The Faerie Queene (105 page)

33 3
Fradubio:
see note to I.2.31 ff.

33 7
Boreas:
the north wind.

34 7
author: instigator.

35 1
prime… youthly; i.e., in the springtime of my youth. corage: heart
(OED,
‘courage' 1, but see
OED
3e: sexual vigour, lust).

36 1
did take in hand: undertake.

36 8
prise martiall: prize of war.

37 4
whether: which.

37 8
Frcelissa:
frailty
(Italian: fralezza).

38 2
doubtfull ballaunce: i.e., the balance of decision was in doubt.

39 S
visage: face.

39 9
treeu mould: form of a tree.

40 1
for my Dame: as my lady.

40 4
Prime: spring. See Milton,
PL
10.572 ff.

40 7
origane and thyme: marjoram (oregano) and thyme, used to cure itching and scabs.

41 8
decay: destruction.

42 8
in wooden wals full faste: i.e., fast within the tree.

43 1
Elfin: faery.

43 4
in a liuing well: grace. See John 4.13–14and Rev. 22.1.

43 6
out find: find out, discover.

43 7
wonted well: i.e., usual state of nature or health; well-being.

43 8
suffised: satisfied.

44 4
dreriment: gloom, sorrow.

45 4
carelesse swowne: unconscious swoon. 45 6 vp gan lift: i.e., began to lift herself.

C
ANTO
3

Arg. 3
mart:
bargaining, traffic.

Arg. 4
kachour:
lecher, i.e., Sansloy.

2 5
true as touch: true as a touchstone.

2 9
deriu'd: taken away.

3 3
prease: press, gathering. 3 8 wastnesse: wilderness.

3 9
wished: wished for.

4 2
vnhastie: slow.

5 2
ramping: raging.

     Lyon: the trrening of the lion is still a vexed question. It was long ago pointed out that the story of the lion tamed by the sight of beauty or of royalty had parallels in earlier romances; but Tuve cautions against reading the poem too ‘morally'
{Allegorical Imagery,
p. 123). Nevertheless, Tuve's case for her candidate (some form of pride) is no more convincing than Upton's argument for the Church of England or Henry VIII
{Variorum,
p. 207) or Fowler's for
sol iustitiae {Spenser and

the Numbers of Time,
pp. 67 ff) or Hankins's for the irascible passions
{Source and Meaning in Spenser's Allegory,
pp. 124-5). The lion is a common attribute of Fortitude, a virtue that Una exemplifies in this canto. Nohrnberg,
Analogy of The Faerie Queene,
p. 213, suggests 2 Kings 17.25.

8 1
Redounding: overflowing.

8 3
constraint: distress.

8 7
brood: ancestry.

8 9
attaine: overtake.

9 5
watch and ward: guard. 10 5 tract: trace.

10 6
hore: hoary, grey.

10 8
slow footing: walking slowly.

10 9
Details in this description of Abessa, first named in stanza 18, relate her to often allegorized passages in the Bible. Her pot of water is meant to recall the Samaritan woman at the Well, to whom Christ speaks: ‘Whosoever drinketh of this water, shall thirst again; but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him, shall never be more athirst' (John 4.13). The distinction is between the things of the flesh and the things of the spirit. The elaboration of the allegory is summarized in D. W. Robertson, jr,
Preface to Chaucer,
pp. 320-21.

    The fact that Abessa ‘could not heare, nor speake, nor vnderstand' is an allusion to Christ's words to his disciples:

… He that hath ears to hear, let him hear… To you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God: but unto them that are without, all things be done in parables. That they seeing, may see, and not discern: and they hearing, may hear, and not understand, lest at any time they should turn, and their sins should be forgiven them (Mark 4.9-12).

11 9
cast in deadly hew: i.e., made her turn pale.

12 2
vpon the wager lay: Le., were at stake.

13 2
wicket: door.

137
beades: rosary beads.

