A、It has a lot of volumes. B、It was planned and prepared by scholars. C、It gives good meanings to the words. D、It traces each wo

The first English dictionary was published in 1604. The dictionary was actually nothing more than a list of about 3,000 difficult words, [16]each followed by a one-word definition. The author, Robert Tawdry, made no attempt to include everyday words in his dictionary. No one, he reasoned, would ever have to look up a word in a dictionary if he already knew the meaning of the word. During the 1600’s more dictionaries were published. Each followed Tawdry’s lead and presented a few thousand hard words. Around 1700 one dictionary maker, John Kelsey, did define easy words as well as hard ones. But until the 1750’s all dictionaries were rather crude and not very valuable. A man named Dr. Samuel Johnson changed all this. In 1755 Dr. Johnson produced the first modern dictionary. He included in his dictionary all important words, both easy and hard, and he gave good meanings. [17]He also gave good sentences to show how each word was actually used in speech and in writing. By the end of the 1700’s most dictionary makers had followed Johnson’s lead. Dictionaries were getting better and better. The 1800’s saw the greatest improvement in the quality of dictionaries. In England scholars planned and prepared the Oxford English Dictionary, a twenty volume work. [18]One of the most interesting features of the Oxford Dictionary is its word histories. It traces the history of each word from its earliest recorded use up to the time of the printing of the dictionary.
16. What do we learn about the first English dictionary?
17. What was the breakthrough in Dr. Johnson’s dictionary?
18. What is an interesting feature of the Oxford Dictionary?