This volume foreshadows a larger forthcoming project, which will be a new multi-volume etymological dictionary of English, a project, the author explains in his introduction, which is rooted in his late-1980s obsession with the word heifer. Liberman (department of German, Scandinavian, and Dutch, U. of Minnesota) describes his endeavors and the contributions, over many years, of undergraduates working at low pay as well as those of the broad community of both short-term and long-term volunteer word-lovers he managed to attract. This bibliography consists of two "volumes" (bound as one). The first identifies sources and includes a journal abbreviation list that extends over 40 pages; a bibliography, about 250 pages; and supplementary materials occupying another 80 or so pages. The second "volume" is 500 pages in length and comprises the word list, which features the history of some 13,000 English words. For each, a bibliographic entry lists the word origin's primary sources--specifically where it was first found in use. There's no scholar investigating word origins who will not need this reference. Annotation ©2010 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)