Chris Squire UK

Annotations and comments

Chris Squire UK has posted 896 annotations/comments since 16 February 2013.

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Second Reading

About Thursday 7 September 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Thank you Graham RA - I’ll visit if I can.

I suggest that the ‘black boy’ was indeed a negro servant and so fit only to be a slave in the eyes of most English people. Crucially this meant he had no soul and would no more benefit from the Resurrection (in which all Anglicans say they believe every Sunday), anymore than a horse or dog would. So, like them, his body could be disposed of as the owner chose.

The Enlightenment came later: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age…

About Tuesday 8 August 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

I have found a well-written press release from 2005 explaining a then-new research paper: ‘Biologists discover why 10% of Europeans are safe from HIV infection’ (2005)
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_re…

Also a book: Professor Christopher Duncan and Dr Susan Scott: Return of the Black Death (2004, Wiley), which argues that the 1665 plague was viral not bacterial.

About Saturday 5 August 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ‘ . . our design upon the mast docke, which I hope to compass . . ‘

‘compass, v.1 < French
. . 11. a. To attain to or achieve (an end or object aimed at); to accomplish.
. . 1653   H. Cogan tr. F. M. Pinto Voy. & Adventures xxii. 77   The better to compass his intent . . ‘

About Saturday 5 August 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Jeannine 2008:

Elizabeth’s art is not mentioned in the DNB entry for her. She left no will, having no property of her own and no children keen to preserve and strengthen their memories of her.

No doubt it passed by descent through several generations of their heirs until the attribution to her was forgotten, the collection was dispersed then discarded unregarded.

About Thursday 3 August 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re:  I left my ‘hacquenee’ —[Haquenee = an ambling nag fitted for ladies’ riding.]— behind

‘hackney, n. and adj. . .
. . Probably < the name of Hackney, formerly a village in Middlesex . . probably with reference to supply of horses from the surrounding meadows.

Re: ‘ . . Then down to the buttery . . ‘

‘buttery, n.Old French . .
a. A place for storing liquor; but the name was also, from an early period, extended to ‘the room where provisions are laid up’ (Johnson). 
. . 1665   S. Pepys Diary 3 Aug. (1972) VI. 180   Then down to the buttery and eat a piece of cold venison-pie . . ‘

(OED)

About Sunday 30 July 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ' . . It was a sad noise to hear our bell to toll and ring so often to-day, either for deaths or burials; I think five or six times . . '

John Donne - Meditation 17: Devotions upon Emergent Occasions

"No man is an iland, intire of it selfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; if a clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as well as if a Mannor of thy friends or of thine owne were; any mans death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee...."

http://www.famousliteraryworks.co…

About Thursday 27 July 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ‘ . . his daughter, a buxom lass, . . ‘

‘buxom < Middle E. . .
II. Blithe, jolly, well-favoured.
3. Blithe, gladsome, bright, lively, gay. arch.
. . 1675 C. Cotton Poet. Wks. (1765) 267 A fine Miss..as free, Buxom, and amorous as He.

. . 4. Full of health, vigour, and good temper; well-favoured, plump and comely, ‘jolly’, comfortable-looking (in person). (Chiefly of women.)
. . 1681 E. Hickeringill Vindic. Naked Truth 22 Those lazy and bucksome Abby-Lubbers ‘ ’

About Sunday 23 July 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ‘ . . where most are strangers; . . ‘

I don’t see a problem here; ‘stranger’ just means ‘visitor’:

‘< Old French . . 3. a. A guest or visitor, in contradistinction to the members of the household . .
. . 1667 Milton Paradise Lost v. 316 And what thy stores contain, bring forth and poure Abundance, fit to honour and receive Our Heav'nly stranger.’ (OED)

The gents he was talking to were not able to offer him dinner, being visitors also. At Whitehall he’d have gone to a tavern to eat that day’s table d’hote (‘special’ as it is called nowadays) at a large common table. There would have been no equivalent at Hampton Court.

So he facing a very thirsty hungry afternoon with no transport - then Cutler reappeared and all was well.

About Thursday 20 July 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

OED has:

'plague-water n. now hist. an infusion of various herbs and roots in alcohol, taken as a remedy against the plague.

' . . 1665 S. Pepys Diary 20 July (1972) VI. 163 My Lady Carteret did this day give me a bottle of plague-water home with me . . '

About Thursday 18 May 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ' . . we shall stand a tug for it . . '

'tug, n.1 < Old English . .
. . 3.a. A strenuous contest between two forces or persons.
1660 Gower in 5th Rep. Royal Comm. Hist. MSS (1876) 204/1 The only tug is between Episcopacy and Presbytery.
1830 Scott Lett. Demonol. & Witchcraft i. 11 Amid the mortal tug of combat . . ‘

About Tuesday 16 May 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Sasha: you can’t just invent new meanings for common English phrases in this cavalier fashion. If ‘with child’ could have had this loose sense, someone would have spotted it in print and told the OED, which gives 18 examples of the use of ‘with child’ to mean ‘pregnant’.

