first edition

American  

noun

1. the whole number of copies of a literary work printed first, from the same type, and issued together.

2. an individual copy from this number.

3. the first printing of a newspaper for a given date.

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Etymology

Origin of first edition

First recorded in 1900–05

Example Sentences

Jane Magnusson recalled rescuing a first edition of Ernest Hemingway’s “The Sun Also Rises” that her mother might otherwise have discarded or given to a stranger.

From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 19, 2026

Welcome to the first edition of Executive Dysfunction.

From Slate • Feb. 19, 2026

The lead story in the first edition, according to the newspaper’s website, was about $1 million being spent to pave a stretch of modern-day Chautauqua Boulevard and to plant trees near Santa Monica Canyon.

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 11, 2025

The first edition is coveted due to a printing error in a passage about Ruth, which reads "and he went into the city" rather than "and she went into the city".

From BBC • Dec. 9, 2025

The first edition sold out in nine days, and Carey ran off a second.

From "An American Plague: The True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793" by Jim Murphy