The Faerie Queene (134 page)

34 7
Satumes
sonne: Mutability's patronymic epithet is intended as an insult in that it deprives Jupiter of his sovereignty and presses home her claim.

34 9
tride: decided by trial.

35 5
by equall might: equally.

35 6
God of Nature: see notes to VII.7.5.1. 35 8 inly grudge: complain within.

35 9
Dan Pkabus
Scribe: Apollo as secretary of this encounter is a humorous touch. Appellation: appeal.

36 6
Arlo-hill:
Galtymore, highest peak in the mountain range near Spenser's home Kilcolman in County Cork, so called because it overlooks the Vale of Aherlow in County Tipperary.

36 6 (Who knowes not
Arlo-hilli):
aside from the impertinence of answering Spenser's question with an annotation, one might compare the similar self-awareness in VI.10.16.4: ‘Poore
Colin Clout
(who knowes not
Colin Clout?)'.

36 7
head: peak.

36 8 old father
Mole:
Spenser's name for the mountain range near his home, which his ‘shepherd's quill' had already described in
Colin Clouts Come Home Again
(i59S).
i^-6g.

37 1
And, were it not…: and if it were not inappropriate in this recital… 37 3 abate: diminish.

37 5
Dianaes
spights: injuries of Cynthia. Diana is the more common name for Cynthia when she is associated with the forest and hunting, as here.

37 9 Meane while…: Spenser invokes the aid of Clio, Muse of history, to help Calliope, die Muse of epic poetry, as he always does when he treats of real historical events or geographical places. See II.10.3 (history of British kings); III.34 (Merlin's prophecy of future kings); and IV.11.10 (catalogue of rivers).

38 1
florished in fame: between the sixth and ninth centuries Ireland was a famous centre of learning and art.

38 9
on ground: on earth.

39 7
enranged on a rowe: arranged in a row.

39 8
consort: mingle.

40
2 Moltmna:
the river Behanagh near Spenser's home. Her name suggests her genealogy: Mol-, ‘old father
Mole
,' -anna,
Behanna.

40 3
Mutta:
the river Awbeg, renamed by Spenser from Kilnemullah, the ancient name for Buttevant, a dty on its banks. Spenser annotates the name himself in
Colin Clouts Come Home Again,
108-15.

40 4
Bregog:
another river, the story of whose marriage with Mulla Spenser tells in
Colin Clouts Come Home Again,
92-155. It would be interesting to know why these river marriages, so characteristically Spenserian, all occurring in areas he knew very well, should find their way into some of the most self-conscious poetry he ever wrote. The most famous example is the marriage of the Thames and the Medway (IV.10), rivers Spenser would have known when he was secretary to John Young, Bishop of Rochester. See note to 53
.6-9.

40 s Shepheard
Colin:
Spenser's name for himself from
The Shepheanks Calender
through VI. 10. He is referring here to his
Colin Clouts Come Home Again.

40 7
shole: shallow.

40 9
flood: flowing river.

41 4
pompous: full of pomp, no pejorative sense intended.

41 7
coverts: glades.

42 7
Faunas:
a faun, for whose qualities see n.2.7–9and note to 11.2.7.5.

42 9
in priuity: in secret, but the rhyme word is meant to expose more of his prurient interests.

43 1
to compasse: to achieve, with overtones of'to embrace'. 43 3 Her: Diana. to discouer: to reveal.

43 6
Queene-apples and red Cherries …: these are typical pastoral gifts, but here they carry overtones of the temptation of Eve.

44 1
pleasure: please.

44 4
Fanchin:
the river Funsheon into which die Behanagh flows.

45 3 saue onely one: Actaeon; a reference to the myth of Diana and Actaeon, a hunter who in chase came upon Diana naked. In fury she turned him into a stag, and his own dogs devoured him. See
Met.
3.173-252, although some of Spenser's details may derive from other Ovidian myths: Callisto, 2.409 ff; Arethusa, 5.572 ff. The whole episode of Faunus and Diana closely parallels the structure of the Actaeon story. The parallelism of characters (Cynthia: Diana; Mutability: Faunus;
Molanna: reader), the similarity in theme: an act of presumptuous rebellion, echoing the Christian myth of the Fall, the numerous verbal parallels, all suggest that Spenser wanted his retelling of the Actaeon myth to be an analogue of and commentary on the main narrative of the poem.

