1859.34

Lexicographer: "Base Ball" is English!

Salience	Noteworthy
Tags
Location	New EnglandNew England
City/State/Country:	MA, United States
Modern Address
Game	Base BallBase Ball
Immediacy of Report	Contemporary
Age of Players
Holiday
Notables
Text	"BASE. A game of ball much played in America, so called from the three bases or stations used in it. That the game and its name are both English is evident from . . . Halliwell's Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words: 'Base-ball. A country game mentioned in Moor's Suffolk Words, p. 238'." [See #1823.2 - Moor - and #1847.6 - Halliwell above.]
Sources	From John Russell Bartlett, Dictionary of Americanisms: A Glossary of Words and Phrases Usually Regarded as Peculiar to the United States, (second edition; Little, Brown and Company; Boston, 1859), page 24.
Warning
Comment	This attestation of baseball's English roots predates by one year Chadwick's assertion of same, and carries the added significance of coming from a distinguished American lexicographer. Edit with form to add a comment
Query	Edit with form to add a query
Source Image	[[Image:\|left\|thumb]]
External Number
Submitted by	David Block
Submission Note	2/27/2008
Has Supplemental Text

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