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What is an index?

Chapter 1: WHAT IS AN INDEX?
By Henry B. Wheatley
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About This Book

The pamphlet opens with a historical survey of the word index and its shifting meanings, tracing early usages, notable opinions, and illustrative specimens; it then provides practical guidance on making indexes, covering compilation techniques, concise and accurate headings, alphabetical order versus classification, treatment of names and prefixes, cross-references, and frequent errors; examples and critiques are used throughout to show good and bad practice and to argue for organized efforts to improve indexing standards.

WHAT IS AN INDEX?

A FEW NOTES ON INDEXES AND INDEXERS.

BY
HENRY B. WHEATLEY, F.S.A.

HON. SEC. OF THE INDEX SOCIETY, AND TREASURER OF THE EARLY ENGLISH TEXT SOCIETY.

“I for my part venerate the inventor of Indexes; and I know not to whom to yield the preference, either to Hippocrates, who was the first great anatomiser of the human body, or to that unknown labourer in literature who first laid open the nerves and arteries of a book.”—Isaac Disraeli, Literary Miscellanies.

“I magnify mine office.”

LONDON:
PUBLISHED FOR THE INDEX SOCIETY
BY LONGMANS, GREEN & Co., 39, PATERNOSTER ROW.
MDCCCLXXIX.

SECOND EDITION.

HERTFORD:
PRINTED BY STEPHEN AUSTIN AND SONS.