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The Internet Oxen of the Sun (Ulysses ch14)

  1a         this page     1c        2a        2b         2c, 3
Arvals       Mandeville   Pepys    Goldsmith  Lamb       Dickens
Sallust      Malory       Defoe    Burke      DeQuincey  Newman
Malmesbury   Holinshed    Swift    Sheridan   Landor     Pater
Anglo-Saxon  Milton       Addison  Junius     Macaulay   Ruskin
moralities   Bunyan       Sterne   Gibbon     Huxley     Carlyle
                                   gothic                slangs

modernised: "And the tables whereon men eat, some be of emeralds, some of amethyst, and some of gold, full of precious stones; and the pillars that bear up the tables be of the same precious stones... And thus went many diverse lusty bachelors for to slay great lords in diverse countries, that were his enemies, and made themselves to be slain, in hope to have that paradise. And thus, often-time, he was revenged of his enemies by his subtle deceits and false cautels..."

unmodernised: "For wee ben clept cristene man after crist oure fader and yif wee be right children of crist we oughte for to challenge the heritage that oure fader lafte us and do it out of hetheene mennes hondes."

The scholarly consensus [eb11] is that "The Travels of Sir John Mandeville" was written in French around 1360, perhaps by the well-documented Jean d'Outremeuse (1338-1400) [ch], or by the less-well-documented Johains a le Barbe (aka Jehan a la Barbe, Bearded John, Jehan de Bourgogne, Johannes de Burgundia, etc) ...who may really have been the extremely shadowy Mandeville (c1295-1372). The hugely-popular contemporary English translation was traditionally credited to the author himself, but translation-errors make this impossible (the translator didn't understand 'his own' French: cite; variants). A veneer of piety is added by framing the whole as a pilgrim's guide to Jerusalem. [Cath] [fringe]

The Black Death c1350 had dealt Latin a blow by thinning the ranks of the educated, increasing the market for translations in the vernacular.

c1366: The Travels of Sir John Mandeville: summary/crit, style, PGut, Calgary, Roman, unmodernised extract, modernised, unmodernised quotes

week nine of pregnancy:

And whiles they spake the door of the castle was opened and there nighed them a mickle noise as of many that sat there at meat. And there came against the place as they stood a young learning knight yclept Dixon.

'nighed' = came near [def]
'mickle' = great [def]
'meat': (no meat but sardines, actually)

'learning knight': ie, medical student. Anglo-Saxon translations of the Bible used 'leorning-cnicht' for 'disciple': [cite]

'yclept' = named, called

'Dixon': mentioned in ch8: [Lestryg] probably also in Portrait: "the medical student [Dixon] who was reading to him [Cranly] a problem from the chess page" [PoA5]

And the traveller Leopold was couth to him sithen it had happed that they had had ado each with other in the house of misericord where this learning knight lay

'was couth to him' = was known to him [def]
'sithen' = since [def]

'the house of misericord where this learning knight lay': cf ch8 "young Dixon who dressed that sting for me in the Mater [Misericodia] and now he's in Holles street"

'lay' = lodged, or abided [defs]

by cause the traveller Leopold came there to be healed for he was sore wounded in his breast by a spear wherewith a horrible and dreadful dragon was smitten him for which he did do make a salve of volatile salt and chrism as much as he might suffice.

'dragon' for 'bee' is characteristic Mandevillian exaggeration (to boost sales). Gifford suggests a correspondence to the geologic age of dinosaurs as well.

'volatile salt' = baking soda (in the 18thC, ammonium carbonate: cite)
'chrism' = olive oil (consecrated: Cath)

And he said now that he should go in to that castle for to make merry with them that were there. And the traveller Leopold said that he should go otherwhither for he was a man of cautels and a subtle. Also the lady was of his avis and repreved the learning knight though she trowed well that the traveller had said thing that was false for his subtility.

'cautels' = prudence
'avis' = opinion, advice
'repreved' = reproved

'thing that was false': probably his flattery about her appearance (indirect evidence suggests she's really homely: Nausikaa calls her 'marriageable' but classes her with bucktoothed Josie Breen)

it's not clear, though, why such a lie would incline her to approve of Bloom joining the party (longshot: could 'thing' mean 'nothing' here? but then 'though' would also need an opposite meaning...?)

But the learning knight would not hear say nay nor do her mandement ne have him in aught contrarious to his list and he said how it was a marvellous castle. And the traveller Leopold went in to the castle for to rest him for a space being sore of limb after many marches environing in divers lands and sometime venery.

'mandement' = command(ment)
'castle': any place of privacy, security, or refuge [defs]
'venery': probably masturbation here (usually hunting or sex: defs)

week ten of pregnancy:

And in the castle was set a board that was of the birchwood of Finlandy and it was upheld by four dwarfmen of that country but they durst not move more for enchantment. And on this board were frightful swords and knives that are made in a great cavern by swinking demons out of white flames that they fix then in the horns of buffalos and stags that there abound marvellously.

'birchwood': light-colored [info]
'Finlandy': (Finlandia and Finlandie are much more common spellings)
'dwarfmen': (a Mandevillian misinterpretation of something he probably hadn't seen himself)

'swinking' = toiling [def]
'white': the 'color' for this chapter [schemata]
'white flames': (I think not, but white-hot steel, yes: cite)

'horns': the knifehandles (plausible? examples)
'there abound': where-- in Finland? not Ireland! (Mandeville's style is exotic-travelogue)

And there were vessels that are wrought by magic of Mahound out of seasand and the air by a warlock with his breath that he blases in to them like to bubbles.

ie, blown-glass, originally discovered c250BC in Mesopotamia [cite] revived c750AD in Islamic world [cite]

'Mahound' = Mohammed (contemptuous? cite)
'blases': blows (unattested on Web?)

And full fair cheer and rich was on the board that no wight could devise a fuller ne richer. And there was a vat of silver that was moved by craft to open in the which lay strange fishes withouten heads though misbelieving men nie that this be possible thing without they see it natheless they are so. And these fishes lie in an oily water brought there from Portugal land because of the fatness that therein is like to the juices of the olivepress.

canned sardines: [pic]

'oily water': canned sardines are normally packed in olive oil (or another vegetable oil) [eg]

'from Portugal land': leading source of sardines

'like to the juices of the olivepress': not real olive oil, apparently (ie, a cheap brand)

And also it was marvel to see in that castle how by magic they make a compost out of fecund wheatkidneys out of Chaldee that by aid of certain angry spirits that they do in to it swells up wondrously like to a vast mountain.

'compost' = mixture [def]
'wheatkidneys': Deuteronomy 32:14 refers to 'the fat of the kidneys of wheat' [info]

Chaldee: ancient Persia [timeline]
'angry spirits': ie, yeast

And they teach the serpents there to entwine themselves up on long sticks out of the ground and of the scales of these serpents they brew out a brewage like to mead.

'serpents': hop-vines [pic]
'scales': hops
'brewage': beer

week eleven of pregnancy:

And the learning knight let pour for childe Leopold a draught and halp thereto the while all they that were there drank every each. And childe Leopold did up his beaver for to pleasure him and took apertly somewhat in amity for he never drank no manner of mead which he then put by and anon full privily he voided the more part in his neighbour glass and his neighbour nist not of this wile. And he sat down in that castle with them for to rest him there awhile. Thanked be Almighty God.

'childe' = youth of noble birth, eldest son due to inherit title [defs]
'did up his beaver': tipped his hat? or took it off? [defs]

'apertly' = openly [def]

1457: Gutenburg prints Psalter with moveable type

"And soo by myracle of oure lady of heuen she was delyuerd with grete paynes But she had taken suche cold for the defaute of helpe that depe draughtes of deth toke her that nedes she must dye and departe oute of this world ther was none other boote And whanne this quene Elyzabeth sawe that ther was none other bote thenne she made grete dole and said vnto her gentylwoman whan ye see my lord kyng Melyodas recommaunde me vnto hym and telle hym what paynes I endure here for his loue and how I must dye here for his sake for defaute of good helpe and lete hym wete that I am ful sory to departe out of this world fro hym therfor pray hym to be frende to my soule Now lete me see my lytel child for whome I haue had alle this sorowe And whanne she sawe hym she said thus A my lytel sone thou hast murthered thy moder and therfore I suppose thou that arte a murtherer soo yong thou arte ful lykely to be a manly man in thyn age..."

