Volume 2

A glossary, or, Collection of words, phrases, names, and allusions to customs, proverbs, etc., which have been thought to require illustration, in the works of English authors, particularly Shakespeare, and his contemporaries / [Robert Nares].

  • Nares, Robert, 1753-1829.
Date:
1882
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A glossary, or, Collection of words, phrases, names, and allusions to customs, proverbs, etc., which have been thought to require illustration, in the works of English authors, particularly Shakespeare, and his contemporaries / [Robert Nares]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Only fliat noise heavVs rolling circles best, Sooth’d mortal cares, and lull’d the world to rest. Fairf. Tasso, ii, 96. KESTRELL, the same as Castril, or Kastril. A hawk of a base unser- viceable breed, and therefore used by Spenser as an adjective, to signify base. See Stannel. Ne thought of honour ever did assay His baser brest, but in his kestrell kynd A pleasant veine of glory he did fynd. Spens. F. Q., II, iii, 4. SKETCHES. Catches? Rock-monday, and the wake in summer, slirovings, the wakeful ketches on Cliristmas-eve, the hoky, or seed-cake, these he yearly keeps, yet holds them no relics of popery. TKETRER. A term of contempt. Mat. Hei, hei! handsom, kether! sure somebody has been rouling him in the rice ; sirrah, you a spoil’d your clothes. [.Offers to heat it off. Chav. Kay, what de do, faather r now to zee your ignorance, why ’tis all the fashion, man; it came over from England with the last ship came in here, there’s no-body look’d upon that is not bedon zo; nay, they /.ay the fine ladies like it so hugeously. they powder their dogs and monkeys. Unnatural Mother, 1698. KETTLE, for kettledrum ; by abbrevia- tion. And let the kettle to the trumpet speak, The trumpet to the cannoneer without, The cannons to the heav’ns, the heav’ns to earth, Now the king drinks to Hamlet. Rami., v, 2. So in the former part of the same play this custom is described : The king doth wake to-night and takes his rouse, Keeps wassel, and the swaggering upspring reels; And as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down. The kettledrum and. trumpet thus bray out The triumph of his pledge. i, 4. KETTLE-PINS, for skettle-pins, nine- pins. Billiards, kettle-pins, noddy-boards, tables, truncks, shovel-boards, fox and geese, and the like. Shelton, Pref. to Don Quix., cited by Todd. fKEWWAW. Askew. The picture topsie-turvie stands Jcewwaw: The world turn’d upside downe, as all men know. Taylor’s WorTces, 1630. KEX, or KECKSIE. A dry stalk of hemlock, and sometimes of other kinds. Perhaps hechsies is only a mistaken form, instead of the plural of hex, Jcexes; and hex itself may have been formed from hech, some- thing so dry that the eater would hech at it, or be unable to swallow it. It can hardly be a corruption of cigue. And nothing teems But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs. Losing both beauty and utility. Ren. V, v, 2. As hollow as a gun : or as a kex. Pay’s Prov., 222. It is now common to say “ as dry as a hex” See Todd. Cotgrave under Canon has, “ Canon de suls, a hex, or elder stick ; also a potgun made thereof;” he gives it too as the translation of Cigue. It was written also hix, which is less remote from cigv.es: If I had never seen, or never tasted The goodness of this kix, I had been a made man. B. Sy FI. Coxcomb., i, 1. By hix, he means the empty useless coxcomb, his companion. Coles inconsistently renders hechs by cremium, which means bavin or dry brush wood ; and hex by cicuta, hem- lock. KEY-COLD. Very cold, as cold as a key. Poor key-cold figure of a holy king ! Rich. Ill, i, 2. Heav’n further it; For till they be key-cold dead, there’s no trusting of’em. B. and FI. Wildgoose Chase, iv, 3. And then in key-cold Lucrece’ bleeding stream He falls, &c. Pape of Lucr., Suppl. to Sliakesp., i, 571. It is oddly used in Decker’s Satiro- mastix, for the disorder called a cold ; but then it is in the mouth of an in- correct speaker : Sir Adam, is best hide your head for fear your wise brains take key-colcl. Hawk. Orig. of Dr., iii, 223. There was one Mr. Key that offended them [the Puri- tans of Cambridge], and one said in a sermon, that of all complexions the worst were such as wrere key- cold. Harr. Nugce, ii, 159, Park’s ed. KEYSAR, KESAR, or KEISAR. Old spelling for Caesar, and used pro- verbially for an emperor; particularly in the expression Kings and. Keysars, which very frequently occurs. Thou art an emperor, Caesar, Keisar, and Pheezar. Merry W. W., i, 3. And treadeth under foot her holy things, Which was the care of Kesars and of kings. Spens. Tears of Muses, 569. Formyters, states, nor crownes may not exclude Popes, mightie kings, nor Keysars from the same. Harringt. Ariosto, xliv, 47. Tell me of no queen or Keysar. B. Jons. Tale of a Tub, ii, 2. See also George a Greene, 0. PL, iii, 49 ; Mirr. for Mag., p. 293. KICKSY-WICKSY, or KICKSY-WIN- SEY. A ludicrous word, of no defi- nite meaning, except, perhaps, to imply restlessness; from hich, and wince, in allusion to a restive horse ; applied by Parolles, in All’s well that ends w'ell, to a wife : He wears his honour in a box unseen, That hugs his kicksy-wicksy here at home. ii, 3. Taylor the wrater-poet has used a similar term, apparently designing to convey by it his determination to hich and wince at his debtors, having given that name to a poem written against them. He calls it, “A Kichsie-winsie, or a Lerry-cum-twangThe same