The different sections of the book were written by different
authors; inconsistent spelling, lay-out, capitalisation, phonetics,
use of ligatures and diacritics, spacing of abbreviations,
transcription, punctuation, etc. have therefore been retained (incl.
canon/canyon/cañon; Spencer/Spenser; i.e./i. e., A.D./A. D., etc.)
except as mentioned below. The same applies to textual and factual
inconsistencies and contradictions.
The order of entries in alphabetical lists is not always truly
alphabetical; this has not been changed.
Indented paragraphs in this text indicate a different lay-out in the
printed work, such as larger or smaller font size, different margins
or indentation, etc. Not all of these differences have been
indicated in this text.
The use of section headings in the printed work was not always
unambiguous, nor was their hierarchy. Section headings (indicated by
two blank lines in this transcription) in this text are therefore
based on the printed book’s typography and on apparent logic, and
may not reflect the authors’ intentions. Some sections have no
section headings as such.
Several subjects mentioned in the various lists of contents are not
present in the original work; similarly, several internal references
do not exist.
In some of the larger tables, the relation between table elements
has had to be surmised; the tables as presented here may therefore
not fully reflect the authors’ intent.
For this text version, the larger tables have had to be split and/or
re-arranged. For the comparison tables in particular, this means
that some of the comparative information has been lost.