"...and so by miracle of Our Lady of Heaven she was delivered with great pains. But she had taken such cold for the default of help that deep draughts of death took her, that needs she must die and depart out of this world; there was none other bote. And when this Queen Elizabeth saw that there was none other bote, then she made great dole, and said unto her gentlewoman: When ye see my lord, King Meliodas, recommend me unto him, and tell him what pains I endure here for his love, and how I must die here for his sake for default of good help; and let him wit that I am full sorry to depart out of this world from him, therefore pray him to be friend to my soul. Now let me see my little child, for whom I have had all this sorrow. And when she saw him she said thus: Ah, my little son, thou hast murdered thy mother, and therefore I suppose, thou that art a murderer so young, thou art full likely to be a manly man in thine age."

Sir Thomas Malory (d1471?) [ch] [style] [extract]

1469: Le Morte D'Arthur: Mich, modern vol2

week twelve of pregnancy:

This meanwhile this good sister stood by the door and begged them at the reverence of Jesu our alther liege Lord to leave their wassailing for there was above one quick with child, a gentle dame whose time hied fast. Sir Leopold heard on the upfloor cry on high and he wondered what cry that it was whether of child or woman and I marvel, said he, that it be not come or now. Meseems it dureth overlong.

'this good sister': (Nurse Callan looks in as Bloom enters)
'alther' = of all

And he was ware and saw a franklin that hight Lenehan on that side the table that was older than any of the tother and for that they both were knights virtuous in the one emprise and eke by cause that he was elder he spoke to him full gently.

'franklin': non-noble landowner [def]
'hight' = named, called (cf yclept) [def]
'older': Dubliners says he's 30-ish [2Gall]
'emprise' = chivalrous undertaking [def]
'eke' = likewise, also [defs]

(Cranly characteristically misues 'eke' in Portrait [PoA5] and Stephen Hero ch24.)

But, said he, or it be long too she will bring forth by God His bounty and have joy of her childing for she hath waited marvellous long. And the franklin that had drunken said, Expecting each moment to be her next. Also he took the cup that stood tofore him for him needed never none asking nor desiring of him to drink and, Now drink, said he, fully delectably, and he quaffed as far as he might to their both's health for he was a passing good man of his lustiness.

'Expecting each moment to be her next': Lenehan repeats a joke he used five hours earlier: [Cyclops]

'needed never none asking': Lenehan's a sponger

And sir Leopold that was the goodliest guest that ever sat in scholars' hall and that was the meekest man and the kindest that ever laid husbandly hand under hen and that was the very truest knight of the world one that ever did minion service to lady gentle pledged him courtly in the cup. Woman's woe with wonder pondering.

exaggerating the alliterative quality of Old English verse

'kindest that ever laid husbandly hand under hen': Nameless's insult: [Cyclops]

'minion' = servile or dainty [defs]

week 13 of pregnancy:

Now let us speak of that fellowship that was there to the intent to be drunken an they might. There was a sort of scholars along either side the board, that is to wit, Dixon yclept junior of saint Mary Merciable's with other his fellows Lynch and Madden, scholars of medicine,

'Dixon yclept junior': (the Sheehy boys' father was David, they were Richard and Eugene, so no 'Jr' there.)

'Merciable' = merciful [def] (but hasn't he left Mater Misericordia?)

'Lynch' = Vincent Lynch = Vincent Cosgrave

'Madden' = William Maddden = George Clancy = Davin in Portrait [PoA5] = Madden in Stephen Hero [info]

'scholars of medicine': Cosgrave was, Clancy I think was not.

and the franklin that hight Lenehan and one from Alba Longa, one Crotthers, and young Stephen that had mien of a frere that was at head of the board and Costello that men clepen Punch Costello all long of a mastery of him erewhile gested

'Alba Longa' = Scotland
'Crotthers': first initial 'J'
'mien of a frere': look of a friar/Franciscan monk
'at head of the board': (the seating arrangement is a Joycean puzzle)
'all long of a mastery': Punch was so called for his boxing-skill
'erewhile gested': performed some time ago (ie, he doesn't box anymore)

(and of all them, reserved young Stephen, he was the most drunken that demanded still of more mead) and beside the meek sir Leopold. But on young Malachi they waited for that he promised to have come and such as intended to no goodness said how he had broke his avow.

'reserved': (Stephen is drunkest, Punch next)
'beside': Bloom is next to Punch
'Malachi': Mulligan is at George Moore's soiree

'such as intended to no goodness': ie, cynics, or Mulligan's enemies (ie, Stephen?)

'he had broke his avow': Stephen may think Mulligan is avoiding him

(probably these thoughts have not been spoken since Bloom joined them)

And sir Leopold sat with them for he bore fast friendship to sir Simon and to this his son young Stephen and for that his languor becalmed him there after longest wanderings insomuch as they feasted him for that time in the honourablest manner. Ruth red him, love led on with will to wander, loth to leave.

'sir Simon': Stephen's father, Simon Dedalus (fast friendship is an exaggeration)

'and for that': Bloom lingers for two reasons-- Stephen, and tiredness

'Ruth red him': pity guided him

(there's no indication Stephen has noticed Bloom yet)

week 14 of pregnancy:

For they were right witty scholars. And he heard their aresouns each gen other as touching birth and righteousness, young Madden maintaining that put such case it were hard the wife to die (for so it had fallen out a matter of some year agone with a woman of Eblana in Horne's house that now was trespassed out of this world and the self night next before her death all leeches and pothecaries had taken counsel of her case).

'he heard': ie, Bloom
'aresouns': arguments

'birth and righteousness': (this discussion may already have been going on before Bloom entered, or it may have been set off by his expression of concern towards Mrs Purefoy)

the issue under debate (not explicit yet, here) is whose life to save, when the doctor must choose between mother and child

apparently Madden was present at the earlier, 1903 debate

'it were hard the wife to die': ie, though the decision is painful, the child's life comes first (the official Catholic view)

'Eblana': c150AD name from Ptolemy for a city in Ireland, conventionally Dublin [etext&map]

And they said farther she should live because in the beginning, they said, the woman should bring forth in pain and wherefore they that were of this imagination affirmed how young Madden had said truth for he had conscience to let her die.

'she should live': this seems to contradict 'the wife to die' and 'to let her die' (but presumably Joyce is playing a grammatical trick?)

'the woman should bring forth in pain': (this almost makes sense as an argument for letting her die, as an extreme instance of punishment for Eve's disobedience)

And not few and of these was young Lynch were in doubt that the world was now right evil governed as it was never other howbeit the mean people believed it otherwise but the law nor his judges did provide no remedy. A redress God grant.

unlike Madden, Lynch has no respect for the Church, and would save the mother (letting-the-baby-die is a form of sterilizing the act of coition, or killing the sacred Oxen of the Sun)

'the mean people': commoners (or wicked people?) [defs]
'believed it otherwise': Lynch argues that the average Irishperson would disagree with the Church on this

'the law nor his judges did provide no remedy': Gifford says the British courts had taken no stand on this question

'A redress God grant': (a prayer-- Lynch's or the narrator's)

This was scant said but all cried with one acclaim nay, by our Virgin Mother, the wife should live and the babe to die. In colour whereof they waxed hot upon that head what with argument and what for their drinking but the franklin Lenehan was prompt each when to pour them ale so that at the least way mirth might not lack.

'all cried with one acclaim': (a fickle crowd)
'by our Virgin Mother': (a highly inappropriate oath, since her son's life was thought so much more important than hers)

Lenehan probably pours to make sure his own glass stays filled

Then young Madden showed all the whole affair and said how that she was dead and how for holy religion sake by rede of palmer and bedesman

'she was dead': this must refer to the baby...?

'rede' = counsel (cf 'red' above)
'palmer' = a pilgrim who carries a symbolic palm-branch [def]
'bedesman' = a poor man who prays (with beads) in exchange for alms [def] [WScott]

and for a vow he had made to Saint Ultan of Arbraccan her goodman husband would not let her death whereby they were all wondrous grieved.

