to weak underdeveloped laws.John Harris is often credited with introducing the now-familiar alphabetic format in 1704 with his EnglishLexicon Technicum: Or, A Universal English Dictionary of Arts and Sciences: Explaining not only the Terms of Art, but the Arts Themselves – to give its full title. Organized alphabetically, its content does indeed contain an explanation not merely of the terms used in the arts and sciences, but of the arts and sciences themselves.Sir Isaac Newton contributed his only published work on chemistry to the second volume of 1710.
Encyclopédie
Indeed, the purpose of an encyclopedia is to collect knowledge disseminated around the globe; to set forth its general system to the men with whom we live, and transmit it to those who will come after us, so that the work of preceding centuries will not become useless to the centuries to come; and so that our offspring, becoming better instructed, will at the same time become more virtuous and happy, and that we should not die without having rendered a service to the human race in the future years to come.
TheEncyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers (French for 'Encyclopedia, or a Systematic Dictionary of the Sciences, Arts and Crafts'), better known as theEncyclopédie (French:[ɑ̃siklɔpedi]), was a general encyclopedia published inFrance between 1751 and 1772, with later supplements, revised editions, an index, and translations. It had many contributors, known among contemporaries as theEncyclopédistes. It was edited byDenis Diderot and, until 1759, co-edited byJean le Rond d'Alembert.[46]
TheEncyclopédie is most famous for representing the thought of theEnlightenment. According to Diderot in the article "Encyclopédie", theEncyclopédie's aim was "to change the way people think" and to allow people to inform themselves.[47] Diderot hoped theEncyclopédie would disseminate a vast amount of knowledge to the present and future generations.[48] Thus, it is an example ofdemocratization of knowledge, though the high price of the first edition especially (980 livres) prevented it from being bought by much of the middle class.[49]
TheEncyclopédie was also the first encyclopedia to include contributions from many named contributors, and it was the first general encyclopedia to describe themechanical arts in much detail. In the first edition, seventeen folio volumes of text were accompanied by eleven volumes of engravings. Later editions were published in smaller formats and with fewer engravings in order to reach a wider audience within Europe.[50]
Printed for 245 years, theBritannica was the longest-running in-print encyclopaedia in the English language. It was first published between 1768 and 1771 inEdinburgh, Scotland, in weekly installments that came together to form three volumes. At first, the encyclopaedia, from edition to edition, grew quickly in size. The second edition extended to 10 volumes, and by its fourth edition (1801–1810), theBritannica had expanded to 20 volumes. Since the beginning of the twentieth century, its size (at least in terms of total word length) has remained roughly steady, at about 40 million words.[52]
TheBritannica's rising stature as an authoritative and scholarly work helped recruiteminent contributors, and the 9th (1875–1889) and11th editions (1911) are landmark encyclopaedias for scholarship and literary style. Starting with the 11th edition and following its acquisition by an American firm, theBritannica shortened and simplified articles to broaden its appeal to the North American market. Though published in the United States since 1901, theBritannica has for the most part maintainedBritish English spelling.
In 1932, theBritannica adopted a policy of "continuous revision," in which the encyclopaedia is continually revised and reprinted, with every article updated on a schedule.[53] The publishers ofCompton's Pictured Encyclopedia had already pioneered such a policy.[54]
The 15th edition (1974–2010) has a three-part structure: a 12-volumeMicropædia of short articles (generally fewer than 750 words), a 17-volumeMacropædia of long articles (two to 310 pages), and a singlePropædia volume to give ahierarchical outline of knowledge. TheMicropædia was meant for quickfact-checking and as a guide to theMacropædia; readers are advised to study thePropædia outline to understand a subject's context and to find more detailed articles.
In the 21st century, theBritannica faced strong competition: in particular from the digital and multimedia encyclopaediaMicrosoftEncarta,[55] and later from the onlinepeer-produced encyclopaediaWikipedia.[56][57][58] Despite (or perhaps because of) such competition, Britannica retained its reputation for authoritative, comprehensive, structured, and scholarly treatments of included subjects.[59] While it continued to score well in assessments of its overall quality,[60] as compared to its competitors, it could not (as an expert-authored compilation of a limited number of articles on only important subjects), match their breadth of coverage and continuous updating.[57]
In March 2012, it announced it would no longer publish printed editions and would focus instead on the online version.[57][61]
TheBrockhaus Enzyklopädie (German forBrockhaus Encyclopedia) is aGerman-language encyclopedia which until 2009 was published by theF. A. Brockhaus printing house.
The first edition originated in theConversations-Lexikon published by Renatus Gotthelf Löbel and Franke inLeipzig 1796–1808. RenamedDer Große Brockhaus in 1928 andBrockhaus Enzyklopädie from 1966, the current[update] 21st thirty-volume edition contains about 300,000 entries on about 24,000 pages, with about 40,000 maps, graphics and tables. It is the largest German-language printed encyclopedia in the 21st century.
In February 2008, F. A. Brockhaus announced the changeover to anonline encyclopedia and the discontinuation of the printed editions. The rights to theBrockhaus trademark were purchased byArvato services, a subsidiary of theBertelsmann media group. After more than 200 years, the distribution of the Brockhaus encyclopedia ceased completely in 2014.