45 4
to so foole-hardy dew: due to one so foolhardy.

45 5
hew: slaughter.

45 8
array: clothes.

46 3
some-what: something.

46 8
conceit: thought.

47 5 darred: dazzled, with a pun on ‘daring'. Larks were dazzled by mirrors or bits of glass so they could be caught, but see Ringler,
MP
63, 1965, 13, note 12.

48 4
Dayr'house: dairy.

49 2
baile: custody. 49 5 haile: pull.

49 7
countervaile: resist.

49 9
Mome: fool, blockhead, unknowing comic butt.

50 1
flouted: derided. 50 3 spill: destroy.

50 5
driue: driven.

51 3
gamesome: sportive.

51 4
in straighter sort: in stricter manner.

52 5
so sore him dread aghast: i.e., so sorely did his dread terrify him.

52 8–9Compare the refrains of
Epithalamim:
“The woods shall to me answer, and my eccho ring,' etc.

53 4
whelm'd: overwhelmed.

53 6–9This is another Spenserian river marriage in which Spenser symbolizes the triumph of love over mutability in a fallen world through the merging of rivers. Cf.
The Shepheardes Calender,
‘July' 79-84;
Colin Clouts Come Home Again,
92-155; IV.10.

54 8
champian: plain. rid: past participle of'to read', seen.

54 9
Shure:
the river Suir that flows through rich country.

55 Spenser intends Diana's curse to explain the present state of Ireland, harassed and torn by faction, an etiological myth. See R. Gottfried,
SP
34. 1937. 107-25.

55 1
way: consider.

55 4
space: roam.

55 7
Chase: hunting ground.

C
ANTO
7

Arg.
1 Pealing:
appealing.
Bar:
court.

2 Alteration: another name for Mutability.

3
Large:
extensive.

I 1 thou greater Muse: Calliope; see I. Proem. 2.1 and VII.6.37.9 and note.

1 3–5Spenser invokes the Muse to lift his firail spirit, whose wing, too weak, may refuse to undertake such a high poetic flight.

1
6
Thy soueraine Sire: here and at IV.11.10 Spenser makes Jupiter the father of the Muses. The more traditional father is Apollo, as in I.11.5, II. 10.3 and IH.3.4. a 3 tume: change of direction, in returning to his original narrative. sable: the 1609 reading. Some editors emend to ‘feeble'. Milton, for one, was not bothered by the original reading, which he imitates in
PL
1:22-3: ‘What in me is dark Illumine.'

3 9
Pluto
and
Proserpina:
the king and queen of the underworld. Their presence at this trial is essential because their power is derived from Nature, whose laws reach to and regulate even the anomalies of the underworld.

5 1 great dame
Nature:
this is the same ‘god of Nature' referred to in VII.6.3 s.6. Her apparently changed sex is explained by lines 5–7and by the literary tradition of which she is a part. She is God's vice-regent of the Providential order of nature and can be identified with the Wisdom or Sapience that Spenser describes in
Hymn of Heavenly Beauty,
183 ff. The ambiguity of her description is part of the tradition beginning with Boethius,
De consolatione philosophiae
and extending through Jean de Meun,
Roman de la Rose,
Alanus de Insulis,
De planctu naturae
and Chaucer,
Parkment ofFouks.

5 2
port: bearing.

5 3
greater and more tall: to show her greater importance.

5 5
physnomy: countenance.

S 7 descry: discover.

5 8
wimpled: lay in folds.

6 3
agrized: horrified.

6 6–9The implications of this radiance are explained in
Hymn of Heavenly Beauty,
183
S,
and are based on 2 Corinthians 3.18.

7 3
sheene: bright, beautiful.

