WORD DICTIONARY DEVICE

PURPOSE:To improve the retrieval speed by using the arrangement order of headers within a storage unit to retrieve words successively while changing a character length to be collated. CONSTITUTION:An index unit retrieving part 81 sets a given Kana (Japanese syllabary) character string to an input character string storage part 83 to retrieve an index unit and outputs it to an output information storage part 84 and reports the address of a storage unit to be retrieved to a storage unit retrieving part 82. The storage unit retrieving part 82 collates successively the input character string, which is set to the storage part 83, with header strings in the storage unit of the address reported from the retrieving part 81, and word information of the header coinciding with the input character string is outputted to the output information storage part 84. Consequently, the number of headers to be retrieved is kept constant, and sequential retrieval is performed by retrieval kept constant, and sequential retrieval is performed by retrieval of an index part and only one retrieval in the storage unit.