After reading a post mentioning Maragaret Cone’s Pali-English dictionary, I started to realize that I don’t really know how such dictionaries are actually made.
So my question is, what is the methodology and what are the textual sources used to create Pali-English dictionaries and find the best meanings of terms?
I was also wondering, how is Margaret Cone’s Pali-English dictionary viewed (in term of quality/accuracy) by:
- early Buddhist scholars? (I’d guess rather well from the few comments by Bhante Sujato on this forum…, if so, I’d be curious to understand why)
- more traditional Sri Lankan, Burmese, Thai and other Theravadin scholars?
And what is the level of interaction about between Margaret Cone and the Theravadin scholar monks/nuns? I’m just fascinated by the fact that she’s been working (seemingly) on her own on this huge task for such a long time and I’m curious to know how integrated it is with the Pali community as a whole.
Thanks in advance for any insights on these matters