The Encyclopaedia Britannica Begins to Appear

In December 1768, Edinburgh printers Colin Macfarquhar and Andrew Bell began issuing a new reference work in weekly serial parts. Published under the title Encyclopaedia Britannica, or, A Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, compiled upon a New Plan, the enterprise aimed to organize knowledge by blending shorter dictionary articles with extensive treatises in a single alphabetical sequence. While treatises covered broad arts and sciences, individual entries treated specific subordinate topics. By 1771, the 100 weekly instalments were complete and could be bound into three volumes, the beginning of what Britannica describes as the oldest English-language general encyclopaedia.

The compilation was largely the work of William Smellie, a Scottish scholar engaged by Macfarquhar and Bell to produce the text. Unlike subsequent managing editors who coordinated expansive networks of specialists, Smellie wrote or compiled nearly all of the main articles himself, borrowing heavily from existing books; according to his biographer, he joked that he had made a dictionary of arts and sciences with a pair of scissors. Although compiled in Edinburgh during a celebrated period of intellectual activity, early editions did not feature contributions from prominent local luminaries. Only with later revisions did outside collaborators participate systematically, reflecting the work's gradual evolution from a local Scottish undertaking into an authoritative British enterprise.