Dictionary Building Resources

Dictionary Craft Tools

A practical guide for lexicographers, wordsmiths, and neologism architects.

MorDictionary does not merely define words.

We build them. We preserve them. We refine them. We sometimes invent them.

This page collects tools, communities, and reference materials useful for crafting dictionary entries, mining example sentences, and coining neologisms.

🛠 Entry Construction Tools

Corpus & Usage Research

Google Books Ngram Viewer — Track historical frequency of words.
COCA (Corpus of Contemporary American English) — Modern usage patterns.
British National Corpus — British English usage data.
Sketch Engine — Advanced corpus querying (professional tool).

Etymology Research

Online Etymology Dictionary — Quick-reference etymology.
Wiktionary — Collaborative etymology chains.
Perseus Digital Library — Classical language references.
Historical dictionaries (OED, Webster 1828, etc.).

Pronunciation Tools

IPA Chart resources
Forvo (crowdsourced pronunciation)
Wiktionary audio archives

Frequency & Register Checking

Word frequency lists
Academic corpora
Literary corpora

✍ Example Sentence Craft

Example sentences are the living proof of a word’s habitat.

Sentence Mining Communities

Reddit — r/SentenceMiners

Lemmy — c/SentenceMiners

🧠 Neologism Design

Coining new words requires discipline, not whimsy.

Neologism Communities

Reddit neologismhelp
Lemmy neologismhelp
Linguistics forums

Principles of Sound Coinage

Morphological consistency
Transparent affix use
Etymological plausibility
Phonetic elegance
Semantic necessity

A good neologism fills a gap. A great neologism feels inevitable.

📚 Recommended Dictionaries & Glossaries

MorDictionary respects tradition while refusing to be boring.

General Dictionaries

Oxford English Dictionary
Merriam-Webster
Wiktionary
Wordnik

Specialized & Historical

Green’s Dictionary of Slang
Webster’s 1828
Regional glossaries
Field-specific glossaries (legal, nautical, theological, technical)

Each dictionary has a temperament. Study their strengths. Observe their weaknesses. Avoid their dullness.

🏛 Collaborative Lexicography

Dictionary-making is no longer confined to ivory towers.

It is communal.

Wiktionary (open lexicography)
Community glossaries
Language preservation projects
Personal lexicographic blogs

MorDictionary encourages participation, experimentation, and preservation.

📜 Philosophy

We oppose boring dictionaries.

A dictionary entry should:

Inform
Contextualize
Illuminate
Delight

A lexicon is not merely a record. It is a living archive of thought.