High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The word base of Esperanto was originally defined by Lingvo internacia, published by Zamenhof in 1887. It contained some 900 root words. The rules of the language allow speakers to borrow words as needed, recommending only that they look for the most international words, and that they borrow one basic word and derive others from it, rather than borrowing many words with related meanings. In 1894, Zamenhof published the first Esperanto dictionary, Universala vortaro, which was written in five languages and supplied a larger set of root words.