'Saint Ultan of Arbraccan': Irish patron saint of sick children and orphans [Cath] (St Ultan's Children's Hospital opened in Dublin in 1919: cite)

'let' = accept?

despite the advice of the Church, and the prayers and promises of the husband, both mother and baby died (when the mother, at least, could have been saved)

To whom young Stephen had these words following: Murmur, sirs, is eke oft among lay folk. Both babe and parent now glorify their Maker, the one in limbo gloom, the other in purgefire.

'Murmur': probably 'complaints' [defs] 'eke' = also

(Stephen dismisses the popular grievance.)

But, gramercy, what of those Godpossibled souls that we nightly unpossibilise, which is the sin against the Holy Ghost, Very God, Lord and Giver of Life? For, sirs, he said, our lust is brief. We are means to those small creatures within us and nature has other ends than we.

'nightly': via masturbation, presumably

'our lust is brief': Stephen seems to be defending the Church's view, that sexual pleasure is dishonorable

'means... ends': the paradox of sexuality is that it's driven by a selfish pleasure-principle, but ends up serving the unselfish end of creating new lives (unless one sterilizes it via a condom or masturbation, etc)

Then said Dixon junior to Punch Costello wist he what ends. But he had overmuch drunken and the best word he could have of him was that he would ever dishonest a woman whoso she were or wife or maid or leman if it so fortuned him to be delivered of his spleen of lustihead.

'wist he what ends': (ie, Dixon asks Punch if he knows what Nature's ends are)

'leman' = mistress or sweetheart (dear-man: defs)
'spleen' = passion

(so Punch expresses the extreme pleasure-principle)

Whereat Crotthers of Alba Longa sang young Malachi's praise of that beast the unicorn how once in the millennium he cometh by his horn, the other all this while pricked forward with their jibes wherewith they did malice him, witnessing all and several by saint Foutinus his engines that he was able to do any manner of thing that lay in man to do.

'sang young Malachi's praise': (possibly a lost poem of Gogarty's-- even a limerick?)

'once in the millennium': some legends hold that unicorns live 1000 years

'cometh by his horn': (probably a blasphemous analogy between Jesus returning and a pure being-- the unicorn-- experiencing a well-disciplined instant of lust, with overtones of insect-etc species that mate once and then die)

'the other... their jibes': ('other' must mean 'otherS' here)

'saint Foutinus': patron of a Christian fertility cult in medieval France [info]

(are they joking about impotence, here, and the paradox that impotent men are virtuous in spite of themselves?)

Thereat laughed they all right jocundly only young Stephen and sir Leopold which never durst laugh too open by reason of a strange humour which he would not bewray and also for that he rued for her that bare whoso she might be or wheresoever.

'strange humour which he would not bewray': Stephen has been cultivating "the enigma of a manner" since his university days [PoA04]

'he rued for her that bare': Bloom is too worried about Mrs Purefoy to laugh

Then spoke young Stephen orgulous of mother Church that would cast him out of her bosom, of law of canons,

'orgulous' = pridefilled
'cast him out': Stephen had left the Church by refusing to make his Easter duty c1901 [PoA5]

'law of canons': the Church's laws [Cath] (presumably these include the requirement to make one's Easter duty, as well as saving the baby's life in preference to the mother's?)

of Lilith, patron of abortions, of bigness wrought by wind of seeds of brightness or by potency of vampires mouth to mouth or,

'Lilith, patron of abortions': ie, of accidental or intentional miscarriages [info] [Talmud]

'bigness': pregnancy

'wind of seeds of brightness': possibly Danae's impregnation (with Perseus) by Zeus via a 'shower of gold' [Apollodorus]

'vampires mouth to mouth': cf incubus [def] [Proteus] (cf? Oxen note: "SD returns to thoughts of a.m.")

'mouth to mouth': cf Douglas Hyde poem [etext]

as Virgilius saith, by the influence of the occident or by the reek of moonflower or an she lie with a woman which her man has but lain with, effectu secuto, or peradventure in her bath according to the opinions of Averroes and Moses Maimonides.

'Virgilius': Georgics, on horses: "of mares, By Venus' self inspired" [etext]

'occident' = west wind

'reek of moonflower': there are various night-blooming flowers with this name [info] but Gifford traces this to Pliny's Natural History, on the scent of menstruation

'effectu secuto' = the effect following (Latin) Web-refs all apply to excommunication automatically following from abortion [eg]

'Averroes': reported by Browne [etext] (not Maimonides)

He said also how at the end of the second month a human soul was infused and how in all our holy mother foldeth ever souls for God's greater glory whereas that earthly mother which was but a dam to bear beastly should die by canon for so saith he that holdeth the fisherman's seal, even that blessed Peter on which rock was holy church for all ages founded.

'at the end of the second month a human soul was infused': derived (by Stephen?) from Aquinas [etext] on Aristotle: "As they develop they also acquire the sensitive soul..." [etext]

(end of 2nd month should be 8th week, not 14th!?)

'our holy mother': Mary, or the Catholic Church

'foldeth' = places in an enclosure (eg sheep) [defs]

'he that holdeth the fisherman's seal' = the pope

'the fisherman's seal': [Cath]

All they bachelors then asked of sir Leopold would he in like case so jeopard her person as risk life to save life. A wariness of mind he would answer as fitted all and, laying hand to jaw, he said dissembling, as his wont was, that as it was informed him, who had ever loved the art of physic as might a layman, and agreeing also with his experience of so seldomseen an accident it was good for that Mother Church belike at one blow had birth and death pence and in such sort deliverly he scaped their questions. That is truth, pardy, said Dixon, and, or I err, a pregnant word. Which hearing young Stephen was a marvellous glad man and he averred that he who stealeth from the poor lendeth to the Lord for he was of a wild manner when he was drunken and that he was now in that taking it appeared eftsoons.

week 15 of pregnancy:

But sir Leopold was passing grave maugre his word by cause he still had pity of the terrorcausing shrieking of shrill women in their labour and as he was minded of his good lady Marion that had borne him an only manchild which on his eleventh day on live had died and no man of art could save so dark is destiny. And she was wondrous stricken of heart for that evil hap and for his burial did him on a fair corselet of lamb's wool, the flower of the flock, lest he might perish utterly and lie akeled (for it was then about the midst of the winter) and now sir Leopold that had of his body no manchild for an heir looked upon him his friend's son and was shut up in sorrow for his forepassed happiness and as sad as he was that him failed a son of such gentle courage (for all accounted him of real parts) so grieved he also in no less measure for young Stephen for that he lived riotously with those wastrels and murdered his goods with whores.

1494: Henry VII applies inappropriate English land-use laws to Ireland

1534: Henry VIII establishes Anglican church [background] (England unlike Continent-- top-down reformation instead of bottom-up)

1541: Henry VIII proclaimed King of Ireland

1547: Edward VI reforms Anglican church to be more Protestant

1553-1563: return to Catholicism under Mary I

1560: John Knox converts Scotland to Calvinist Presbyterianism

1563: Elizabeth I restores 'episcopal' Anglicanism, more Lutheran than Calvinist (opposed as insufficiently protestant by Brownists, Presbyterians, Puritans, Separatists, and Quakers)

Bible viewed as sole authority by Puritans, Episcopalians add that bishops-etc are founded on 'natural law'

"One thing only I mislike in them, and that is their usual going into Italy, from whence very few without special grace do return good men whatsoever they pretend of conference or practice, chiefly the physicians who under pretence of seeking of foreign simples do oftentimes learn the framing of such compositions as were better unknown than practised, as I have heard often alleged, and therefore it is most true that Doctor Turner said: 'Italy is not to be seen without a guide, that is, without special grace given from God, because of the licentious and corrupt behaviour of the people.'" (Harrison)

Raphael Holinshed (d1580?) source for 'Macbeth'; William Harrison (1534-1593) was also a collaborator

1577: Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland: multipage, facsimiles, extracts, extracts, short
Harrison's Description of England: [ch] Bartleby, Fordham

other chroniclers: Edward Hall, John Stow, John Speed, William Camden, John Leland, Sir Thomas Smith, John Foxe, George Cavendish, Sir John Hayward [cite]

Joyce mentions Holinshed in Chamber Music [CMxxvi]

Thou leanest to the shell of night,
    Dear lady, a divining ear.
In that soft choiring of delight
    What sound hath made thy heart to fear?
Seemed it of rivers rushing forth
From the grey deserts of the north?

