This little Classical Dictionary is, in the main, a reprint of Dr Smith's Dictionary published many years ago. But a considerable amount of revision has been made; few of the longer articles appear exactly in the form in which they originally appeared; and a great deal of new matter has been introduced in order to bring the work up to date, as far as was consistent with the Publisher's plan of including in Everyman's Library a short and concise companion to the classics. Armed with this book, the average reader will have little difficulty in understanding classical allusions as they appear, not only in standard English writers, but also in the the periodical literature of our time.
I love this book: it fits into a capacious pocket, and it’s the ideal companion for reading anything with classical allusions, as for instance Simon Raven.
It is, according to the Preface, in the main a reprint of Dr. Smith’s Dictionary of many years ago, with a considerable amount of revision (what Dr. Smith’s first name may have been is not specified, here or elsewhere, but was presumably William).
My edition (which I inherited from my uncle who was killed in WWII) is a 1942 reprint of the 1937 revision “necessitated by the work of modern scholars”.
The contents are as follows:
Preface The Chief Greek Writers and Artists The Chief Greek Philosophers The Chief Latin Writers Patristic Literature — Greek and Roman Some Dates in Greek History Some Dates in Roman History List of Roman Emperors List of some Famous Classical Scholars Some Standard Books Recommended to Students of Classical Antiquity To the Student of Roman History
Dictionary
Illustrations
One amusing feature, that you wouldn’t see in a modern book, is that there is no hesitation in telling the reader what the best edition of this or that work is.
The illustrations comprise some black and white photos of coins, statues and architecture. I remember that in my teens the photo of Praxiteles’s head of Hermes filled me with a desire to see it in person.
How do I grade this, it's a dictionary for Pete's sake. It is good for short descriptions, but often is missing terms found in larger dictionaries concerning Western antiquity.