80 Encyclopaedias 



parts. I. Pure science, II. Mixed and applied sciences, III. History and biography, 

 IV. Miscellaneous. Part I and II include many authoritative articles which still de- 

 serve the attention of historians of science. 



The most popular and useful of all encyclopaedias, and vi^e might perhaps say, 

 the best for general purposes, the Encyclopaedia Britannica, is also a child of the 

 eighteenth century. Its first edition began to appear in serial form (6d. per num- 

 ber!) in 1768 and was completed in 1771. Let us list here the following editions: 

 2nd in 1778-83, 3rd in 1788-97; 4th in 1801-10; 5th in 1815-24; 6th in 1823; 7th 

 in 1830-42; 8th in 1853-61; 9th in 1875-89 (reprinted in 1898); lOth in 1902; llth 

 in 1910-11; 12th in 1922; 13^/i in 1926; 14th in 1929,^ later Chicago editions 

 1943 ff. 



The most ambitious encyclopaedic eflFort of the nineteenth century was made by 

 JoHANN Samuel Ersch (1766-1828) and Johann Gottfried Gruber (1774-1851). 

 Their AUgemeine Encyclopadie der Wissenschaften und Kiinste began to appear in 

 Leipzig in 1818; by 1889, 167 volumes had been pubhshed and the work was 

 stopped before being completed. In order to hasten its publication, it was divided 

 into three series A-G, H-N, O-Z. Only the first A-G was completed (99 vols., 1818- 

 82); the second H-N, stopped at the entry 'ligature' (43 vols. 1827-89), the third 

 stopped at the entry 'Phyxios' (1830-50). Some articles were monographs of con- 

 siderable size. E.g., vol. 27 of the second series included an "article" by Moritz 

 Steinschneider on Jewish literature (printed 1850). That article was Englished 

 by the mathematician and physicist, William Spottiswoode (1825-83), revised by 

 the author and published in book form "Jewish literature from the eighth to the 

 eighteenth century" (414 p., London 1857); an index to the 1600 Jewish writers 

 dealt with was published much later (52 p., Frankfurt a. M., 1893). The Ersch 

 and Gruber purpose was defeated by its own magnitude, and that immense work is 

 almost forgotten today, at least outside of German lands. 



A briefer enumeration of the nineteenth and twentieth century encyclopaedias 

 will suffice as the reader is familiar with them. Instead of dealing with them 

 in straight chronological order, it is simpler to divide them into four linguistic 

 groups, German, French, Spanish, Italian. 



The first "new" encyclopaedia of importance in the German world was established 

 by the firm Brockhaus of Leipzig, the founder of which was Friedrich Arnold 

 Brockhaus (1772-1823), and the first edition of the Brockhaus' Konversations-Lexi- 

 kon (as different from an older Lexikon, dating back to 1796-1808, out of which 

 it developed) is the one dated 1809-11, second edition 1812-19. 15th ed., called 

 Der Crosse Brockhaus (20 vols. Leipzig 1928-35, supt. vol. 21, 1935); revision (20 

 vols., plus atlas, Leipzig 1939). 



Meyers Crosses Konversations-Lexikon was first pubhshed in 46 vols. (Leipzig 

 1840-55), seventh edition (12 vols. Leipzig 1924-30, supp. vols. 13-15, 1931-33; atlas 

 1933, gazetteer 1935). 



Herders Konversations-Lexikon was first published in 5 vols. ( Freiburg im Breis- 

 gau 1853-57). Third edition (8 vols., 1902-07; supt. 1, 1910, supt. 2, 1921-22). 



After the German debacle a new Lexikon, to be completed in 7 volumes, was 

 undertaken in Switzerland. (7 vols., Schweizer Lexikon Zurich 1945-48). 



The leader of encyclopaedic endeavor in France was the grammarian, Pierre 

 Larousse (1817-75), whose family name has almost become a common name 

 wherever French language is used. The main work edited or published by him 

 was Le grand dictionnaire universel du XIXe siecle ( 15 very large vols., Paris 

 1866-76; suppt. 2 vols., 1878-90). This is the combination of a French dictionary 

 with an encyclopaedia. Nouveau Larousse illustre, edited by Claude Auge (8 

 vols., Paris 1897-1904; Supplement et Complement 1906-7). Larousse du XXe 



^ Some of these editions were not completely new but constituted by the volumes of the 

 preceding editions plus supplementary volumes; annual supplements were also published from 

 time to time, like the Britannica Year-Book of 1913 (Isis 1, 290-92) but these things do not 

 matter much in retrospect. The main point is that there are 15 editions of the Encyclopaedia 

 Britannica, 3 of these in the eighteenth century, 6 in the nineteenth, 6 in the twentieth. There 

 is no other "encyclopaedic" lecord comparable to that, that is, if size, authoritativeness and 

 frequency of publication are all taken into account. 