7 6 three sacred
Saints:
Peter, James, and John, who saw Christ transfigured on Mount Tabor. See Matthew 17.1-8; Mark 9.2-3. The Transfiguration was the first time that Christ's divinity shone through his humanity and became apparent to his disciples.

8 3
idle: vain.

9 1
heard: hard.

9 3
Dan Geffrey:
Master Geoffrey Chaucer, whose
Parkment of Foules,
295-329, describes Nature, as does Alanus de Insulis in
De planctu naturae (Pleynt of Kynde).
Spenser is placing himself squarely in the tradition of regarding Nature as a Wisdom figure. See note to 5.1.

9 4 well head: source; Spenser, like most sixteenth-century poets, considered Chaucer the father of English poetry and imitated many of his poems. Spenser's
Daphnaida
is based on Chaucer's
Book of the Duchess,
and IV.2–3is a continuation of Chaucer's “The Squire's Tale'.

9 5
Foules parley:
Chaucer's
Parkment of Foules.

98 so as it ought: as it should be.

10 4 mores: roots, plants.

11 1
Mole:
see VII.6.36.8.

12 3
Haemus
hill: the marriage of Peleus and Thetis did not take place on Haemus Hill. Spenser transfers the location because of Ovid's description of Haemus
{Met.
6.87-9), who was changed into a mountain for daring to assume the names of the gods.

12 5
Peleus
and dame
Thetis:.
Jupiter insisted that the goddess Thetis be married to the mortal Peleus when he learned that any son of hers would be more powerful than his father. ThetU objected and resisted Peleus by changing into a number of shapes, but Peleus' persistence was successful. Their son was Achilles, the hero of Homer's
Iliad.
Spenser stresses their wedding day, when Eris threw the apple of discord at the feet of Juno, Minerva, and Venus, the event that led to the Trojan war. See note to m.9.36.3-4. pointed: appointed.

13 7
feld: prostrate.

13 8
obaysance: obedience.

13 9
amplifie: speak with rhetorical figures.

14H7 Mutability's case is orderly in the extreme and may be divided in two parts: her plea (14-26) and her presentation of witnesses (27-47), and as Hawkins has pointed out, her case reproduces the structure of canto 6 in which the first half is devoted to argument and the second half to the presentation of the Arlo Hill myth. Her plea is based on the fact that she is
de hire
ruler since all things composed of the four elements are subject to mutability: earth (17-19), water (20-21), air (22-3), fire (24). Her plea ends with a recapitulation (2s) and an extension of her argument to the celestial counterparts of the four elements (26). The witnesses presented are the four seasons (28-31), the twelve months, beginning with March, one of the conventional beginnings of the year in the sixteenth century (32-^.3), Day and Night (44), die Hours (45), and Life and Death (46). In the final challenge (47) she again asserts her claim to sovereignty.

14 4
indifferently: impartially.

14 5
tortious: wrongful.

15 3
challenge: claim.

15 5
heritage in Fee: i.e., hold as one's absolute and rightful possession.

15 6
-7 Mutability's presumption is evident here in her lapse of logic: I consider heaven and earth alike because you consider them alike, but she is forgetting about the principle of hierarchy.

16 3
And that: and that which.

16 9
dew descent: see note to VII.6.2.6.

17 2
most regiment: most power. 17 4 inholders: tenants. to conuent: to assemble.

17 5
incontinent: immediately.

18 4
earthly slime: material source of being. 18 5 mortall: deadly.

18 7 Prime: spring.

18 9
still: continually.

20 1
case: condition.

20 9
them vnfold: open themselves.

21 3
plights: condition.

21 7
certaine grange: fixed dwelling.

22 2
i.e., air is the medium by which sense perceptions are transmitted.

22 3
subtill influence: air maintains life in creatures by flowing into them (influencing them) because it is a less material element than either earth or water, hence subtle.

22 4
thin spirit: thin substance, less, that is, than earth or water.

22 6
tickle: unstable.

23 5
Streight: immediately.

24 3
seuer: separate.

25 1 ground-work: the four elements are the basis of all creation. For an explanation of the working of the four elements see Tillyard,
Elizabethan World Picture,
pp.
SS
ff