    That mood of thine, O timorous,
Is his, if thou but scan it well,
    Who a mad tale bequeaths to us
At ghosting hour conjurable--
    And all for some strange name he read
        In Purchas or in Holinshed.

(Samuel Purchas, 1577-1626, travel-narratives: ch)

week 16 of pregnancy:

About that present time young Stephen filled all cups that stood empty so as there remained but little mo if the prudenter had not shadowed their approach from him that still plied it very busily who, praying for the intentions of the sovereign pontiff, he gave them for a pledge the vicar of Christ which also as he said is vicar of Bray. Now drink we, quod he, of this mazer and quaff ye this mead which is not indeed parcel of my body but my soul's bodiment. Leave ye fraction of bread to them that live by bread alone. Be not afeard neither for any want for this will comfort more than the other will dismay. See ye here. And he showed them glistering coins of the tribute and goldsmith notes the worth of two pound nineteen shilling that he had, he said, for a song which he writ. They all admired to see the foresaid riches in such dearth of money as was herebefore. His words were then these as followeth: Know all men, he said, time's ruins build eternity's mansions. What means this? Desire's wind blasts the thorntree but after it becomes from a bramblebush to be a rose upon the rood of time. Mark me now. In woman's womb word is made flesh but in the spirit of the maker all flesh that passes becomes the word that shall not pass away. This is the postcreation. Omnis cam ad te veniet. No question but her name is puissant who aventried the dear corse of our Agenbuyer, Healer and Herd, our mighty mother and mother most venerable and Bernardus saith aptly that She hath an omnipotentiam deiparae supplicem, that is to wit, an almightiness of petition because she is the second Eve and she won us, saith Augustine too, whereas that other, our grandam, which we are linked up with by successive anastomosis of navelcords sold us all, seed, breed and generation, for a penny pippin. But here is the matter now. Or she knew him, that second I say, and was but creature of her creature, vergine madre figlia di tuo figlio, or she knew him not and then stands she in the one denial or ignorancy with Peter Piscator who lives in the house that Jack built and with Joseph the Joiner patron of the happy demise of all unhappy marriages, parceque M. Léo Taxil nous a dit que qui l'avait mise dans cette fichue position c'était le sacré pigeon, ventre de Dieu! Entweder transsubstantiality oder consubstantiality but in no case subsubstantiality. And all cried out upon It for a very scurvy word. A pregnancy without joy, he said, a birth without pangs, a body without blemish, a belly without bigness. Let the lewd with faith and fervour worship. With will will we withstand, withsay.

'Know all men': traced to De Quincey [cite]

week 17 of pregnancy:

Hereupon Punch Costello dinged with his fist upon the board and would sing a bawdy catch Staboo Stabella about a wench that was put in pod of a jolly swashbuckler in Almany which he did straightways now attack: The first three months she was not well, Staboo, when here nurse Quigley from the door angerly bid them hist ye should shame you nor was it not meet as she remembered them being her mind was to have all orderly against lord Andrew came for because she was jealous that not gasteful turmoil might shorten the honour of her guard. It was an ancient and a sad matron of a sedate look and christian walking, in habit dun beseeming her megrims and wrinkled visage, nor did her hortative want of it effect for incontinently Punch Costello was of them all embraided and they reclaimed the churl with civil rudeness some and shaked him with menace of blandishments others whiles they all chode with him, a murrain seize the dolt, what a devil he would be at, thou chuff, thou puny, thou got in peasestraw, thou losel, thou chitterling, thou spawn of a rebel, thou dykedropt, thou abortion thou, to shut up his drunken drool out of that like a curse of God ape, the good sir Leopold that had for his cognisance the flower of quiet, margerain gentle, advising also the time's occasion as most sacred and most worthy to be most sacred. In Horne's house rest should reign.

'The first three months': (12 weeks, not 17?)

1450-1750: the change called the Great Vowel Shift occurred during this period. It accounts for the quite startling differences in pronunciation between Modern English "long" vowels and Old English long vowels--most of the consonants stayed pretty much the same, and so did the short vowels.

c1600: English begin to see themselves as 'chosen' to lead reformation (Milton 1644: "nation chosen before any other... a nation of prophets, of sages, and of worthies")

1603: death of Elizabeth without heirs; coronation of James I (Elizabeth's cousin's grandson, a Stuart not a Tudor)

"And what was their shimmer but the shimmer of the scum that mantled the cesspool of the court of a slobbering Stuart." [PoA5]

1605: failure of Gunpowder Plot [account]

1607: Flight of the Earls [info]

1580- 1640? Episcopalians (Anglican hierarchy dominated by bishops) vs Presbyterians (hierarchy flattened, presbyters not bishops) [overview] defs

Hooker was an Episopalian, Milton a Presbyterian

Browne was anti-Presbyterian, Henry Burton was anti-Episcopalian

1630s: 20k Puritans emigrate to Massachusetts [cite]

1637: Charles I tries to impose Episcopalian ritual in Scotland

"...they began to drawe downe all the Divine intercours, betwixt God, and the Soule, yea, the very shape of God himselfe, into an exterior, and bodily forme, urgently pretending a necessity, and obligement of joyning the body in a formall reverence, and Worship circumscrib'd, they hallow'd it, they fum'd it, they sprincl'd it, they be deck't it, not in robes of pure innocency, but of pure Linnen, with other deformed, and fantastik dresses in Palls, and Miters, gold, and guegaws fetcht from Arons old wardrobe, or the Flamins vestry; then was the Priest set to con his motions, and his Postures his Liturgies, and his Lurries, till the Soule by this meanes of over-bodying her selfe, given up justly to fleshly delights, bated her wing apace downeward: and finding the ease she had from her visible, and sensuous collegue the body in performance of Religious duties, her pineons now broken, and flagging, shifted off from her selfe, the labour of high soaring any more, forgot her heavenly flight, and left the dull, and droyling carcas to plod on in the old rode, and drudging Trade of outward conformity." (Milton)

"Laws, as all other things human, are many times full of imperfection; and that which is supposed behoveful unto men, proveth oftentimes most pernicious. The wisdom which is learned by tract of time, findeth the laws that have been in former ages established, needful in later to be abrogated. Besides, that which sometime is expedient doth not always so continue: and the number of needless laws unabolished doth weaken the force of them that are necessary." (Hooker)

Latinate prose styles

John Milton (1608-1674, Puritan) [ch] prose style, [timeline] [extracts] [politics]

Milton's prose style was unfortunate. Least objectionable is 'Areopagitica'

'Hypocrisy was impossible to him... He was very fond of long sentences which too frequently become a mere welter... He exaggerated the defects of composition, usual after Hooker's time, in an almost unbelievable way... [but] wonderful prose cadence... [in his Latin prose] his manner was not very different... [sometimes] rude railing and insolent swagger... grossly indecent... inconceivably dreary horseplay... welters and wallows through clause after clause of ill-jointed afterthought and ill-selected abuse" [ch]

Poetic style: "...proper names of resonance and colour-- scattering them over his verse paragraphs with an effect that is almost pyrotechnical... 'verse paragraphs' inspired by the soliloquies of Shakespeare... sense of stately order" [ch]

Stephen is teaching 'Lycidas' in ch2 [Nestor]

