glossary
A glossary ( Latin glossary , from ancient Greek glōssarion , to glōssa , Attic glōtta "tongue, language") is a list of words with attached meanings or translations . As an appendix ( addendum ) to a work, a glossary is also known as a dictionary , and a separate glossary is called a dictionary . The Latin word glossarium describes an object as a “ book ” that explains old, outdated or foreign words. In a broader sense, a glossary is also disambiguation called (as opposed to a disambiguation ). In particular, when it comes to describing or explaining individual terms , a glossary is also referred to as a (term) delimitation or definition .
history
In antiquity and in the Middle Ages, glossaries were used by so-called glossographers as collections of words in need of explanation ( archaisms , dialect words, foreign words , see glosses ) for studying grammar and as an aid to explaining texts (such as Homers and the Bible ) created. Since late antiquity , bilingual, Greek-Latin and Latin-Greek glossaries have also been created, which served to convey the respective foreign language, and in the Latin Middle Ages then formed the point of contact for the emergence of Latin-vernacular glossaries ( Abrogans , Affatim glossary ).
As a lexicographical genre, the monolingual and bilingual glossaries form a preliminary stage for the dictionaries , which are designed to fully capture a vocabulary , of which Charles Du Cange's lexicon of Vulgar and Middle Latin as the glossarium ad scriptores mediae et infimae was still used in the 18th century latinitatis (1st edition Paris 1678). The glossaries of antiquity and late antiquity often used the method of etymology , which seeks to derive a word or its components from similar-sounding words in order to uncover not only the origin of the word, but also the essential properties of the thing referred to. In addition to primarily linguistic explanations, they often also offered a high proportion of factual explanations, which made them a preliminary stage of the encyclopedias . The most powerful encyclopedia for the Middle Ages, the Etymologiae of Isidore of Seville , is compiled from glossaries from late antiquity, among other things.
In modern times , a glossary in the field of philology and edition technique is usually a list of words with linguistic explanations that opens up the vocabulary of an edited text and is usually printed in the appendix to this text. A specialist language or technical glossary lists the terminology of a specialist language or a technical subject area with conceptual and factual definitions that are intended to ensure the correct use of these specialist terms and their clear understanding.
Examples
Special glossaries:
- Controlled vocabulary , a fixed glossary to avoid ambiguity ( disambiguation )
- Terminology database , a computer-aided glossary with a link to word processing and editing systems
Known glossaries (dictionaries):
Web links
Individual evidence