On Thu, 25 Sep 2008 08:00:55 -0400, "Jean B." > wrote:

<snipped>
>
>Sure, but then one would have to find every relevant entry. Not
>quite the same as having some source that lists the earliest known
>occurrences of such names/concepts.

I can't see how anybody could begin to compete with the online Oxford
English Dictionary and its battalions of readers that haved searched
for occurrences over the last 150 years.

I am unsure what you mean by the problem of having to 'find every
relevant entry'. You type in the word, up comes the list of earliest
known occurrences, together with changes in meaning over the
centuries.

Take just one entry - the favourite English dessert 'Spotted Dick' -
How long would it take you to do the reading that went into this
single entry?

OED defines it as a ' suet pudding made with currants or raisins'.

Among the citations a

1849 A. SOYER Modern Housewife 350 Plum Bolster, or *Spotted Dick. -
Roll out two pounds of paste.., have some Smyrna raisins well washed
[etc.].

1892 Pall Mall G. 15 Dec. 2/3 The Kilburn Sisters..daily satisfy
hundreds of dockers with soup and Spotted Dick.

1854 C. M. SMITH Working-Men's Way in World xii. 288 For supper come
smoking sheep's-heads..and ‘*spotted dog’, a very marly species of
plum-pudding.

a1936 KIPLING Something of Myself (1937) i. 18 An enormous currant
roly-poly - a ‘spotted dog’ a foot long.

1974 Country Life 25 Apr. 990/1 The other hound..reminded me of a
spotted dog pudding at school.

All I can say is 'the best of luck' if you tried to compete with the
OED.

Richard