13 8
Pater nosters:
the Lord's Prayer.

13 9
Aues:
Hail Marys. See note to I.1.35.9.

14 2
ashes: symbol of penitence.

14 3
sackcloth: symbol of penitence.

14 4
fast from any bit: i.e., not eat any bite of food.

14 9
she rest her may: i.e., she might rest herself.

15 6
late: recent.

16 1
Aldeboran:
a star in the constellation Taurus.

16 2
Cassiopeias
chaire: Cassiopeia, mother of Andromeda, was transformed into the constellation that bears her name. In 1572 the most brilliant nova ever recorded broke out in this constellation and was observed by the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe. The appearance of a new star in the unchanging heavens had great significance for the abandonment
of the ancient Ptolemaic theory of the universe and the acceptance of the Copernican theory, which placed the sun rather than the earth at the centre of the universe. For a description of the Ptolemaic universe see headnote to ‘Mutabilitie Cantos'. FowJer,
Spenser and the Numbers of Time,
p. 71 n, suggests that the sun is in a summer sign, possibly Leo.

16 4
fere: come. See Matthew 7.7.

16 8
seuerall: of various kinds.

16 9
purchase criminall: robbery.

17 3
poore mens boxes: alms boxes. 17 5 vestiments: garments.

17 7
spoild: despoiled, robbed. habiliments: religious vestments.

17 9
in at the window crept: John 10.1-2: ‘Verily, verily, I say unto you. He that entereth not in by the door into the sheepfold but climbeth up another way, he is a thief and a robber. But he that goeth in by the door, is the shepherd of the sheep.' Cf. Milton,
Lycidas
115, echoing Spenser,
Shepheardes Calender,
‘Maye' 136 and
PL
4.183 ff.

18 4
Abessa:
Maclean points out the similarity to
abbess,
the head of a female monastery, and cites Ephesians 4.17–18in reading her as an instance of Spenser's view of the Church of Rome. Within the context of the poem she is related to
Fidessa
and
Duessa.
Fidessa is Duessa (doubleness or duplicity) masking as Faith or the One Truth (Una). Abessa is the daughter of Corceca (blind heart), or superstition, which fosters a particular kind of faithlessness. Kirkrapine (church robbery) can be associated with monastic abuses, but he should also, in this context, be associated with all those who use the Church and rob as in John 10.1-2.

19 3
frayed: frightened,

20 5
strand: ground.

20 8
hap: mishap.

21 5
long wandring
Greeke:
Ulysses, who preferred to return to Penelope rather than to accept the immortality offered by the nymph Calypso
(Od.
3). The allusion reinforces the idea of Una's faithfulness.

22 3
Kirkrapine:
see note to 18.4. 24 4 embost: encased.

28 5
meere: pure.

30 1
her seemd: seemed to her.

30 3
dispence: make up for.

31 1
beaten: storm-beaten.

31 3
soust: soaked.
Tethys:
wife of Oceanus, here ‘the ocean'.

316
Orions
hound: Sirius, the dog star, which brings in the ‘dog days' of summer'

31 9
Nereus:
a sea god. Cf. IV.11.18 ff. pledg around: drink a toast.

32 s
Neptune:
god of the oceans.

32 9
fell: befelL

33 S
yron: bit.

33 6
chauffed: heated.

33 9
Sansloy:
‘-without law'. See note to L2.25.6-9.

34 8
good hap: good fortune.

35 3
vainely crossed shield: i.e., vain because the cross here does not protect and because it is almost sacrilegious that Archimago should be carrying such a shield.

35 5
beare: thrust. 3d 2 reaue: take.

36 6
Lethe: river of forgetfulness in hell.

36 8
Furies:
spirits of evil and discord who with Cerberus the three-headed dog guard the gate to hell (Met. 4.454). doen aslake: do pacify.

37 3
in place: i.e., whoever you may be.

389
round lists: enclosures for tournaments or jousts.

