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SCANNED PDF

On "Authentic," etc.

In The Oxford Universal Dictionary (3d ed; 1955), the adjective "authentic" is defined as having nine meanings, four of which (1, 2, 4, and 7) are judged obsolete, and the last two of which (8a and b) are said to have to do respectively with a mode of church musi c and a musical cadence. The first seven meanings are: (1) of authority, authoritative; entitled to obedience or respect; (2) legally valid; of persons, legally or duly qualified; (3) entitled to belief, as being in accordance with, or as stating fact; reliable, trustworthy, of established credit; (4) original, first-hand (opposed to copied); (5) real, actual, genuine (opposed to pretended); (6) really proceeding from its reputed source or author; genuine (opposed to counterfeit, forged, etc.); (7) own, proper. The third meaning is identified as "the prevailing sense." And the substantive, "authenticity," defined separately simply as "the quality ofbeing authentic," is said to have four senses: (1) as being authoritative or duly authorized; (2) as being true in substance; (3) as being genuine; genuineness; and (4) as being real, actual; reality.

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The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language( 1976) gives five meanings of "authentic": (1 a) worthy oftrustof trust, reliance, or belief, as in "authentic records";(1b) having an undisputed origin; genuine, (2) executed with due process of law, as in "an authentic deed"; (3a) designating a medieval mode of music having a range from its final tone to the octave above it; and (3b) designating a musical cadence with the dominant chord immediately preceding the tonic chord. Synonyms are given elsewhere in the entry on "real" (along with "actual," "true," "concrete," "existent," "genuine," "tangible," and "veritable"), and "authentic" is said to imply "acceptance of historical or attributable reliability rather than visible proof" (sic!). "Authenticity" is defined in a separate entry as meaning the condition or quality of being authentic, trustworthy, or genuine.

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