Encyclopedias in the United States
In the United States, the 1950s and 1960s saw the introduction of several large popular encyclopedias, often sold on installment plans. The best known of these wereWorld Book andFunk and Wagnalls. As many as 90% were solddoor to door.[33] Jack Lynch says in his bookYou Could Look It Up that encyclopedia salespeople were so common that they became the butt of jokes. He describes their sales pitch saying, "They were selling not books but a lifestyle, a future, a promise of social mobility." A 1961World Book ad said, "You are holding your family's future in your hands right now," while showing a feminine hand holding an order form.[62] As of the 1990s, two of the most prominent encyclopedias published in the United States wereCollier's Encyclopedia andEncyclopedia Americana.[63]
Digital encyclopedias
Physical media
By the late 20th century, encyclopedias were being published onCD-ROMs for use withpersonal computers. This was the usual way computer users accessed encyclopedic knowledge from the 1980s and 1990s. Later,DVD discs replaced CD-ROMs, and by the mid-2000s,internet encyclopedias were dominant and replaced disc-based software encyclopedias.[5]
CD-ROM encyclopedias were usually amacOS orMicrosoft Windows (3.0, 3.1 or 95/98) application on a CD-ROM disc. The user would execute the encyclopedia's software program to see a menu that allowed them to start browsing the encyclopedia's articles, and most encyclopedias also supported a way to search the contents of the encyclopedia. The article text was usuallyhyperlinked and also includedphotographs,audio clips (for example in articles about historical speeches or musical instruments), andvideo clips. In the CD-ROM age, the video clips usually had a low resolution, often 160x120 or 320x240 pixels. Such encyclopedias which made use of photos, audio and video were also calledmultimedia encyclopedias.
Microsoft'sEncarta, launched in 1993, was a landmark example as it had no printed equivalent. It featured around 25,000 articles, supplemented with 7,000 high-quality images, 9 hours of audio files, and 30 videos. After sixteen years, Microsoft discontinued the Encarta line of products in 2009 with the rise of the Internet.[64] Other examples of CD-ROM encyclopedia areGrolier Multimedia Encyclopedia andBritannica.
Digital encyclopedias enable "Encyclopedia Services" (such asWikimedia Enterprise) to facilitate programmatic access to the content.[65]
"Free encyclopedia" redirects here. For the website that uses the term as its motto, seeWikipedia.
List of other free encyclopedias, from Enciclopedia Libre.
The concept of a free encyclopedia began with theInterpedia proposal onUsenet in 1993, which outlined an Internet-basedonline encyclopedia to which anyone could submit content that would be freely accessible. Early projects in this vein includedEverything2 andOpen Site. In 1999,Richard Stallman proposed theGNUPedia, an online encyclopedia which, similar to theGNU operating system, would be a "generic" resource. The concept was very similar to Interpedia, but more in line with Stallman'sGNU philosophy.
It was not untilNupedia and laterWikipedia that a stable free encyclopedia project could be established on the Internet.
TheEnglish Wikipedia, which was started in 2001, became the world's largest encyclopedia in 2004 at the 300,000 article stage.[67] By late 2005, Wikipedia had produced over two million articles in more than 80 languages with content licensed under thecopyleftGNU Free Documentation License. As of August 2009,[update] Wikipedia had over 3 million articles in English and well over 10 million combined articles in over 250 languages. Today, Wikipedia has7,080,095 articles in English, over 60 million combined articles in over 300 languages, and over 250 million combined pages including project and discussion pages.[68]
Since 2002, other free encyclopedias appeared, includingHudong (2005–) andBaidu Baike (2006–) in Chinese, and Google'sKnol (2008–2012) in English. Some MediaWiki-based encyclopedias have appeared, usually under a license compatible with Wikipedia, including the Spanish encyclopediaEnciclopedia Libre (2002–2021) and the English encyclopediasConservapedia (2006–),Scholarpedia (2006–), andCitizendium (2007–).
^"Encyclopedia". Archived fromthe original on August 3, 2007. Glossary of Library Terms. Riverside City College, Digital Library/Learning Resource Center. Retrieved on: November 17, 2007.
^ab"Encyclopaedia".Encyclopædia Britannica.Archived from the original on December 16, 2010. RetrievedJuly 27, 2010.An English lexicographer, H.W. Fowler, wrote in the preface to the first edition (1911) ofThe Concise Oxford Dictionary of Current English language that a dictionary is concerned with the uses of words and phrases and with giving information about the things for which they stand only so far as current use of the words depends upon knowledge of those things. The emphasis in an encyclopedia is much more on the nature of the things for which the words and phrases stand.
^abcHartmann, R. R. K.; James, Gregory (1998).Dictionary of Lexicography. Routledge. p. 49.ISBN978-0-415-14143-7. Archived fromthe original on January 14, 2021. RetrievedJuly 27, 2010.In contrast with linguistic information, encyclopedia material is more concerned with the description of objective realities than the words or phrases that refer to them. In practice, however, there is no hard and fast boundary between factual and lexical knowledge.
