1. ZEDECHYE: FOOTNOTES
2 seith, says.
3 beleve, belief.
4 aungellis, angels.
6-7 puissaunce, puissance/power.
14 holly, wholly.
15 shamefast, shamefaced; peasible, peaceful.
16 wele attempred, of good temperament.
17 obeissaunt, obedient; magesté, majesty.
18 roialme, realm.
20 tresoure, treasure.
25 tho, those; passinge evreux, exceptionally fortunate.
27 malevreux, unfortunate; fauten, fault.
28 dispreiseth, dispraises, denounces.
30 sekenesse, sickness.
30-31 but yf, unless.
32 aventure, danger.
33 enfourmed, informed.
34 connynge, wisdom.
34-35 rightwose, righteous.
35 haunte, visit.
38 her, their.
39 here, their.
41 hem, them.
46 feire, fair.
49 verrey, true.
51 renomme, renown.
53 alloone, all alone.
54 tecchis, customs.
56 tacchis, habits.
60 weneth, believes, supposes.
61 Creatour, Creator.
64-65 here pleasaunce, their pleasure.
65 diffence, defense.
66 defended, forbidden.
67 her, their.
68 dilectaciouns, delectations.
69 parreye, parry (block).
71 delytes transitories, transitory delights.
72 noye, annoy.
74 th'ende, the end.
78 covenable, appropriate.
82 veyne, vain.
84 covenably, appropriately.
1. ZEDECHYE: EXPLANATORY NOTES
ABBREVIATIONS: B = Dicts and Sayings of the Philosophers, ed. Bühler (1941); CA = Gower's Confessio Amantis; CT = Chaucer's Canterbury Tales; G = Pierpont Morgan Library MS G.66; MED = Middle English Dictionary; OED = Oxford English Dictionary; S = Scrope, Dicts and Sayings of the Philosophers, ed. Schofield (1936).
These explanatory notes cannot hope to provide a complete accounting for the source of every proverbial statement in Dicts and Sayings. That task would be a separate book in its own right. Instead, I have attempted to contextualize this rather heterogeneous body of lore by identifying the people and places named in the text, as well as noting points that may be of interest to students and general readers. Those interested in tracing the source of particular quotations should begin by consulting Whiting's Proverbs, Sentences, and Proverbial Phrases From English Writings Mainly Before 1500. Readers are also invited to consult the thorough notes to Knust's Bocados de Oro, the Spanish translation of the original Arabic ancestor of Dicts and Sayings.
1 Zedechye. Schofield posits that Zedechye is either the Egyptian deity Set (the evil god of trickery, murderer of his brother Osiris) or Seth, the third son of Adam and Eve after Cain and Abel (S, p. 206n2). Either is possible, given that the text draws on both ancient Egyptian and Judeo-Christian-Islamic mythologies, though Seth's peaceable wisdom seems more in keeping with the ethos of Zedechye's philosophy.
5-7 to obeye to kinges and princes that God hath sette on erthe for to governe and reule and have puissaunce over the people. As I discussed in the Introduction, medieval wisdom literature tends to endorse a conservative political ideology, one that encourages - or often demands - respect for authority and obedience to the laws of God and temporal rulers. For the best studies of this phenomenon, see the work of Louis, especially "Authority in Middle English Proverb Literature," and "Proverbs and the Politics of Language."
16 And seithe. "And [Zedechye] says." This rhetorical formula of dropping the subject (proseopesis) is characteristic throughout Dicts and Sayings. Usually the subject will appear in the first saying (e.g., "the same Hermes seith" [Hermes, lines 22-23]), after which we get the formula"And seith" as a header (lines 24, 32, etc.). Compare "Pyctagoras seide" (Pyctagoras, line 1), then "And seide" (line 12), "and seith" (lines 15, 16, 17 [twice], 20, 21, 22, etc). The "And(e)" is written with a large capital that serves as a marker to help the reader to locate individual sayings.
80-82 A man shulde nat juge anothir by his wordis, but by his deedis, for wordes bene commounly veyne, but the dedis maken knowe the hurtis and the profitis. See also Pythagoras, lines 72-73, Loginon, lines 104-05, and The Last Philosophers, lines 304-05. For other manifestations of this maxim, see Whiting W642.
1. ZEDECHYE: TEXTUAL NOTES
1 which. So G. B emends to by which.
26 goode. B: good.