The word ''dord'' is a
dictionary error in
lexicography
Lexicography is the study of lexicons, and is divided into two separate academic disciplines. It is the art of compiling dictionaries.
* Practical lexicography is the art or craft of compiling, writing and editing dictionaries.
* Theoretica ...
. It was accidentally created, as a
ghost word
A ghost word is a word published in a dictionary or similarly authoritative reference work even though it had not previously had any meaning or been used intentionally. A ghost word generally originates from a typographical or linguistic error, tak ...
, by the staff of G. and C. Merriam Company (now part of
Merriam-Webster
Merriam-Webster, Inc. is an American company that publishes reference books and is especially known for its dictionaries. It is the oldest dictionary publisher in the United States.
In 1831, George and Charles Merriam founded the company as ...
) in the ''
New International Dictionary'', second edition (1934). That dictionary defined the term as a synonym for density used in physics and chemistry in the following way:
dord (dôrd), ''n. Physics & Chem.'' Density.
Philip Babcock Gove
Philip Babcock Gove (June 27, 1902–November 16, 1972) was an American lexicographer who was editor-in-chief of the ''Webster's Third New International Dictionary'', published in 1961.
Born in Concord, New Hampshire, he received his A.B. from Da ...
, an editor at
Merriam-Webster
Merriam-Webster, Inc. is an American company that publishes reference books and is especially known for its dictionaries. It is the oldest dictionary publisher in the United States.
In 1831, George and Charles Merriam founded the company as ...
who became editor-in-chief of ''
Webster's Third New International Dictionary
''Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged'' (commonly known as ''Webster's Third'', or ''W3'') was published in September 1961. It was edited by Philip Babcock Gove and a team of lexicographers who spent 757 ...
'', wrote a letter to the journal ''American Speech'', fifteen years after the error was caught, in which he explained how the "dord" error was introduced and corrected.
On 31 July 1931, Austin M. Patterson, the dictionary's
chemistry
Chemistry is the science, scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a natural science that covers the Chemical element, elements that make up matter to the chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules and ions ...
editor, sent in a slip reading "D or d, cont./density." This was intended to add "
density
Density (volumetric mass density or specific mass) is the substance's mass per unit of volume. The symbol most often used for density is ''ρ'' (the lower case Greek letter rho), although the Latin letter ''D'' can also be used. Mathematical ...
" to the existing list of words that the letter "D" can abbreviate. The phrase "D or d" was misinterpreted as a single, word: ''Dord''. This was a plausible mistake because headwords on slips were typed with spaces between the letters, so "D or d" looked very much like "D o r d". The original slip went missing, so a new slip was prepared for the printer, which assigned a
part of speech
In grammar, a part of speech or part-of-speech (abbreviated as POS or PoS, also known as word class or grammatical category) is a category of words (or, more generally, of lexical items) that have similar grammatical properties. Words that are assi ...
(
noun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Living creatures (including people, alive, d ...
) and a
pronunciation
Pronunciation is the way in which a word or a language is spoken. This may refer to generally agreed-upon sequences of sounds used in speaking a given word or language in a specific dialect ("correct pronunciation") or simply the way a particular ...
. The would-be word was not questioned or corrected by
proofreader
Proofreading is the reading of a galley proof or an electronic copy of a publication to find and correct reproduction errors of text or art. Proofreading is the final step in the editorial cycle before publication.
Professional
Traditional m ...
s.
The entry appeared on page 771 of the dictionary around 1934, between the entries for ''
Dorcopsis
The dorcopsises are the marsupials of the genera '' Dorcopsis'' and ''Dorcopsulus''. They are found in the tropical forests of New Guinea and Southeast Indonesia. They are placed in the subfamily Macropodinae, along with other Australasian ma ...
'' (a type of small kangaroo) and
doré (golden in color).
[
On 28 February 1939, an editor noticed "dord" lacked an ]etymology
Etymology ()The New Oxford Dictionary of English (1998) – p. 633 "Etymology /ˌɛtɪˈmɒlədʒi/ the study of the class in words and the way their meanings have changed throughout time". is the study of the history of the Phonological chan ...
and investigated, discovering the error. An order was sent to the printer marked "plate change/imperative/urgent". The non-word "dord" was excised; "density" was added as an additional meaning for the abbreviation "D or d" as originally intended, and the definition of the adjacent entry " Doré furnace" was expanded from "A furnace for refining Doré bullion
Bullion is non-ferrous metal that has been refined to a high standard of elemental purity. The term is ordinarily applied to bulk metal used in the production of coins and especially to precious metals such as gold and silver. It comes from t ...
" to "a furnace in which Doré bullion is refined" to close up the space. Gove wrote that this was "probably too bad, for why shouldn't ''dord'' mean 'density'?" In 1940, bound books began appearing without the ghost word
A ghost word is a word published in a dictionary or similarly authoritative reference work even though it had not previously had any meaning or been used intentionally. A ghost word generally originates from a typographical or linguistic error, tak ...
, although inspection of printed copies well into the 1940s shows "dord" still present. The entry "dord" was not completely removed until 1947.
See also
* Boole's rule
In mathematics, Boole's rule, named after George Boole, is a method of numerical integration.
Formula Simple Boole's Rule
It approximates an integral:
: \int_^ f(x)\,dx
by using the values of at five equally spaced points:
: \begin
& x_0 ...
, a mathematical rule of integration sometimes known as Bode's rule, due to a typographical error in Abramowitz and Stegun
''Abramowitz and Stegun'' (''AS'') is the informal name of a 1964 mathematical reference work edited by Milton Abramowitz and Irene Stegun of the United States National Bureau of Standards (NBS), now the ''National Institute of Standards and Te ...
(1972, p. 886) that was subsequently propagated
* Esquivalience
The ''New Oxford American Dictionary'' (''NOAD'') is a single-volume dictionary of American English compiled by American editors at the Oxford University Press.
''NOAD'' is based upon the ''New Oxford Dictionary of English'' (''NODE''), published ...
* Fictitious entry
Fictitious or fake entries are deliberately incorrect entries in reference works such as dictionaries, encyclopedias (including Wikipedia), maps, and directories. There are more specific terms for particular kinds of fictitious entry, such as Moun ...
* ''Frindle
''Frindle'' is a middle-grade American children's novel written by Andrew Clements, illustrated by Brian Selznick, and published by the company Aladdin in 1996. It was the winner of the 2016 Phoenix Award, which is granted by the Children's Liter ...
'', a children's novel in which a fictitious word passes into common parlance
*Mondegreen
A mondegreen () is a mishearing or misinterpretation of a phrase in a way that gives it a new meaning. Mondegreens are most often created by a person listening to a poem or a song; the listener, being unable to hear a lyric clearly, substitutes w ...
* Phono-semantic matching
Phono-semantic matching (PSM) is the incorporation of a word into one language from another, often creating a neologism, where the word's non-native quality is hidden by replacing it with Phonetics, phonetically and semantically similar words or ...
* Trap street
In cartography, a trap street is a fictitious entry in the form of a misrepresented street on a map, often outside the area the map nominally covers, for the purpose of "trapping" potential plagiarists of the map who, if caught, would be unable t ...
References
{{Reflist
External links
"Dord" at fun-with-words.com; quotes Gove article
Dord: A Ghost Word
Fictitious entries
Lexicography
English words
Error