Chambers's Encyclopædia

Chambers's Encyclopaedia was founded in 1859 by W. & R. Chambers of Edinburgh and became one of the most important English language encyclopaedias of the 19th and 20th centuries, developing a reputation for accuracy and scholarliness that was reflected in other works produced by the Chambers publishing company. The encyclopaedia is no longer produced.

The first edition, titled Chambers's Encyclopaedia A Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for the People, was partly based on a translation into English of the 10th edition of the German-language Konversations-Lexikon, which became the Brockhaus Enzyklopädie, however, the publishers found it necessary to include much additional material.Andrew Findlater was the acting editor and spent ten years on the project. The work appeared between 1859 and 1868 in 520 weekly parts at three-halfpence each and totalled ten octavo volumes, on 8,320 pages, and over 27,000 articles from over 100 authors. Volume 10 included a supplement of 409 pages at the back for new and revised content. A revised edition appeared in 1874. The index of matters not having special articles contained about 1,500 headings. The articles were generally excellent, especially on Jewish literature, folk-lore and practical science; but, as in Brockhaus, the scope of the work did not allow extended treatment.

An entirely new edition was published 1888–1892 in ten volumes edited by David Patrick. In this edition, the majority of the articles were re-written and the articles on American matters were written mainly by Americans and an edition published there by Messrs. Lippincott of Philadelphia. Further new editions appeared regularly, edited by Patrick, up to the First World War.

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