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Words lost from the Oxford Junior Dictionary in the 2007 edition

On 6th December 2008, the Daily Telegraph reported the following words had been dismissed from the 2007 edition of the Oxford Junior Dictionary:

  • Regarding the world of plants and animals - acorn, adder,  ash, ass, beaver, beech, blackberry, bluebell, boar, bramble, budgerigar, buttercup, canary, carnation, catkin, cheetah, chestnut, clover, conker, corgi, cowslip, crocus, cygnet, dandelion, doe, drake, fern, ferret, fungus, gerbil, goldfish, gorse, guinea pig, hamster, hazel, hazelnut,  heather, heron, herring, holly, horse chestnut, ivy, kingfisher, lark, lavender, leopard, lobster, magpie, minnow, mint, mistletoe, mussel, nectar, nectarine, newt, oats, otter, ox, oyster, pansy, panther, pelican, plaice, poodle, poppy, porcupine, porpoise, primrose, raven, spaniel, starling, stoat, stork, sycamore, terrapin, thrush, tulip, violet, walnut, weasel, willow, wren.

  • Regarding food and farming - allotment, almond, apricot, bacon, beetroot, blacksmith, bloom, bran, bray, bridle, brook, bullock, canter, cauliflower, colt, county, gooseberry, leek, liquorice, manger, marzipan, melon, nectarine, parsnip, pasture, piglet, porridge poultry, prune, radish, rhubarb, sheaf, spinach, turnip, vine.

  • In the faerie worlds - dwarf, elf, goblin.

  • Regarding religions - abbey, aisle, altar, bishop, carol, chapel, christen, disciple, minister, monastery, monk, nun, nunnery, parish, pew, psalm,
    pulpit, saint, sin, devil, vicar

  • Regarding people - coronation, duchess, duke, emperor, empire, monarch, decade

 The following words were added to the Dictionary in their place:

"allergic, alliteration, analogue, apparatus, attachment, bilingual, biodegradable, block graph, blog, boisterous, brainy, broadband, bullet point, bungee jumping, cautionary tale, celebrity, chatroom, childhood, chronological, citizenship, classify, colloquial, committee, common sense, compulsory, conflict, cope, creep, curriculum, cut and paste, database, debate, democratic, donate, drought, dyslexic, emotion, endangered, EU, Euro, export, food chain, idiom, incisor, interdependent, MP3 player, negotiate, square number, tolerant, trapezium, vandalism, voicemail."

As Lila MacLellen says in her review of The Lost Words (December 2018):

"Then, in 2015, a group of 28 writers penned an open letter to the publisher. Why, they wanted to know, should children have to choose between the hard-edged language of the internet and the name of a flowering plant? Why was the word “voicemail” more important than “wren?” “In light of what is known about the benefits of natural play and connection to nature; and the dangers of their lack, we think the choice of words to be omitted shocking and poorly considered,” the authors declared.

Macfarlane and Morris were among the people who’d signed the letter. It seeded the creation of the The Lost Words—an exquisite example of turning to one’s craft to devise subtle, inventive protest. Its success is a welcome reminder that art, as well as nature, can still cast a spell over all of us—adults and children alike."

A copy of this open letter can be found here.