^abCowie, Anthony Paul (2009).The Oxford History of English Lexicography, Volume I. Oxford University Press. p. 22.ISBN978-0-415-14143-7. Archived fromthe original on April 15, 2021. RetrievedAugust 17, 2010.An 'encyclopedia' (encyclopaedia) usually gives more information than a dictionary; it explains not only the words but also the things and concepts referred to by the words.
^ἐγκύκλιοςArchived March 8, 2021, at theWayback Machine, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott,A Greek–English Lexicon, at Perseus Project
^παιδείαArchived March 8, 2021, at theWayback Machine, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott,A Greek–English Lexicon, at Perseus Project
^According to some accounts, such as theAmerican Heritage DictionaryArchived August 19, 2017, at theWayback Machine, copyists of Latin manuscripts took this phrase to be a single Greek word,ἐγκυκλοπαιδείαenkuklopaideía.
^As explained by Richard Yeo,Encyclopaedic Visions: Scientific Dictionaries and Enlightenment Culture (Cambridge: University Press, 2001ISBN978-0-521-15292-1
^abcHartmann, R. R. K.; James, Gregory (1998).Dictionary of Lexicography. Routledge. pp. 48–49.ISBN978-0-415-14143-7.Archived from the original on January 14, 2021. RetrievedJuly 27, 2010.Usually these two aspects overlap – encyclopedic information being difficult to distinguish from linguistic information – and dictionaries attempt to capture both in the explanation of a meaning...
^abcBéjoint, Henri (2000).Modern Lexicography. Oxford University Press. p. 31.ISBN978-0-19-829951-6.The two types, as we have seen, are not easily differentiated; encyclopedias contain information that is also to be found in dictionaries, and vice versa.
^Denis Diderot; Jean le Rond d'Alembert.Encyclopédie.Archived April 29, 2011, at theWayback Machine. University of Michigan Library: Scholarly Publishing Office and DLXS. Retrieved on: November 17, 2007.
^Jeff Loveland, "Why Encyclopedias Got Bigger ... and Smaller,"Information and Culture 47 (2012): 244.
^Paul Kruse, "The Story of theEncyclopaedia Britannica, 1768-1943," PhD dissertation (University of Chicago, 1958), 389.
^M. A. Khan,The Principles and Practice of Library Science (New Delhi: Sarup and Sons, 1996), 281.
^Carmody, Tim (March 14, 2012)."Wikipedia Didn't Kill Britannica. Windows Did".Wired.ISSN1059-1028. RetrievedJuly 15, 2023. Note that in 1985 Microsoft approached Encyclopaedia Britannica to collaborate on digitising and releasingBritannica's material on CD-ROM; this collaboration did not eventuate, and Microsoft then pursued deals with other encyclopaedia companies (includingFunk and Wagnalls) instead.
"encyclopedia".Online Etymology Dictionary.Archived from the original on March 8, 2021. RetrievedMay 13, 2020.
"Encyclopaedia".Encyclopædia Britannica.Archived from the original on December 16, 2010. RetrievedJuly 27, 2010.
Béjoint, Henri (2000).Modern Lexicography. Oxford University Press.ISBN978-0-19-829951-6.
C. Codoner, S. Louis, M. Paulmier-Foucart, D. Hüe, M. Salvat, A. Llinares,L'Encyclopédisme. Actes du Colloque de Caen, A. Becq (dir.), Paris, 1991.
Bergenholtz, H.; Nielsen, S.; Tarp, S., eds. (2009).Lexicography at a Crossroads: Dictionaries and Encyclopedias Today, Lexicographical Tools Tomorrow. Peter Lang.ISBN978-3-03911-799-4.
Blom, Phillip (2004).Enlightening the World: Encyclopédie, the Book that Changed the Course of History. New York; Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.ISBN978-1-4039-6895-1.OCLC57669780.
Collison, Robert Lewis (1966).Encyclopaedias: Their History Throughout the Ages (2nd ed.). New York, London: Hafner.OCLC220101699.
Kafker, Frank A., ed. (1981).Notable encyclopedias of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: nine predecessors of the Encyclopédie. Oxford: Voltaire Foundation.ISBN978-0-7294-0256-9.OCLC10645788.
Kafker, Frank A., ed. (1994).Notable encyclopedias of the late eighteenth century: eleven successors of the Encyclopédie. Oxford: Voltaire Foundation.ISBN978-0-7294-0467-9.OCLC30787125.
Needham, Joseph (1986). "Part 7, Military Technology; the Gunpowder Epic".Science and Civilization in China. Vol. 5 – Chemistry and Chemical Technology. Taipei: Caves Books Ltd.ISBN978-0-521-30358-3.OCLC59245877.
Ioannides, Marinos (2006).The e-volution of information communication technology in cultural heritage: where hi-tech touches the past: risks and challenges for the 21st century. Budapest: Archaeolingua.ISBN963-8046-73-2.OCLC218599120.
Walsh, S. Padraig (1968).Anglo-American general encyclopedias: a historical bibliography, 1703–1967. New York: Bowker. p. 270.OCLC577541.