L'Allegro (poem): [ch] Bartleby
Il Penseroso (poem): [ch] GeoCities, Toronto, Bartleby, Bartleby
1634: Comus, A Mask (verse play): [ch] Renas
1638: Lycidas (poem): [ch] Bartleby
1641: Of Reformation Touching Church Discipline in England (prose): Bryson
1642: The Reason of Church Government (prose): Bryson
1642: An Apology Against a Pamphlet (prose): Bryson
1643: The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce (prose): text, Dartmouth
1644: Of Education (prose): Renas, Bartleby, Dartmouth
1644: The Judgment of Martin Bucer Concerning Divorce (prose): text
1644: Areopagitica (prose): Bryson, PGut, Dartmouth, Renas
1645: Tetrachordon (prose): text
1645: Colasterion (prose): text, Dartmouth
1645: Poems of Mr. John Milton: Dartmouth
1649: The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates (prose): Bryson
1649: Eikonoklastes (prose): Bryson
1651: The First Defense of the English People (prose): Bryson
1654: The Second Defense of the English People (prose): Bryson
1655? De Doctrina Christiana (prose): Bryson
1659: The Readie and Easie Way to Establish a Free Commonwealth (prose): Renas
1667: Paradise Lost (poem): [ch] Barger, Renas, Mindspring, LitOrg, Dartmouth
1670: The History of Britain (prose): text
1671: Paradise Regained (poem): [ch] Renas, Dartmouth, LitOrg
1671: Samson Agonistes (poem): [ch] Renas, Dartmouth
The Poetical Works of John Milton: PGut
The Complete Poems of John Milton: Bartleby

Richard Hooker (1554-1600) [ch] [bio] [primer] [links] [extract]

1585: A Learned Discourse of Justification: CCEL
1592-1600: Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity: crit [ch], VTS

week 18 of pregnancy:

To be short this passage was scarce by when Master Dixon of Mary in Eccles, goodly grinning, asked young Stephen what was the reason why he had not cided to take friar's vows and he answered him obedience in the womb, chastity in the tomb but involuntary poverty all his days.

'Mary in Eccles': Mater Misericordia hospital

'not cided to take friar's vows': Milton was educated at Cambridge with the idea of becoming an Anglican minister, but mysteriously abandoned this goal after graduation. [detailed analysis]

'obedience... chastity... poverty': the Evangelical Counsels or Counsels of Perfection [Cath] derived from Matthew [19:12] [19:21]

'involuntary poverty': in contrast to the vow of voluntary poverty

Master Lenehan at this made return that he had heard of those nefarious deeds and how, as he heard hereof counted, he had besmirched the lily virtue of a confiding female which was corruption of minors and they all intershowed it too, waxing merry and toasting to his fathership.

'besmirched': longshot: this may refer to Stephen's propositioning Emma, as described in Stephen Hero, probably based on a real 1902 scandal that may have played a role in Joyce's dropping out of Dublin medschool [info] [timeline] (if Lenehan heard about it, probably half of Dublin had.)

this may be the beginning of Bloom's 'haunting' by allusions to his past sins-- here perhaps Mary Discoll (cf Circe)

'confiding female': a phrase of Dickens', also used by birdwatchers (!?)

'intershowed it': maybe: retold the gossip to each other?

But he said very entirely it was clean contrary to their suppose for he was the eternal son and ever virgin.

'ever virgin': Joyce considered that his experiences with prostitutes didn't really count, and that psychologically he was a virgin when he met Nora [Exiles notes]

Thereat mirth grew in them the more and they rehearsed to him his curious rite of wedlock for the disrobing and deflowering of spouses, as the priests use in Madagascar island,

'rehearsed to him his curious rite': cf? ch9 "He holds my follies hostage." [Scylla] (Oxen-note: "Reminder of my errors (SD to Lynch)" traced to Landor cite)

'rite of wedlock': longshot: "--Take hands, Stephen and Emma. It is a beautiful evening now in heaven..." [PoA3]

'Madagascar': perhaps after the anecdotal style of Browne [etext] (Bloom's library includes an 1858 travelogue on Madagascar: Ithaca)

she to be in guise of white and saffron, her groom in white and grain, with burning of nard and tapers, on a bridebed while clerks sung kyries and the anthem Ut novetur sexus omnis corporis mysterium till she was there unmaided.

'groom': traced to De Quincey [cite]

'clerks': Joyce is exploiting the change in meaning from 'cleric' (sacred witnesses) to 'officeworker' (profane witnesses)

'kyries': Kyrie Eleison = Lord have mercy (Greek)

'Ut novetur sexus omnis corporis mysterium': That the whole mystery of physical sexuality may become known (Latin)

(Stannie's diary c1904 claimed of JAJ: "He is trying to commit the sin against the Holy Ghost for the purpose of getting outside the utmost rim of Catholicism." ie, knowing the whole mystery of sexuality)

He gave them then a much admirable hymen minim by those delicate poets Master John Fletcher and Master Francis Beaumont that is in their Maid's Tragedy that was writ for a like twining of lovers: To bed, to bed was the burden of it

'He gave them': Stephen sings the song for them (Joyce c1903 favored Elizabethan songs)

'hymen minim': probably medical dog-latin for 'short hymn' (only one verse)

'delicate': B&F were noted for their poetic purity and simplicity [ch]

Beaumont (1585-1616: bio) and Fletcher (1579-1625: bio): [ch] [bios] [etexts]

Robert Burton was a fan of B&F [cite]

'Maid's Tragedy... To bed, to bed': [etext]

to be played with accompanable concent upon the virginals.

'accompanable' = sociable, punning on 'accompaniable'

'concent' = harmony [def] (used by Milton: etext¬es) punning on consenting virgins

'virginals': 16thC keyboard instruments, perhaps named after the young girls who typically played them? [def] [Vermeer] (possibly after Pepys' diary via Peacock: cite)

An exquisite dulcet epithalame of most mollificative suadency for juveniles amatory whom the odoriferous flambeaus of the paranymphs have escorted to the quadrupedal proscenium of connubial communion.

'epithalame' = epithalamium (French) = poem sung as bride led to bridal chamber [def]

'mollificative' = soothing (Joyce's coinage)
'suadency' = persuasiveness (Joyce's coinage)
'paranymphs' = friends of the bridegroom, or supporters-in-general [refs] (in B&F, the song is sung by actors in a masque, playing the sea-gods Neptune and Aeolus)

'proscenium' = stage [def] (here, the bed)

Well met they were, said Master Dixon, joyed, but, harkee, young sir, better were they named Beau Mount and Lecher for, by my troth, of such a mingling much might come.

'Well met they were': B&F may have been introduced by Ben Jonson. Pope considered that 'Fletcher contributed the wit and Beaumont the judgment, and that Beaumontšs function was to check the overflowings of Fletcheršs genius' [ch]

'harkee' = hark ye = hear ye

'Beau Mount' = good fuck (Gifford implausibly suggests 'Mount of Venus')

Young Stephen said indeed to his best remembrance they had but the one doxy between them and she of the stews to make shift with in delights amorous for life ran very high in those days and the custom of the country approved with it.

John Aubrey's 'Brief Lives': "They lived together on the Banke side, not far from the Play-house, both batchelors; lay together; had one Wench in the house between them, which they did so admire; the same cloathes and cloake, &c.; between them." [cite] perhaps Aubrey's over-reading of Ben Jonson's 1614 barb in 'Bartholomew's Fair' "I say between you, you have both but one drab."

'stews' = brothels [def]
'make shift with' = make do with

'life ran very high in those days': echoing Mulligan quoting Dowden in ch9: [Scylla] [cite]

(the cliche is 'emotions ran high'. 'running high' is probably a metaphor based on tides and river-levels.)

'The Custom of the Country': 1619 (? 1628) play by Fletcher and Massinger

Greater love than this, he said, no man hath that a man lay down his wife for his friend. Go thou and do likewise.

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." [John 15:13]

'Go thou and do likewise': [Luke 10:37]

Thus, or words to that effect, said Zarathustra, sometime regius professor of French letters to the university of Oxtail nor breathed there ever that man to whom mankind was more beholden.

'Thus... said Zarathustra': Stephen is paraphrasing Mulligan in ch1: [Telem]

'regius professor': any professorship sponsored by the British crown [def]

'professor of French letters': again paraphrasing Mulligan, ch9: "--Monsieur Moore, he said, lecturer on French letters to the youth of Ireland." [Scylla]

'French letters' = condoms, or French literature

'Oxtail': Oxford + ox-motif

'more beholden': Jesus, or Nietzsche, or Zarathustra, or Moore, or even Mulligan?

Bring a stranger within thy tower it will go hard but thou wilt have the secondbest bed. Orate, fratres, pro memetipso. And all the people shall say, Amen.

