El Diccionario de autoridades entre la tradición y la innovación. A propósito de la definición de las denominaciones de animales

Abstract

The aim of the present paper is to analyse the first dictionary of the Real Academia Española (1726–1739) with particular focus on the definitions of terms belonging to the lexical set of animal designations. This comprehensive study is carried out in the light not only of previous monolingual dictionaries but also of contemporary treatises that reflect the naturalist doctrines of the day. With its independent approach, the Diccionario de autoridades breaks away from such lexicographical models and scholarly treatises, merely preserving from the latter a limited selection of encyclopedic knowledge and technical terms of Greco-Latin origin. Its definitions are characterized instead by the objective manner in which the visible features of the referents are described; for this reason, it is argued, the academic dictionary brings an innovative perspective to both zoological description and lexicographical technique.