The Century Dictionary: An Encyclopedic Lexicon of the English Language

The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia was a monumental American English dictionary, first published in six volumes between 1889 and 1891. Supervised by William Dwight Whitney, a professor at Yale University, it contained over 200,000 main entries and 500,000 definitions. The dictionary was noted for its thorough coverage of American English, detailed etymologies, and strong emphasis on scientific and technical terms. A supplementary Cyclopedia of Names was added in 1894, followed by an atlas in 1897. Though it went out of print, it remained a valuable reference for scholars.1