'stranger': Haines, or Stephen (it's Mulligan's tower, and he invited both Haines and Stephen, so 'thy... thou' should refer to Mulligan)

'secondbest bed': according to Stephen's interpretation, an expression of Shakespeare's anger at Ann Hathaway for cuckolding him [Scylla]

'Orate, fratres, pro memetipso' = Brothers, pray for me myself (Latin)

'tipso': Stephen is also tipsy

'Orate... Amen': parody of end of offertory of Mass [bilingual]

Remember, Erin, thy generations and thy days of old, how thou settedst little by me and by my word and broughtest in a stranger to my gates to commit fornication in my sight and to wax fat and kick like Jeshurum.

'Remember... thy generations and thy days of old': cf [Deuteronomy]

'Remember, Erin': Thomas Moore's 'Let Erin Remember' [etext]

'thou settedst little by me and by my word': Stephen/Joyce in 1904 was concluding that Ireland was unlikely to appreciate his art (so exile was necessary)

'a stranger to my gates': [Exodus]

'to commit fornication in my sight': who? how? (longshot: Mulligan may have protested that Stephen masturbated some night at the Tower: motif)

'to wax fat and kick like Jeshurum': to grow fat and rebel against God's law [Deuteronomy] (Mulligan is fat, Stephen rebels against Yahweh's law, Haines perhaps rebels against nature's law?)

Therefore hast thou sinned against my light and hast made me, thy lord, to be the slave of servants. Return, return, Clan Milly: forget me not, O Milesian.

'my light': Stephen's art?

'thy lord': Stephen the natural aristocrat? cf 1904 essay: "...who, in revery at least, had been acquainted with nobility" [PoA04]

'slave of servants': definitely Stephen: "A server of a servant" [Telem]

'Clan Milly': the legendary Milesian invaders who supplied all the ruling families of Ireland, supposedly c1700BC but more plausibly identified with the Celtic invasions of 600-500BC [timeline] [Milly]

so Stephen sees himself as one of Ireland's native aristocrats, displaced by the British (and the Catholics)

Why hast thou done this abomination before me that thou didst spurn me for a merchant of jalaps and didst deny me to the Roman and to the Indian of dark speech with whom thy daughters did lie luxuriously?

'merchant of jalaps': Haines' father [Telem]

'jalaps': purgative tubers of Mexican plant [def] [pic] (same geog. region as jalapeños, but different plant)

'deny me': Stephen-as-Jesus

'Roman': Catholic church, or Pope (or the priest at the 40-foot for whom Mulligan crossed himself?)

'Indian of dark speech': Bloom? Zarathustra? longshot: Theosophist Mohini Chatterjee visited Yeats and AE in Dublin in 1886 (and was later involved in sexual scandals in London) [timeline] ...or the Tibetan 'master' Koot Hoomi?

Look forth now, my people, upon the land of behest, even from Horeb and from Nebo and from Pisgah and from the Horns of Hatten unto a land flowing with milk and money.

Stephen-as-Moses

But thou hast suckled me with a bitter milk: my moon and my sun thou hast quenched for ever. And thou hast left me alone for ever in the dark ways of my bitterness: and with a kiss of ashes hast thou kissed my mouth.

'my moon and my sun': vaguely suggests Swinburne's 'Genesis' [etext] and thus Mulligan's theory of why Stephen can't be a poet [WRocks]

'kiss of ashes': Stephen's mother's ghost's breath [Telem]

This tenebrosity of the interior, he proceeded to say, hath not been illumined by the wit of the septuagint nor so much as mentioned for the Orient from on high which brake hell's gates visited a darkness that was foraneous.

'tenebrosity': darkness (used by Browne [etext] and Burton: cite)

'the wit of the septuagint': c285BC Greek translation of Old Testament, including various non-canonical books [links]

'Orient from on high': a Greek Orthodox expression for Jesus (as a sun-god??) [Cath]

'brake hell's gates': "And as David spake thus unto Hell, the Lord of majesty appeared in the form of a man and lightened the eternal darkness and brake the bonds that could not be loosed: and the succour of his everlasting might visited us that sat in the deep darkness of our transgressions and in the shadow of death of our sins." apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus [etext]

'foraneous': either 'utterly remote' (Gifford) or 'relating to forums' [def] or simply alien/non-local/foreign

Stephen's personal hell, rather than being relieved by Jesus, seems to have been introduced by Jesus.

Assuefaction minorates atrocities (as Tully saith of his darling Stoics)

'Assuefaction minorates' = familiarity breeds content regarding (used by Browne: "Forget not how assuefaction unto any thing minorates the passion from it" etext)

'Tully': Marcus Tullius Cicero [links]

'as Tully saith': Gifford claims this refers to the Tusculan Disputations (not online in English) [extracts] but 'De Officiis' was probably better known c1600 [etext]

'Stoics': taught that one can (and should) rise above suffering

and Hamlet his father showeth the prince no blister of combustion.

ie, the Ghost (King Hamlet) holds his tongue regarding the horrors of the afterlife [etext] [summary/context]

'combustion': traced to Landor [cite]

The adiaphane in the noon of life is an Egypt's plague which in the nights of prenativity and postmortemity is their most proper ubi and quomodo.

'The adiaphane' = Aristotle's term for opaque nature (cf ch3 "Diaphane, adiaphane. If you can put your five fingers through it it is a gate, if not a door." Proteus)

'noon': Stephen and Bloom were at (or approaching) the newspaper office at noon [clocktime]

'noon of life': c40yo according to Jung (eg Bloom) but more like Stephen's 22yo, I'd say

'Egypt's plague': darkness sent in punishment for the Pharaoh's treatment of the Israelites [Exodus]

'nights of prenativity and postmortemity': if life is a day, then night precedes and follows it

'ubi and quomodo' = where and manner

ie, to be young and gloomy is unnatural

And as the ends and ultimates of all things accord in some mean and measure with their inceptions and originals, that same multiplicit concordance which leads forth growth from birth accomplishing by a retrogressive metamorphosis that minishing and ablation towards the final which is agreeable unto nature so is it with our subsolar being.

'retrogressive metamorphosis': ie, old age is infantile-- a major theme of FW's 'Mamalujo' vignette (II.4, detailed)

Gifford claims this is a paraphrase of Aristotle: [Physics] (I don't see it at all, there. Likelier: GenCorr)

The aged sisters draw us into life: we wail, batten, sport, clip, clasp, sunder, dwindle, die: over us dead they bend.

'aged sisters': cf ch3's 'midwives': [Proteus]

'batten' = grow fattened (eg Milton: cite) (opposed by 'dwindle')

'clip, clasp' = embrace (opposed by 'sunder')

'over us dead they bend': in ch1, Stephen imagined Mulligan bending over the milkwoman's corpse: [Telem]

First, saved from waters of old Nile, among bulrushes, a bed of fasciated wattles:

'Nile... bulrushes': Moses [Exodus]

'a bed of fasciated wattles': bundled reeds as ancient construction material. cf "she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch" [Exodus]

at last the cavity of a mountain, an occulted sepulchre amid the conclamation of the hillcat and the ossifrage.

Moses again: "he buried him in a valley in the land of Moab, over against Bethpeor: but no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day" [Deuteronomy] (passing mention in Browne: etext)

'conclamation' = crying-out together (esp at funeral: cite)

'ossifrage': a bird [def] (OED cites Browne, with 'Septuagint' too)

And as no man knows the ubicity of his tumulus nor to what processes we shall thereby be ushered nor whether to Tophet or to Edenville in the like way is all hidden when we would backward see from what region of remoteness the whatness of our whoness hath fetched his whenceness.

'ubicity' = where-ness
'tumulus' = mound (Latin) esp grave-mound
'Tophet': figuratively Hell, literally the site of human sacrifices outside Jerusalem pre-Josiah (c600BC)

'Edenville': figuratively Heaven, cf ch3 [Proteus]

'the whatness of our whoness': cf ch9 [Scylla]

ie, where we go after death is as unknown as where we were before birth

week 19 of pregnancy:

Thereto Punch Costello roared out mainly Étienne chanson but he loudly bid them lo, wisdom hath built herself a house, this vast majestic longstablished vault, the crystal palace of the Creator, all in applepie order, a penny for him who finds the pea.

