Nudansk Ordbog 1953-2010

Abstract

The article presents as a piece of Danish dictionary history, the story of NDO, Nudansk Ordbog, 1953-2010. The dictionary is a two-volume monolingual general dictionary and may be seen as the third Danish dictionary of its kind, the former ones being Molbech’s Dansk Ordbog (1833, 1859) and Dahl & Hammer’s Dansk Ordbog for Folket (1914). In addition it is a dictionary that has been published in several different editions, thereby representing changes in vocabulary and word meanings and showing changes in structural principles reflecting different lexicographic approaches during the period. The dictionary was designed to include proper names and a greater amount of foreign words than was the practice in other non-special-purpose dictionaries. Besides etymology and examples of use, the entries comprise pronunciations and definitions, though in the first fifteen editions this was mainly for non-native words as the dictionary was oriented towards users with a reasonable command of the Danish language. In 1996 the dictionary was turned into a fully definitional dictionary, this inspired by similar English, Norwegian and Swedish smaller general dictionaries and in accordance with its two Danish predecessors. The editions 1996-2010 are accessible also electronically as CD’s. After the 2010-edition NDO ceased as a paper dictionary and is now distributed as an online version. Thus the editing of the dictionary is no longer dependt on a two-volume paper version – with the constraints and benefits such may have had.