... the expansion of trade with the growth of the Empire; all these factors led to an awareness of the deficiencies of the vernacular to reflect such momentous changes. The printing press provided the literate public with dozens of replica texts but, without a recognised standard, spelling varied greatly, especially from writer to writer. Moreover the novice reader was still unable to understand the borrowed Latin words that littered the translations, so common in the sixteenth century. Thus, during the Renaissance dictionaries were either Latin-English or English-Latin. Sir Thomas Elyot began the tradition of Latin-English dictionaries. Elyot, (1490 ?- 1546), was a true Renaissance spirit who compiled and translated books on education, language and government in the vernacular. His work led to a realisation of the inadequacies of the English language and its dictionaries when compared to the classical sources he translated and consulted. Consequently in 1538 he compiled his own dictionary. ...

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