'Étienne chanson' = "Stephen, a song!"

'but he...': presumably this 'he' is Stephen

"Wisdom hath builded her house, she hath hewn out her seven pillars" [Proverbs]

'crystal palace': architectural marvel of 1851 world's fair, subject of a poetic parody of 'House that Jack Built' [etext]

'finds the pea': the princess and the pea? (with Stephen as the hypersensitive princess?)

Behold the mansion reared by dedal Jack, See the malt stored in many a refluent sack, In the proud cirque of Jackjohn's bivouac.

'Behold...': brilliant c1890 parody [etext]

'The House that Jack Built' dates from 1755 (not c1650 as Milton et al) [history]

if Stephen is still complaining about life-as-hell, then 'Jack' must be Yahweh, and the 'pea' corresponds to the rat in the next verse of the nursery rhyme

the syntactic structure is echoed in an Oxen-note that Joyce drew from Defoe's Colonel Jack: "the Clerk, who the Man that stop'd this Boy had call'd to" [cite]

"Because they cannot ride an horse, which every clown can do, salute and court a gentlewoman, carve at table, cringe, and make conges, which every common swasher can do, hos populus ridet, etc., they are laughed to scorn and accounted silly fools by our gallants. Yea, many times, such is their misery, they deserve it. A mere scholar, a mere ass..." (Burton)

"Altho at this distance you had no early Account or Particular of his Death; yet your Affection may cease to wonder that you had not some secret Sense or Intimation thereof by Dreams, thoughtful Whisperings, Mercurisms, Airy Nuncio's, or sympathetical Insinuations, which many seem to have had at the Death of their dearest Friends: for since we find in that famous Story, that Spirits themselves were fain to tell their Fellows at a distance, that the great Antonio was dead; we have a sufficient Excuse for our Ignorance in such Particulars, and must rest content with the common Road, and Appian way of Knowledge by Information." (Browne)

'Neither in thought nor in style can Robert Burton rival the subtlety of Sir Thomas Browne, to whom he has been compared and with whom he certainly has this in common: that the same readers seem drawn to both.' [ch]

Robert Burton (1577-1640) [ch]

Burton's style: 'an Oxford resident and priest in the Anglican church [compiled] a storehouse of multifarious learning... a book of satirical though kindly humour; and... a panorama and criticism of human life... impression of multitudinousness... a widely tolerant spirit... profuse quotation... It was an age when appeal lay to tradition and authority, and the tendency was fostered by the formation of libraries... medical writers of all periods, and scientific works; the Bible, the fathers, theologians; Greek and Latin classics... historians and chroniclers; travels, descriptions of cities and countries... treatises on government and politics; the miscellanea of scholars and Latin belles lettres from the revival of learning... English poetry: Chaucer, Spenser, Marlowe, Shakespeare, Jonson, Daniel, Drayton; Haringtonšs Ariosto, Floriošs Montaigne, Rabelais and others.' [ch]

1621: The Anatomy of Melancholy: page-images, extract [ch] [links]

Sir Thomas Browne (1605-1708, Royalist) [ch] [style] [fansite] [Life]

Browne's style: 'intense idiosyncrasy of mental attitude... rhythmical elaboration, highly coloured language and conceit... the manufacture of Latin or Greek compounds with English terminations... a peculiar sort of catachresis; so that its plain and straightforward meaning, even if known, will not fully illuminate the passage... ostentatious desultoriness... the astonishing chiaroscuro, the mixture of shaded sunlight and half illuminated gloom which makes the charm of his style... the singular charity and equity of his temper and judgment' [ch]

1643: Religio Medici: [ch] CCEL, Chgo, Bartleby, Renas
1646: Pseudodoxia Epidemica: [ch] Chgo
1658: Hydriotaphia: Urn Burial: Chgo, Renas
1658: The Garden of Cyrus: [ch] Chgo
1690: A Letter to a Friend: [ch] Chgo, Renas
1716: Christian Morals: [ch] Chgo
Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend: PGut
Selected works and commentary: Chgo

week 20 of pregnancy:

A black crack of noise in the street here, alack, bawled, back.

Anglo-Saxon alliteration has evolved into internal-rhyming?

Joyce glossed the style-change here as "...a passage solemn, as of Milton, Taylor, Hooker, followed by a choppy Latin-gossipy bit, style of Burton-Browne..." but Browne especially was present all thru the 'solemn' section.

'noise in the street': cf Stephen's famous definition of God ('a shout') in ch2: [Nestor]

'bawled, back': Stephen instinctively perceives the thunder as a divine response to his recitation/song (ie, he intended 'Jack' as flawed Yahweh)

Loud on left Thor thundered: in anger awful the hammerhurler.

JAJ: "The double-thudding Anglo-Saxon motive recurs from time to time to give the sense of the hoofs of oxen."

'on left': probably Stephen's left (probably not significant!)

Came now the storm that hist his heart. And Master Lynch bade him have a care to flout and witwanton as the god self was angered for his hellprate and paganry.

'hist': hushed (Milton: cite) [line 55]

'have a care to' = be on his guard about [def]

'witwanton' = to engage in irreverent wit [cite]

'the god self' = the god himself

And he that had erst challenged to be so doughty waxed wan as they might all mark and shrank together and his pitch that was before so haught uplift was now of a sudden quite plucked down and his heart shook within the cage of his breast as he tasted the rumour of that storm.

'doughty' = brave [def]
'pitch': angle of attack? [defs]
'haught' = high (cf haughty)

'heart': perhaps the first beating of the fetus's heart, which Joyce would have taken as around week 16 [week 8]

'rumour': Shakespeare supposedly used this (King John?) to suggest the rumble following thunder [cite]

Then did some mock and some jeer and Punch Costello fell hard again to his yale which Master Lenehan vowed he would do after and he was indeed but a word and a blow on any the least colour.

'yale' = ale [OED]

'a word and a blow': the full saying is 'a word and a blow, and the blow first' implying a sudden attack with minimal warning (WS, Bunyan, Huxley) [examples]

'any the least colour' = any hint [Lamb]

ie, Lenehan would drink at the drop of a hat

But the braggart boaster cried that an old Nobodaddy was in his cups it was muchwhat indifferent and he would not lag behind his lead.

'braggart boaster': style of Bunyan?
'an' = as
'Nobodaddy': Blake's name for Yahweh [cites]
'in his cups' = drunk

Stephen sees the storm as God's drunken tantrum, and sees no reason to behave better himself

But this was only to dye his desperation as cowed he crouched in Horne's hall. He drank indeed at one draught to pluck up a heart of any grace for it thundered long rumblingly over all the heavens so that Master Madden, being godly certain whiles, knocked him on his ribs upon that crack of doom

'to dye': to mask
'to pluck up a heart of any grace': ie, to summon his courage

'being godly certain whiles': in Portrait, Clancy/Madden/Davin's Catholicism is described unkindly as "the attitude of a dullwitted loyal serf" [PoA5]

'knocked him on his ribs': crossed himself

and Master Bloom, at the braggart's side, spoke to him calming words to slumber his great fear, advertising how it was no other thing but a hubbub noise that he heard, the discharge of fluid from the thunderhead, look you, having taken place, and all of the order of a natural phenomenon.

'to slumber': ie semi-hypnotic, after the style of Bloom in Circe
'advertising': Bloom's art

cf Browne: "...this is the reason not only of this fulminating report of Guns, but may resolve the cause of those terrible cracks, and affrighting noises of Heaven; that is, the nitrous and sulphureous exhalations, set on fire in the Clouds; whereupon requiring a larger place, they force out their way, not only with the breaking of the cloud, but the laceration of the air about it." [etext]

'discharge of fluid': (probably corresponding to a phase of pregnancy?)

1649: Oliver Cromwell [info]

Huguenots flee to Ireland (with red dyes)

"A tilted urn poured from its mouth a flood of bloodhued poplin: lustrous blood. The huguenots brought that here." [Lestryg]

"Therefore Passion had not so much reason to laugh at Patience, because he had his good things first, as Patience will have to laugh at Passion, because he had his best things last; for first must give place to last, because last must have his time to come; but last gives place to nothing; for there is not another to succeed. He, therefore, that hath his portion first, must needs have a time to spend it; but he that hath his portion last, must have it lastingly; therefore it is said of Dives, Thou in thy life-time receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things; but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented."

