Block:London Dictionary Defines "Baseball" in 1768
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| English Baseball |
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| Data | A dictionary entry and definition for the word "baseball": "(From base and ball) A rural game in which the person striking the ball must run to his base or goal." Also, as one of the definitions for the word "base": "A rural play, called also Baseball; as, Lads more like to run the country base. Shakesp." |
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| Sources | A General Dictionary of the English Language, by a Society of Gentlemen, London, 1768, printed for J. and R. Fuller, p. 66 (approx., unpaginated) |
| Block Notes | This work is unusually rare for a major dictionary; only two library copies have been located. The identities of the authors are unknown. The citing of the Shakespeare quote demonstrates that confusion between the games of prisoner's base and baseball began at a very early date. |
| Comment | "A Society of Gentlemen" was the same rubric used by the authors of the first Encyclopedia Britannica, also published in 1768. This Dictionary was apparently intended to be a companion work by those men, or perhaps a copycat work by imitators (the Britannica was essentially Scottish and first printed in Edinburgh), though evidently an unsuccessful one.- Bill Hicklin Edit with form to add a comment |
| Query | Can the Shakespeare citation be located? Yes. The cite is to Cymbeline, Act 5, Scene 3. [ba] "He with two striplings—lads more like to run
The country base than to commit such slaughter," |