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Dodi Schultz
July 27th, 2005, 01:57 PM
>> ...the 1828 and 1913 editions [of M-W] are available in digital
>> form.

And they list GRECQUE as a regular word?

BTW, Paul, you didn't reply to the question I raised concerning the mining
of multiple dictionaries and combining the results thereof, rather than
obtaining the true def from a single source.

--DS

Paul Keating
July 27th, 2005, 05:36 PM
> And they list GRECQUE as a regular word?

No, it isn't in either.

> BTW, Paul, you didn't reply to the question I raised concerning the
> mining of multiple dictionaries and combining the results thereof,

I didn't think it was exactly a question. But I know what trouble it
causes when you put up a word that has two significations and your
definition only has one of them. To do it out of ignorance is
pardonable, but to do it knowingly isn't.

I was happy with the Chambers fret def and was going to use that. When
I crosschecked it in the OED, I found the coffe-strainer sense, with
no proper means of verifying it.

If I had had the 1864 Webster available, and had found the word listed
there out of the main sequence, and also not in either the previous or
subsequent editions, I would have ignored that sense completely. But I
couldn't check the coffee-strainer sense properly, so I had no basis
for excluding it.

I considered the OED definition of fret poorly drafted and unsupported
by the citations, so I didn't want to use that.

So I compromised. I think that what I did was fairly harmless.

As for the strict interpretation of the rules, I think you may be on
shaky ground. Your point was, I think, that the rules say "any
dictionary", singular, and I used dictionaries, plural.

But look again. "The dealer begins the round by selecting from any
accepted dictionary a word the players are not likely to know" (1a).
Note, _word_, not _definition_. I did that.

The rules also say (4b) "The real definition should stick as closely
as reasonably possible to the official wording and format." The
definition of each signification does that too.

The rules do not say that the definition in its entirety is to be
drawn from a single dictionary (though I grant you that the
implication, or at least the drafters' expectation, is there). Rule 4
is about editing defs, not about selecting them, and this rule tells
dealers not to take unwarranted liberties with the dictionary editors'
wording. Which I didn't.

So I think I am within both the letter and the spirit of the rules.
Only just, maybe, but within.

Paul Keating
The Hague

Toni Savage
July 27th, 2005, 07:53 PM
I think what we've done in the past when someone has
chosen a word that is...ummm... bending the rules, is
simply to state that it should be frowned on the
future (a word from Black's Law dictionary and Mother
Carey's Chickens come to mind... also a word I forget
which was just taken from a paragraph in World Wide
Words)
I'll add my frown to yours. <g>

TS

--- Dodi Schultz <schultz (AT) compuserve (DOT) com> wrote:

>
>
> >> ...the 1828 and 1913 editions [of M-W] are
> available in digital
> >> form.
>
> And they list GRECQUE as a regular word?
>
> BTW, Paul, you didn't reply to the question I raised
> concerning the mining
> of multiple dictionaries and combining the results
> thereof, rather than
> obtaining the true def from a single source.
>
> --DS
>


-- Toni Savage

Daniel B. Widdis
July 29th, 2005, 03:53 PM
Toni Savage wrote:
> a word from Black's Law dictionary and Mother
> Carey's Chickens come to mind... also a word I forget
> which was just taken from a paragraph in World Wide
> Words
I used Dutton's _American Practical Navigator_ for a woid once, as
well. But it was such a good woid!

--
Dan