‘ . . P1. with child.
a. Pregnant. Hence to get with child, to go with child . .
. . 1701 G. Farquhar Sir Harry Wildair i. 10 In the matter of five Days he got six Nuns with Child, and left 'em to provide for their Heretick Bastards.

†b. In extended use, of ground, trees, ships with swelling sails, etc. Obs.
. . 1577 B. Googe tr. C. Heresbach Foure Bks. Husbandry ii. f. 105 In the spring, all trees are as it were with childe.

c. fig. . . (b) eager, longing, yearning (to do something).
Now only in historical contexts.
. . 1660 S. Pepys Diary 14 May (1970) I. 138 I sent my boy—who, like myself, is with child to see any strange thing . . ‘

About Saturday 13 May 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ' . . in some little gruntings of pain . . ' where L&M read "grutchings."

< Old French groucier . . to murmur, grumble . . of unknown origin. Obs. exc. dial. or arch.

1.a. The action of the verb grutch v.; murmuring, complaining; murmur, complaint, reluctance.
. . 1892 R. L. Stevenson Vailima Lett. (1895) 241 The rest is grunting and grutching.

(OED)

About Wednesday 26 April 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ‘ . . my stomach sick with the buttered ale that I did drink the last night in bed . . ’

‘ . . 2. b. buttered ale n. (also buttered beer) a beverage composed of sugar, cinnamon, butter, and beer brewed without hops.
. . 1662 S. Pepys Diary 5 Dec. (1970) III. 275 And gave him a morning draught of butterd ale.
1667 S. Pepys Diary 28 Sept. (1974) VIII. 454 It will cost him..l300 in ale and l52 in buttered-ale . . ‘
(OED)

About Sunday 23 April 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ’ . . the mayde of the house, a pretty mayde and very modest . . ’

‘modest, adj. < Middle French . .
. .2. a. Of a woman: decorous in manner and conduct; not forward, impudent, or lewd; demure; (of a personal attribute, action, etc.) proper to or distinctive of such a woman. Hence: scrupulously avoiding impropriety or vulgarity in speech or behaviour. (Sometimes applied to men in later use.)
. . 1667 Milton Paradise Lost iv. 310 And by her yeilded, by him best receivd, Yeilded with coy submission, modest pride, And sweet reluctant amorous delay . . ‘
……….
He enjoyed nothing better that ‘chatting up the birds’ (as we said c. 1960) and they must have enjoyed I too or they’d have sent him away. No doubt they got a better class of chat from him than from the young men of their own class

About Friday 21 April 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ‘ . . good dinner the worst dressed that ever I eat any . . ’

‘dress, v.i< Anglo-Norman . .
. . II. To make ready or right; to set in order.
4. a. trans. To prepare (food) for cooking or eating; to season or cook (meat, fish, etc.). Now chiefly: to add a sauce to (food, esp. a salad).
. . 1673 R. Ligon True & Exact Hist. Island of Barbadoes 120 The Sea-men, who were the greater number, resolv'd, the Passengers should be drest and eaten, before any of them should goe to the Pot . . ‘

About Thursday 20 April 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ‘ . . how he were able to debauch a poor girl if he had opportunity . . ’

‘debauch, v. < (c1600) French . .. The original pronunciation after modern French, and its gradual change, are seen in the spellings debosh , debaush , deboach , debauch rhyming in 1682 with approach . .
1. a. trans. To turn or lead away, entice, seduce, from one to whom service or allegiance is due; e.g. soldiers or allies from a leader, a wife or children from husband or father, etc. (Usually with the connotation ‘lead astray, mislead’.) Rarely with against. Obs.
. . 1614 T. Lodge tr. Seneca Of Benefits in tr. Seneca Wks. 49 Not to have such a woman to his wife that was not debauched from her husband.
. . 1697 K. Chetwood Pref. to Pastorals in Dryden tr. Virgil Wks. sig. ***2 He who had the address to debauch away Helen from her Husband . .

. . 2.b. To seduce (a woman) from chastity.
(Closely related to 1: see quots. 1614, 1697 there; but eventually also associated with the notion ‘corrupt’.)
1711 R. Steele Spectator No. 151. ⁋1 A young lewd Fellow..who would..debauch your Sister, or lie with your Wife . . ‘
………..
Pepys stands in loco parentis towards Mercer accountable to her parents and the Court of Public Opinion. He is expected to help find her a repspectable husband, not to pimp her to his cronies.

About Tuesday 4 April 1665

Chris Squire UK  •  Link

Re: ‘Matt Newton on 5 Apr 2018 ‘Admire, yes. Covert, no.
And Sam has a track record of coverting.
He could covert for London.’ (sic)

‘covet, v. < Old French . .
†2. a. To desire with concupiscence or with fleshly appetite. Obs. (or merged in sense 3).
. . 1484   Caxton tr. G. de la Tour-Landry Bk. Knight of Tower(1971) lvi. 82   Sychem..sawe her so faire that he coueyted her . .

3. a. To desire culpably; to long for (what belongs to another). (The ordinary sense.)
. . 1611   Bible (King James) Exod. xx. 17   Thou shalt not couet thy neighbours house, thou shalt not couet thy neighbours wife..nor any thing that is thy neighbours.’

(OED)