The Merry Wives of Windsor (38 page)

⁶⁰
blazon
banner bearing the coat of arms

⁶²
compass
circle (i.e. the Garter ribbon, worn below the knee)

⁶³
Th’expressure
picture, expression (i.e. fairy ring or circle of darker green grass)

⁶⁵
Honi … pense
“shamed be he who thinks evil (of it)” (the French motto that appeared on the Garter ribbons)

⁶⁸
Buckled
tied

⁶⁹
charactery
writing

⁷¹
dance of custom
customary dance

⁷⁵
measure
stately dance

⁷⁶
man of middle-earth
i.e. a mortal, dwelling on the earth (midway between heaven and hell)

⁷⁸
cheese
supposedly the favorite food of the Welsh

⁷⁹
o’erlooked
looked on with the evil eye, bewitched

⁸¹
trial-fire
testing fire

⁸¹
touch me
touch (
me
is emphatic)

⁸³
turn
expose

⁸³
start
recoil, flinch

⁸⁶
wood
i.e. Falstaff’s finger

⁹⁰
About
surround

⁹¹
trip
dance/skip

⁹¹
still
continually

⁹³
fantasy
imaginings/amorous desire

⁹⁴
luxury
lechery
green … Anne
the original Quarto stage direction has Caius taking a boy
in red
, Slender one
in green
, and Anne
in white;
see “Text” in Key Facts

⁹⁵
bloody fire
fire in the blood/lustful fire

⁹⁹
mutually
all together

¹⁰³
watched
spied and caught

¹⁰⁴
serve your turn
do for you

¹⁰⁵
hold … higher
maintain the joke no more

¹⁰⁷
yokes
Falstaff’s antlers are shaped like the oxen’s yoke

¹¹⁴
arrested
seized by legal warrant (until the debt is paid)

¹¹⁶
meet
encounter one another amorously

¹¹⁷
deer
puns on “dear”

¹¹⁹
proofs
i.e. his horns

¹¹⁹
extant
apparent/protruding

¹²²
surprise … powers
ambush of my faculties/understanding

¹²³
foppery
trickery, foolery

¹²³
in … of
in spite of, the face of

¹²⁵
Wit
intelligence

¹²⁵
Jack-a-Lent
figure of a man traditionally pelted during Lent, butt of jokes

¹³⁴
wants matter
lacks the means

¹³⁴
o’erreaching
deception

¹³⁵
with
by

¹³⁵
coxcomb
fool’s cap (with a crest like a cock’s comb)

¹³⁶
frieze
coarse woolen cloth

¹⁴⁰
fritters
fried scraps of battered meat

¹⁴¹
late-walking
going out with whores late at night

¹⁴⁶
hodge-pudding
pudding made from a random assortment of ingredients

¹⁴⁶
bag of flax
sack of flax (plant fibers used for cloth)

¹⁴⁷
puffed
swollen

¹⁴⁸
intolerable
insufferable/ excessively large/impossible to carry

¹⁵⁰
Job
in the Bible, Job suffered great poverty; his
wife
advised him to curse God for it

¹⁵³
metheglins
spiced liquor of Welsh origin

¹⁵⁴
starings
glares

¹⁵⁵
theme
subject (of your mockery)

¹⁵⁵
start of
advantage over

¹⁵⁶
dejected
cast down, humbled, humiliated

¹⁵⁶
flannel
coarse woolen cloth

¹⁵⁷
Ignorance … me
I am searched to the very depths by ignorance itself (i.e. Evans); may pun on “plumbet” (woolen fabric)

¹⁵⁷
plummet
device for measuring the depth of the sea

¹⁵⁹
should … pander
were to have been a pimp

¹⁶²
posset
hot drink made with milk, liquor, and spices

¹⁶⁷
this
this time, now

¹⁶⁹
dispatched
managed things

¹⁷¹
know
of what

¹⁷²
Of what
i.e.

¹⁷⁴
lubberly
loutish

¹⁷⁵
swinged
beaten

¹⁷⁷
postmaster
keeper of post horses (which were hired out for the swift conveyance of messages)

¹⁷⁸
took the wrong
went wrong (in following instructions); Slender responds to the sense of “made a mistake (in thinking the boy was Anne)”

¹⁸¹
had him
accepted him as my wife/had sex with him

¹⁸⁴
green
most editors emend to “white” for consistency with the setup in
5.2

¹⁸⁸
white
most editors emend to “green” for consistency with the setup in
4.6

¹⁹¹
paysan
peasant

¹⁹³
white
most editors emend to “green” for consistency with the setup in
5.3

¹⁹⁴
raise
rouse

²⁰²
amaze
bewilder

²⁰⁴
proportion … love
balanced, mutual loving relationship

²⁰⁵
contracted
engaged (secretly)

²⁰⁶
sure
firmly bound

²⁰⁹
title
name

²⁰⁹
unduteous title
undutifulness

²¹⁰
evitate
avoid

²¹⁴
guide the state
rule matters

²¹⁷
stand
advantageous position from which a hunter may shoot

²¹⁸
glanced
struck superficially

²²²
muse
wonder/grumble