Books of Words: A Story of Dictionaries

Abstract

ON TUESDAY, 3 December 1878, there was held within the premises of Mr Dowell at 18 George Street, Edinburgh, an auction of the library of Andrew Jervise, Esq., F.S.A.(Scot.). Jervise, a bachelor, had died almost eight months before at the age of 58. In his library was a two‐volume edition of Jamieson's Dictionary of the Scottish Language, edited by John Johnstone, published by Wm. Tait in 1840–41, and printed at the University Press (Messrs. Stevenson's), then in Thistle Street. This was sold for the sum of £3 3s. to an unnamed buyer. In 1967 in ‘The Book Cellar’, a newly‐opened secondhand bookshop in Dundas Street, Edinburgh, it was to appear again. This time it was broken‐backed and apparently of undistinguished origin.

Citation

Mackenzie, L.D.M. (1969), "Books of Words: A Story of Dictionaries", Library Review, Vol. 22 No. 1, pp. 7-10. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb012511