The OED is the accepted authority on the evolution of the English language over the last thousand years. It aims for nothing less than recording the complete history of the vocabulary of the English language - not just what each word means and how that meaning may have changed, but where the word comes from, when it was first used, and how different people have used it since. There are over 600,000 words and phrases in the dictionary and their uses are illustrated with over 2.5 million citations.
Ever since its inception, the work of professional lexicographers has been augmented by help from the public. The initial vision of the dictionary's founders was to make sure the dictionary was truly accurate, complete and up to date, by reading everything that had ever been written. In 1879, the dictionary's founding editor James Murray issued his famous 'Appeal to the English-speaking and English-reading public to read books' and send evidence from them to him to help compile the dictionary. The Balderdash & Piffle Wordhunt is inspired by this original appeal and true to its principles.
The first edition, in 10 volumes, took 71 years to complete and was first published in 1928 with the title A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles. The second edition was published in 20 volumes and first came out in 1989.
For the last decade the OED team have been working on the Third Edition, a process sometimes described as the largest humanities project worldwide. This involves not just adding new words but revising every entry in the dictionary. It's the first comprehensive revision and update that the big dictionary has received in its 125-year history. Work started on the letter M. Currently the dictionary editors are working on R. The Third Edition is not available in book form - it is published online, integrated into the Second Edition, and is available by subscription at www.oed.com
The entire OED online is freely available all the time in most public libraries in the UK, including from library users' homes via their library cards.
Meet the OED panel
John Simpson joined the Oxford Dictionaries in 1976 and has been Chief Editor of the OED since 1993. As Chief Editor John leads the work on the Third Edition of the dictionary, and has the final say on which words can or cannot be recorded in the OED, and how they are defined.
Perhaps surprisingly, this is not a job for people who 'love words', according to John. The role requires strict critical discipline, logical analysis, and an ability to write stylishly and concisely. There is no room for sentimentality on the OED!
John is the seventh Editor of the OED and is also a specialist in English slang and proverbs. In his spare time John plays for a local village cricket team in Oxfordshire.
Peter Gilliver is an Associate Editor of the OED. As a member of the team of general revisers, Peter participates in the task of reviewing each entry in the OED in turn, considering a whole host of issues: whether the meaning of a word has undergone even the slightest change, how to rewrite the definitions to reflect this, what is the best way to represent the interrelationship of the different senses that a word may have had over the course of its history, how to represent a word's pronunciation.... He particularly enjoys tackling the larger entries in the dictionary, such as the verb 'put', which currently runs to just over 500 senses and subsenses.
Peter is also researching and writing a history of the OED.
In 2004 Peter captained the Oxford University Press team in 'University Challenge: The Professionals', reaching the final (where they were beaten by a team from the British Library). In his spare time Peter is a keen choral singer.
Tania Styles is a Senior Editor at the OED with responsibility for etymology.
As an etymologist Tania has the complex job of working out how words enter the English language; a notoriously tricky process. Given that words can originate from a multitude of different sources, the work of the OED etymologists involves thorough research in historical dictionaries of various languages, and often consultation with specialists in a particular language or period of history.
Tania has also appeared in "dictionary corner" in 'Countdown'.
Your language still needs you!
This year's Balderdash & Piffle Wordhunt is over, but the Dictionary's work is never done. If you can trump the evidence presented so far, you can still contribute to the dictionary by contacting the OED:
Oxford English Dictionary
Oxford University Press
Great Clarendon Street
Oxford, OX2 6DP
Tel: +44 (0)1865 353660
Fax: +44 (0)1865 353811
E-mail: oed3@oup.com