Which Is The First Published Encyclopedia?

The idea of compiling an encyclopedia has been present for centuries. Pliny the Elder (first century CE), wrote the Naturalis Historia, which was a 37-volume account of the natural world which was popular in western Europe for much of the Middle Ages.

The first Christian encyclopedia was Cassiodorus' Institutiones (560 CE), which inspired St Isidore of Seville's Etymologiae (636), which was the most influential encyclopedia of the Early Middle Ages.

The earliest Byzantine work that could be called an enclopedia was the Bibliotheca, by the Patriarch Photius (9th century).

'De proprietatibus rerum' (1240), by Bartholomeus de Glanvilla, was the most widely read and quoted enyclopedia in the High Middle Ages.

'Speculum Majus' (1260), by Vincent of Beauvais, was the most most ambitious encyclopedia in the late medieval period, with over 3 million words!

The encyclopedia, as we know it today, was developed from the dictionary in the 18th century.