March 2001 newsletter

As the editors work their way through the OED text, one of the issues which arises from time to time is the question of whether a particular entry, or pair of entries, should be treated as one word or two: in other words, at what point should two prominent variants of what appears to be the same word part company, so the individual history of each can be clearly told? Semantic 'twins' which have had to be extensively thought about in this way over the past 12 months include the pairings madam and madame, megrim and migraine, mask and masque, and marzipan and marchpane. Marzipan and marchpane were in fact treated as a double headword in the First Edition of the OED, on the understanding that the two words derived ultimately from the same Italian etymological roots. While this is indeed the case, additional research has shown that both variants have distinct enough histories to justify inclusion in the OED as separate headwords. Peter Gilliver, in his Tale of Two Treats, shows how the OED's treatment of marzipan and marchpane has changed in the light of this extra evidence.

As well as the publication of the range mast to meaty, this quarter we celebrate the first anniversary of OED Online. Mark Dunn, of the OED Publication Group, describes some of the highlights of that year. The success of the electronic version has demonstrated beyond doubt that the decision to take the OED into the 21^st century with the technology of the era was the right one. Curiously, however, the publication of electronic sections of OED text as it is revised mirrors the OUP's decision over a century ago to publish the First Edition of the OED in fascicles, as James Murray and his editors completed each section of the alphabet. Contemporary technology, then, has served to enhance OED's established editorial traditions, while making the text available to a wider public than ever before.

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