John Bunyan (1628-1688) [ch] [style] [extract] [timeline] [complete works]

1656: Some Gospel Truths Opened: Zion
1657? A Vindication of Gospel Truths Opened Zion
1658: A Few [Some] Sighs from Hell Zion, Acacia
1659: The Doctrine of the Law and Grace Unfolded: Acacia, Zion
1662: I Will Pray With the Spirit: Acacia, Zion
1663: Christian Behaviour: Acacia, Zion
1665: The Holy City: Acacia, Zion
1665: The Resurrection of the Dead and Eternal Judgment: Acacia, Zion
1666: Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners: [ch] CCEL, Zion
1671: Justification by Christ: Zion
1672: Defence of Justification: Zion
1673: Water Baptism: Zion
1676: The Strait Gate: Acacia, Zion
1678: The Pilgrim's Progress: [ch] CCEL, Bartleby
1679: A Treatise of the Fear of God: Acacia, Zion
1680: The Life and Death of Mr. Badman: [ch] PGut
1681: Come and Welcome to Jesus Christ: Acacia, Zion
1682: The Holy War: [ch] PGut, CCEL
1682: The Barren Fig-Tree: Acacia, Zion
1684: Seasonable Counsel: Acacia, Zion
1685: A Discourse Upon the Pharisee and the Publican: Acacia, Zion, PGut
1688: The Jerusalem Sinner Saved: Acacia, PGut
1689: The Work of Jesus Christ as an Advocate: Acacia, Zion
1692: Christ a Complete Saviour: Acacia, Zion
1692: The Saints' Knowledge of Christ's Love: Acacia, Zion
1701: A Book for Boys and Girls: Acacia, Zion

week 21 of pregnancy:

But was young Boasthard's fear vanquished by Calmer's words? No, for he had in his bosom a spike named Bitterness which could not by words be done away. And was he then neither calm like the one nor godly like the other? He was neither as much as he would have liked to be either.

'Calmer... calm': Bloom
'godly': Madden

'he would have liked to be either': Stephen-the-proud has been humbled by this chink in his armor

But could he not have endeavoured to have found again as in his youth the bottle Holiness that then he lived withal? Indeed no for Grace was not there to find that bottle.

'as in his youth': c16yo, after the retreat [PoA4]
'the bottle Holiness': when his holiness began departing, Stephen experienced this as "spiritual dryness" [PoA4]

'Grace': a major theme of Bunyan [examples]

Heard he then in that clap the voice of the god Bringforth or, what Calmer said, a hubbub of Phenomenon? Heard? Why, he could not but hear unless he had plugged him up the tube Understanding (which he had not done). For through that tube he saw that he was in the land of Phenomenon where he must for a certain one day die as he was like the rest too a passing show.

'Bringforth': ie, the Creator
'Heard?': the narrator seems to ignore or misunderstand the real question (voice or hubbub)

'through that tube he saw': (probably something embryological)

'land of Phenomenon': (again not an answer to the question, because the world is phenomenal whether god exists or not)

And would he not accept to die like the rest and pass away? By no means would he though he must nor would he make more shows according as men do with wives which Phenomenon has commanded them to do by the book Law.

'By no means would he though he must': ie not accept death, though he must die

'make more shows': progeny (so Stephen is sterilizing the act of coition, symbolically the sin against the Oxen of the Sun)

'Phenomenon has commanded... by the book Law': whether god/Bible or nature/natural-law

Then wotted he nought of that other land which is called Believe-on-Me, that is the land of promise which behoves to the king Delightful and shall be for ever where there is no death and no birth neither wiving nor mothering at which all shall come as many as believe on it? Yes, Pious had told him of that land and Chaste had pointed him to the way

'wotted' = knew [def]
'that other land' = Heaven
'behoves to': behooves = is necessary and proper to [def]
'Delightful': a favorite adjective of Bunyan's for Heaven [examples]

'and shall be for ever': "Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen."

'Chaste had pointed him to the way': chastity (outside of marriage) was considered essential for good Christians

but the reason was that in the way he fell in with a certain whore of an eyepleasing exterior whose name, she said, is Bird-in-the-Hand and she beguiled him wrongways from the true path by her flatteries that she said to him as, Ho, you pretty man, turn aside hither and I will show you a brave place, and she lay at him so flatteringly that she had him in her grot which is named Two-in-the-Bush or, by some learned, Carnal Concupiscence.

'whore': often used by Bunyan [examples]

'Bird-in-the-Hand': implying Heaven as 'two in the bush' (the uncertain greater-reward)

'flatteries': used by Bunyan [examples]

'brave': excellent [def] Bunyan describes Heaven as a 'brave place' [example]

'lay at': lied to
'her grot' = her grotto (used by Milton: cite) = her cunt (also suggests Calypso's cave; also 'grotesque')

week 22 of pregnancy:

This was it what all that company that sat there at commons in Manse of Mothers the most lusted after and if they met with this whore Bird-in-the-Hand (which was within all foul plagues, monsters and a wicked devil) they would strain the last but they would make at her and know her.

ie, they most lusted after cheap sex with a devil-possessed whore, and would do almost anything to have her

For regarding Believe-on-Me they said it was nought else but notion and they could conceive no thought of it for, first, Two-in-the-Bush whither she ticed them was the very goodliest grot and in it were four pillows on which were four tickets with these words printed on them, Pickaback and Topsyturvy and Shameface and Cheek by Jowl

'ticed' = enticed

'pillows... tickets': a metaphor, or maybe a real memory of nighttown?

'Pickaback and Topsyturvy and Shameface and Cheek by Jowl': four basic sexual positions?

'Pickaback' = piggyback (doggy style, cf Mrs Mastiansky Penelope)
'Topsyturvy': (69, or woman on top?)
'Shameface': (oral-anal? cf Bloom with Molly: Ithaca)
'Cheek by Jowl': (missionary position)

and, second, for that foul plague Allpox and the monsters they cared not for them for Preservative had given them a stout shield of oxengut and, third, that they might take no hurt neither from Offspring that was that wicked devil by virtue of this same shield which was named Killchild.

the condom motif: [more]

'Offspring that was that wicked devil': (a strange image for parent-child competition!?)

So were they all in their blind fancy, Mr Cavil and Mr Sometimes Godly, Mr Ape Swillale, Mr False Franklin, Mr Dainty Dixon, Young Boasthard and Mr Cautious Calmer.

'all in their blind fancy': since Bloom is included, this probably refers to belief in condoms

'Mr Cavil' = Crotthers or Lynch?
'Mr Sometimes Godly' = Madden
'Mr Ape Swillale' = Punch Costello?
'Mr False Franklin' = Lenehan?
'Mr Dainty Dixon' = Dixon
'Young Boasthard' = Stephen
'Mr Cautious Calmer' = Bloom

Wherein, O wretched company, were ye all deceived for that was the voice of the god that was in a very grievous rage that he would presently lift his arm up and spill their souls for their abuses and their spillings done by them contrariwise to his word which forth to bring brenningly biddeth.

'that was the voice of the god': the thunder (unconvincing rhetoric-- bare assertion)

'their spillings': ie, depositing their seed in condoms rather than in their wives' grottos

'brenningly' = ardently (used by Chaucer)

1688: Irish support James II

"We fought for the royal Stuarts that reneged us against the Williamites and they betrayed us. Remember Limerick and the broken treatystone. We gave our best blood to France and Spain, the wild geese. Fontenoy, eh? And Sarsfield and O'Donnell, duke of Tetuan in Spain, and Ulysses Browne of Camus that was fieldmarshal to Maria Teresa. But what did we ever get for it?" [Cyclops]

1689: James II debases Irish currency [info]

"On the sideboard the tray of Stuart coins, base treasure of a bog: and ever shall be." [Nestor]

1690: William III defeats James II at Battle of the Boyne [info]

first 'Wild Geese' (supporters of James II) go into exile, incl Patrick Sarsfield

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