COMPOUNDS WITH OVER AS A PREFIX. Shakespeare had a great partiality for these, made up with several grammatical parts of speech. New Eng. Dict. has given a number due to him in the first instance. Ben Jonson followed closely on his heels. But all writers used them and the subject is altogether too wide and diffuse to be slurred over here. I find many in Golding's Ovid for the first time. Sidney has a number of them in Arcadia. Spenser seems to use those older ones that came to his hand, oftenest. Peele coins several. So does Kyd. Perhaps about four apiece in their early and undoubted work. But no one approaches Shakespeare in the liberality with which he pours them out. In the present play, over-awe, over-daring, over-matched, overmounting, over-tedious, over-veiled, may be mentioned. ADJECTIVES FORMED FROM SUBSTANTIVES WITH THE SUBJECT -FUL. These are more abundant, naturally, carrying with them a development and extension of an idea as they do instead of a negation of it, like words in -less. New Eng. Dict. gives a paragraph upon them which is of the same purport as that under -less. Many are old, but like the last a new vogue came in, culminating in Shakespeare's work. These words are on a higher grade and better class: they belong to riper works and do not as a group denote an affectation or a peculiarity so much as the last-except in the fact of coining and dallying with construction being itself rather a puerility. The extension here is of earlier date, I think, than the last. We have an excellent list in Schmidt for Shakespeare. I have made no list from Golding. Spenser, however, has spoilful, groanful, threatfull, stryfull, gladfull, wailfull, gastfull (this is in Golding), vauntfull, choicefull (besides the older guileful, doleful, direful, etc.). Several of Spenser's are coinages showing that he had taken it up deliberately. I have not noted this to any characteristic extent in Peele or Marlowe. Greene seems to have had little tendency to original word-making in any direction whatever. Sylvester indeed goes at it at once, but Shakespeare had preceded him with strenuous efforts and examples. Sylvester has mastful (oak), fishfull (sea) early in his work. Shakespeare has the following only once: disgraceful, distrustful in 1 Henry VI.; fraudful, deathful, unhelpful in 2 Henry VI.; mirthful, easeful, wishful in 3 Henry VI. In Lucrece only are increaseful, faultful and mistful. Gleeful and mightful are only in Titus Andronicus. Dareful and fitful only in Macbeth. There are but few others peculiar and they demand no notice here. Again we see the influence of Spenser with his wonderful poetic vocabulary in the growing genius of Shakespeare; and predominating in Henry VI. Fretful in 2 Henry VI. is quoted in New Eng. Dict. But it may be earlier in Kyd. Cornelia, certainly, is earlier than New Eng. Dict. date (" 1593"). WITH THE SUFFIX -ISH. There is also an early formation, but belonging chiefly to proper or national names. It is more amply dealt with in New Eng. Dict. than the preceding ones from a historical view, but not illustrated except from modern times as an ordinary means of obtaining an adjective. It was apparently an idle arm, for the most part, until Golding, and subsequently Spenser, handled it, and polished it by use. The suffix has the sense of "somewhat" when applied to another adjective: "somewhat like a" when added to a noun. Golding leads the way with snakish, sheepish, saltish, moorish, sluggish, raughtish (grunting), currish, an interesting list for his date. Spenser has clownish, brackish, dampish, sluggish, currish, moorish, goatish. He evidently helped himself from Golding. But I am not postulating originality for any of these. And there is not much business doing in -ish evidently. Sir Philip Sidney used it sometimes—he has at any rate gluttonish, shepherdish and lobbish in Arcadia. Shakespeare has only a handful of these words, and I doubt if he adds any. I have no exhaustive list. Shrewish, elvish and dankish are confined to Comedy of Errors; brinish is earlier in Lyly's Euphues. Brainish (Hamlet) is no doubt new-minted. There is no need to pursue this inquiry since it is outside Henry VI. The use of the pronoun there in Shakespeare is well dealt with by Schmidt, and by Abbott. There was a very subtle discrimination usually between thou and you. As the word is now almost discontinued, in ordinary use, so also is the inflection -est to the verb in the past tense, second person. The language arising has a Biblical cast in modern ears, but in Shakespeare's time it had hardly acquired that distinction. But as Abbott (231) points out it was becoming archaic to use thou except in the higher poetic style and the solemn language of prayer. The termination in -est was felt to be ponderous, and too serious. These three plays exhibit a group of these "ponderous" examples, which are seldom found in the later ones. They are felt to be noteworthy on account of the somewhat terrific need of elision in pronouncing such a word as "suckedest❞ as a monosyllable. This occurs in 1 Henry VI. v. iv. 27 : the milk Thy mother gave thee when thou suck'dest her breast. And in Coriolanus, III. ii. 129; and in Titus Andronicus, II. iii. 144. Marlowe has an example in Edward II. (Dyce, 211, a): "that philosophy . . . Thou suck'dst from Plato and from Aristotle." Here are a few examples : Sentest. Titus Andronicus, III. i. 236. Meantest. 