39 8
Which doen away: i.e., when the swoon was passed.

41 5
ramping: rearing.

42 6
chaufed: heated.

42 7
brand: sword.

43 4
spill: destroy.

43 7
will or nill: willing or not, willy-nilly.

C
ANTO
4

1 6
misweening: erroneous opinion.

2 1
lorne: abandoned.

2 2
misdeeming: misjudging.

2 3
borne: carried off.

2 6
brauely garnished: finely decorated.

2 8
broad high way: see Matthew 7.13: ‘Enter ye in at the strait gate, for it is the wide gate and broad way that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat.'

3 6
lazars: lepers.

4 4
golden foile: probably taken from OF 6.59, in which Alcana's palace is made of gold.

5 1
heape: building; no such usage is recorded in
OED.
5 2 wit: skill.

5 3
mould: structure.

5 5
sandie hill: see Matthew 7.26-7.

6 4
Maluenil:
‘evil welcome', opposite of French ‘bienvenu', welcome; similar to the character Bel Accueil in
Roman de la Rose,
2787
S.

7 2
Presence: i.e., Lucifera enthroned.

7 5
richesse: richness.

81
cloth of State: canopy, baldachin.

8 s
Titans:
Saturn's older brother, a figure of rebellious pride, but here a poetic name for the sun.

9 1
Phoebus fairest childe: Phaetlon, who stole the chariot of the sun from his father Apollo. Through his act of presumption he destroyed the chariot, himself, and almost the whole world (Met. 2.1-328).

9 8
rapt: carried away. 10 3 lowly: lowliness.

10 6
mirrhour: in the Renaissance a mirror could be a symbol either of self-knowledge or, as here, self-love.

11 1–2
Lucifera's genealogy and name link her with the infernal powers. Her mother and father are king and queen of hell. See Chaucer's “The Merchant's Tale', 2219-318. Her name is derived from ‘Lucifer', the light-bearer, named in Isaiah 14.12 ff, to which the whole stanza is indebted:

How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning? and cut down to the ground, which didst cast lots upon the nations? Yet thou saidst in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven and exalt my throne above beside the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the Congregation in the sides of the North. I will ascend above the height of the clouds, and I will be like the most high. But thou shalt be brought down to the grave, to the sides of the pit.

12 7
pollicie: political cunning. 14 7 frounce: frizz or curl.

14 8
prancke their runes: pleat their ruffs. 16 3 hurtlen: dash. 16 4
Aurora:
goddess of dawn, pall: robe.

16 9
glitterand: glittering.

17 3
Flora:
goddess of flowers and spring. See note to I.1.48.9.

17 5–9
The description of Juno's chariot is derived from
II.
5.720 ff, where the same details occur. Spenser moralizes the episode to symbolize Lucifera's pride. The peacocks that traditionally draw Juno's chariot are from
Met.
1.588 ff, where Jupiter, surprised by Juno while ravishing Io, turns her into a heifer which he is forced to give to Juno, who puts it in the custody of the hundred-eyed monster, Argus. At Jupiter's request Mercury through his eloquence puts all hundred eyes to sleep and cuts off the monster's head. Juno in sorrow places the eyes on the tail of the peacock.

18 ff
Samuel Chew,
The Pilgrimage of Life
(New Haven, 1962), pp. 70 ff, points out that Spenser's procession of the seven deadly sins is organized around the medieval concept of the ‘Infernal Trinity': the World, the Flesh, and the Devil, which is ultimately derived from and related to 1 John 2.16: ‘For all that is in the world (as the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life) is not of the Father, but is of the world.' Sloth, Gluttony and Lechery are of the Flesh; Avarice is of the World; and Envy, Wrath, and Pride are of the Devil. See Morton Bloomfield,
The Seven Deadly Sins
(Michigan State University, 1952), p. 131 and
passim.
Subsequent explanations of iconographical details can be verified in Chew.