The Pali Text Society's Pali-English Dictionary

was undecided, whether I should buy a "Childers" then, or wait until the "International Dictionary" should
be out in 1905. Little did I dream that I should have had to wait till I myself finished the International
Dictionary in 1925! By 1909 only one--eighth of the work had been done. Gradually the co--workers sent
back the materials which Rhys Davids had supplied to them. Some had done nothing at all, nor even
opened the packets. Only Messrs. Duroiselle, Konow, and Mrs. Bode had carried out what they had
undertaken to do. After Rhys Davids had again conferred with his colleagues at the Copenhagen Congress
in 1908, he published the full scheme of the Dictionary in J.P.T.S. for 1909. Then the War came and
stopped the plans for good. The failure of the original scheme teaches us that dictionary work cannot be
done en passant and in one's spare time; it requires one's whole time. At any rate, they were very
disappointing years for my friend, and he had almost despaired of the vitality of his pet plan, when, in
1916, he asked me, under the auspices of the P.T.S. and with his assistance, to do the Dictionary on a
uniform plan. So he left the compiling to me, and I set to work, conferring with him at frequent intervals.
He revised my work. This had become more exhaustive than was planned, because double the amount of
texts had been published by 1922 than in 1902. This was a gain for the Dictionary, but meant much more
work for the editor.
3. MY MATERIAL.
The Pali Dictionary is in a certain respect the result of the work of many. It is a resume of all the indexes to
the texts, so that every indexer has his or her share in the work. But the indexes do not give translations,
and thus the main work was often left to me: to find the most correct and adequate English term for the Pali
word. It needs careful and often intricate study to accomplish this task, for even the most skilled and well-read
translators have either shirked the most difficult words, or translated them wrongly or with a term
which does not and cannot cover the idea adequately. Thus many a crux retarded the work, not to speak of
thousands of incorrectnesses in the text of the printed editions. A few contributors gave more (like Mrs.
Bode and Professor Duroiselle), but only from scanty material and texts up to 1909. Rhys Davids'material,
copied from his copy of Childers (which was bequeathed him by Childers, interleaved by the binder and
filled in from 1878 to 1916), was partly old, and mostly without the English translation, which was only to
be found here and there in his translated texts.
Mrs. Rhys Davids has shown her constant sympathy with the work, and I am indebted to her for many
suggestions, especially concerning psychological termini. She also condensed and revised my articles on
vinnana and sankhara. To summarize what actual help I have received by using materials other than my
own, I have to state that I found the following contributions of use:
(1) For the whole alphabet:
All the indexes to the P.T.S. publications.Many of these are very faulty (the Kvu trsln word index contains
60 per cent. of error). The only index with which I have no fault to find is that to Sn and SnA by Helmer
Smith. Rhys Davids'annotations to his Childers, representing about 10 per cent. of all important references.
Kern's additions to Childers'(Toevoegselen); to be taken with caution in translations and explanations, but
at least equal to Rhys Davids'in extent and importance. It is to be regretted that this valuable collection is
marred by any amount of errors and misprints (see also below, 4 end). Hardy's occasional slips and
references (5 per cent. of the whole).
(2) For single letters:
Mrs. Bode's collection of B and Bh. Professor Konow's collection of S (J.P.T.S. 1909) and H (ibid. 1907),
which I have used very extensively, after correcting them and bringing them up to date. Professor
Duroiselle's collection of one--half of K and Mr. E. J. Thomas'N__.
4. HOW TO JUDGE THE DICTIONARY.