Selections from Early Middle English, 1130-1250. Part 2: Notes
General
Selections from Early Middle English, 1130-1250. Part 2: Notes
English literature -- Middle English, 1100-1500
83. #uneuenlich#: comp. ‘al so ase heo (blisse) is unefenlich to alle
worldes blissen, al so heo is untalelich to alle worldliche tungen,’ AR
410/11. R has unwerilich.
85. #ne mei# &c.: comp. 46/285, 126/303; ‘ne mahte hit na mon rikenin ne
tellen,’ SJ 50/4.
88. #smeke#: smoke RT. #smeche forcuðest#, vilest of fumes, but RT have
smecche, of flavours (#smæcc#); comp. ‘þreaste smeorðrinde smoke ut
smecche forcuðest,’ SM 9/6. The adjective is everywhere else used of
moral worthlessness; comp. 26/253.
90. #alles cunnes pinen#: see 81/80.
91. #ase deoflen#: R has as þe deoulen, which is preferable.
94. For #bute bote# T has unbotelich, a rare word, but ‘unboteliche
lure,’ HM 17/25. The combination of bote and bale is very common; see
Minot i. 4 note. #as--weren# belongs to #hal#. #ful--grure#, and
unmistakably they see themselves terrible and awful. #grisle . . .
grure#: comp. 56/40, 120/122, 121/131; ‘þet grisliche word ⁊ grureful
ouer alle,’ AR 306/5; ‘grislich ⁊ grureful uorto biholden,’ id. 242/12.
95. #froggen#: T has frode{n}: see 46/273 note.
96. The omission of #þe# would improve the grammar of this passage by
giving a verb for helle wurmes, tadden ⁊ froggen.
97. #eauraskes#, water-frogs: eaureskes R, eafroskes T.
99. #eauerȝete#, at any time yet: comp. ‘al þe wo ꝥ nu is ⁊ euer ȝete
was,’ AR 52/12. In ‘For falshede euer ȝite heo souhten,’ Castel off
Loue, 342, it represents Fr. tut tens. #remunge# &c.: ‘Ibi est fletus et
stridor dentium (S. Matt. xxii. 13 altered), ibi transitur a frigore
nivium ad calorem ignium, et utrumque intolerabile,’ V 208 _d_. Comp.
42/231-6, 76/25.
100. #hechelunge#: apparently here only: Morris translates ‘chattering.’
If it is connected with ME. hechele, a tool for heckling flax, grating
or gnashing is a more likely meaning.
102. #monge#, mixture, alternation of extremes.
103: ‘Ibi omnes comburuntur . . . nec consumuntur,’ V.
104. #forwalleð#, ‘tortures by boiling,’ NED; apparently here only:
comp. 43/222.
106. #unhope#, absence of hope, of any prospect of release: ‘ibi nulla
spes boni,’ V 208 _d_. A rare word, differing in meaning from wanhope:
comp. ‘in desperaunce, þet is, in unhope ⁊ in unbileaue forte beon
iboruwen,’ AR 8/17. See 46/289.
108. #iwa#: i{n} wa RT.
109. #heateð#: ‘Omnis, qui est in eo, odit se et omnes alios,’ V. T has,
hateð oðer . ⁊ ter teken hi{m} selue{n}, and in addition thereto (#tō
ēacan#).
110. #blake#: ‘bestia nigerrima sicut corvus,’ Visio Tnugdali, 36/4.
114. #tungen of stele#: Virgil’s ‘ferrea vox’; ‘isene stemne,’ Wulfstan,
215/2; ‘teþ and tunge . of stel imaked,’ OEM 154/268.
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