Etymologicon Linguæ Anglicanæ

Stephen Skinner

Etymologicon Linguæ Anglicanæ

London

T. Roycroft

1671

The English Civil Wars drove Skinner overseas, where he studied medicine. Upon returning, he became a physician in Lincoln and embarked on lexicography. While most dictionaries of his day contained only superficial etymologies, Skinner lavished scholarly attention on word histories and explored cognates in Latin, Greek, Italian, Spanish, Danish, and Germanic. He treated nearly 8,000 words, many never before recorded.  Skinner made it through the Great Plague of 1665, but his luck ran out two years later when a “malignant fever” took his life.

Ex coll. Karolyne & Bryan A. Garner. HHD no. 18