Author Archives: Swany

The herb Pantagruelion has a small, hard, roundish root…

The herb Pantagruelion has a small, hard, roundish root, ending in a blunt white point, with few filaments, and does not sink into the earth more than a cubit.

Original French: L’herbe Pantagruelion a racine petite, durette, rõdelette, finante en poinƈte obtuſe, blãche, a peu de fillamens, & ne profonde en terre plus d’une coubtée.

Modern French: L’herbe Pantagruelion a racine petite, durette, rondelette, finante en poincte obtuse, blanche, a peu de fillamens, & ne profonde en terre plus d’une coubtée.

Notes

profonder

To sound, search, pierce, or goe deep into; to dive, or sink unto the bottom of; to press downe, or put into the deepe.

Cotgrave, Randle (–1634?), A Dictionarie of the French and English Tongue. London: Adam Islip, 1611. PBM

coubtée

Coubte. The elbow

Cotgrave, Randle (–1634?), A Dictionarie of the French and English Tongue. London: Adam Islip, 1611. PBM

strike deep

Read ne profonde, from profonder, the verb (profundare, Du Cange), a far better reading than ne est profonde (M.)

Rabelais, François (ca. 1483–1553), The Five Books and Minor Writings. Volume 1: Books I-III. William Francis Smith (1842–1919), translator. London: Alexader P. Watt, 1893. Internet Archive

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Among other things I saw that he had loaded great abundance of his herb

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Among other things I saw that he had loaded great abundance of his herb

Original French: Entre aultres choſes ie veids qu’il feiſt charger grande foiſon de ſon herbe

Modern French: Entre aultres choses je veids qu’il feist charger grande foison de son herbe

Je veids — The elegy of Pantagruelion at the end of The Third Book is no longer from the viewpoint of Panurge, but from that of the narrator himself. A similar change occurred at the at the end of Pantagruel when Alcofrybas reentered the history during the episode in the giant’s mouth.

Notes

François Rabelais

François Rabelais
Anonymous, 17th century
Musée national du château et des Trianons, Palace of Versailles

Collections du Château de Versailles. Collections du Château de Versailles

Laid aboard

Detail of woodcut by Holbein. Death touchers a man loading a ship.

Holbein, Hans (c 1497-1543), Les simulachres & historiees faces de la mort, autant elegamme[n]t pourtraictes, que artificiellement imaginées (Dance of Death). Lyon: Soubz l’escu de Coloigne, 1538. p. 52. Internet Archive

The Tempest, Act 4, Scene 1

Line 123:
Earth’s increase, foison plenty,
Barns and garners never empty,
Vines with clust’ring bunches growing,
Plants with goodly burden bowing;
Spring come to you at the farthest
In the very end of harvest.

Line 175:
All things in common nature should produce
Without sweat or endeavor; treason, felony,
Sword, pike, knife, gun, or need of any engine
Would I not have; but nature should bring forth
Of its own kind all foison, all abundance,
To feed my innocent people.

Earth’s increase, foison plenty,
Barns and garners never empty,

Shakespeare, William (1564-1616), The Tempest. London: [First Folio], 1623. Folger Shakespeare Library

Foison

Foison: Store, plentie, abundance, great fullness, enough.

Cotgrave, Randle (–1634?), A Dictionarie of the French and English Tongue. London: Adam Islip, 1611. PBM

je veids

Le narrateur signale sa présence, au moment de louer cette plante qui réunit les vertus du chanvre et du lin. Pline n’est pas le seul à la vanter. Cœlius Rhodiginus, Antiquae Lectiones, V, 12, célèbre le lin «diuinæ rei maxime idoneum»; voir aussi Polydore Vergile, De rerum inuentoribus, III, 6.

Rabelais, François (1483?–1553), Le Tiers Livre. Edition critique. Jean Céard, editor. Librarie Général Français, 1995. p. 444.

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