Bailey

Bailey, NATHAN or NATHANIEL, an early English lexicographer, whose work appeared in 1721 under the title, An Universal Etymological English Dictionary, to which a supplementary volume was added in 1727. In 1802 it had reached its thirtieth edition. An interleaved copy was the foundation of Johnson's more famous work. Lord Chatham is said to have read it through twice, and it was one of the sources from which Chatterton drew his pseudo Old English words. In 1730 appeared the Dictionarium Britannicum, by several hands, under the supervision of Bailey. This busy author wrote several other books, now of but slight importance. Of his life very little is known, save that he was a 'Seventh-day Baptist' and kept a boarding-school at Stepney, where he died, June 27, 1742. The English Dialect Society reprinted, in 1883, the 18th-century dialect words preserved in Bailey's Dictionary.