2 Henry VI. 111. ii. 222 (Peele uses this). Wentest. 3 Henry VI. 111. i. 54. Dippedst. 3 Henry VI. 1. i. 157. Calledst. 2 Henry VI. 1v. iii. 31 (and twice elsewhere in Shakespeare). Strokest. Tempest, 1. ii. 333 (purposely stilted). Oughtest. 2 Henry VI. Iv. vii. 54. Soughtest. Antony and Cleopatra, v. ii. 335 (the "high Roman style.") The latter two are Biblically familiar. No doubt there are more in Shakespeare, but they seem to be somewhat characteristic of these three plays, and therefore dwelt on a little. Hardly more euphonious are the corresponding present tense monosyllables, noted already under Peele. Shakespeare probably desisted purposely from these in his later work as his ear grew more musically exacting. Serv'st, forc'st, com'st, hear'st, fight'st, join'st, and others all occur, monosyllabically, in 1 Henry VI. Peele used these freely. But so do modern poets. Shelley has speak'st, somewhere, three or four times in as many lines. WITH THE SUFFIX -Y. Adjectives from nouns formed with the suffix -y are very conspicuous in Spenser. Many of them are his own undoubted introductions. He had grassy, calmy, watery, hoary, misty, frothy, sappy, dewy, starry, foamy, rosy, finny, shiny, airy, fleecy, plumy, snowy, scaly, frory, pearly, gloomy, briny, leamy, heedy, vetchy, bushy, weedy, cloudy, horsy, whelky, fenny, slimy, snaky, ashy, muddy, balmy, cooly, in his early work. A very great list with numbers of interesting words. It must not be assumed that several of these, now very common, were so in his time, or ever in use at all. Golding is not noteworthy in this respect. Shakespeare has many of the above. He has also slumbery, womby, vasty and paly in his later works. Mothy and pithy belong to Taming of a Shrew. But I only find him once indulging in a bout of such terms, and that is in a very appropriate place, Midsummer Night's Dream, wherein he is especially reminiscent of Spenser. He has there, only wormy, sphery, starry, rushy, barky, batty, brisky, unheedy. He sets a friendly seal of approval on Spenser's trick. In the foregoing efforts of research, I have read no predecessors, and they are altogether too comprehensive to attempt singlehanded with any finality. I trust my errors are not many and that my conclusions are sound as a rule. It seems to me that some such methods will prove more reliable in coming to a knowledge of the chronological position and sequence of literary compositions, and of their authors even, than any other internal test, not excepting metrical ones which often break down and seldom extend past the field of a single writer's own work, except in unsettled boundaries. Or even, if that be an unfair view, these tests of new compounds are importantly additional. Now that New Eng. Dict. has progressed so far and so splendidly there is always a final court of appeal. I have usually referred to it, but my collections are from my own reading, and my instances precede theirs occasionally. NOTE ON THE CHRONICLES. In the historical events of this play Shakespeare follows sometimes Hall, occasionally Grafton, and commonly Holin shed. I have made use of Grafton where possible, since his chronicle has been usually neglected; and in its earliest parts (Hall begins with Henry IV.), his pleasant writings afford many illustrations of Shakespeare's language. For the Henrys, Grafton (1567) may be taken as identical with Hall (1548) from whom he transcribed. But he also omitted, added, and in a much less degree altered, Hall a few times. Holinshed varies from both in Henry VI. Shakespeare made use of him of course. All this is fully dealt with in Boswell Stone's admirable summary of Shakespeare's Holinshed. But I am urged to say this much in extenuation of my use of Grafton, admittedly an inferior source to the others. I found evidences of his having been consulted; I found him lighter reading than the others with some room for original research; and I wished to do this for myself. The evidences will appear from time to time in my extracts. For example, the St. Alban's Scene (ii. 1) in 2 Henry VI. (from Sir Thomas More's Dialogue) is told by Grafton only. It is more likely Shakespeare found it there than in More (1530). As a rule Holinshed and Grafton both paraphrase Hall. As a rule Shakespeare used Holinshed. But there is evidence that he used Hardyng, Fabyan and Stowe in addition. For Fabyan, see Part II. IV. iii. at the word "sallet." For Hardyng see Boswell Stone, p. 262; and see the same authority for Stowe in two or three places. Grafton was made use of again, probably, where episodes from Hall and Jack Straw's rebellion (1381) are woven into Cade's. There is one remark I wish to make with regard to the Chroniclers. They afford an excellent hunting ground (Grafton in particular perhaps) for Shakespearian expressions. Not illustrations of a historical nature or with any reference to the historical plays, necessarily, but of passages and turns of phrasing in Shakespeare's later work-where he drops them harmoniously in unexpected places from the store-house of his memory. In addition to the above paragraph I find Polydore Vergil yielding two or three useful notes in Part III., as at II. vi. 30, and II. v. I. And also of Edward's love for the ladies at III. ii. 14, 15. Philip de Commines (Danett's translation was not available) comes in with advantage at V. ii. 31, and v. iii. 20, 21. |