[LittleCloud]

C# 1.0 did not have generics, period. So the standard dictionary (Hashtable†) type took keys and values typed as "System.Object". As seen in the linked documentation this class still exists in the latest .NET to this day.

Occasionally one would still encounter non-generic classes like this, when working with older frameworks/libraries, which cause a fair bit of impedence mismatch with modern styles of coding. (Also one of the causes of some people's complaints that C# has too many ways of doing things; old ways have to be retained for backwards compatibility, of course.)

† https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/system.collecti...

The paper that the other commentator was referring to might be this: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/wp-content/uploads/...

[vrighter]

Yeah, that does not mean type erasure. There were just no generics. That is just making use of polymorphism in the language. At no point is there a difference between what the language knows a container can contain, and what the runtime knows it can contain. There is nothing erased.