CJTranslations - Richard II

QUOTES BY TOPIC

’Twill make me think the world is full of rubs, And that my fortune rubs against the bias.

PLAY: Richard II ACT/SCENE: 3.4 SPEAKER: Queen CONTEXT: QUEEN
What sport shall we devise here in this garden,
To drive away the heavy thought of care?
LADY
Madam, we’ll play at bowls.
QUEEN
’Twill make me think the world is full of rubs,
And that my fortune rubs against the bias. DUTCH: k Herdenk dan al den aanstoot -in de wereld,
En mijn geluk, dat zijwaarts rolt en stuit.139 MORE:
Proverb: To run against the bias

Rub=Cause of difficulty, hindrance, obstacle (Originally from the game of bowls, meaning any impediment that would deflect the bowl from its course.)
Bias=That which draws to a particular direction, preponderant tendency (and following the bowls theme, the lead weight in the bowl that turns it in a certain way)

Compleat:
Rub (obstacle, hindrance)=Beletsel, hinderpaal
Rub (word used by way of interjection at bowls)=Zoetjes aan, met gemak
Bias=Hellen van een kloot
Bias=Overhelling, overzwaaijing, neiging
To run bias=Schuin loopen Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use

A heavy sentence, my most sovereign liege, And all unlook’d for from your highness’ mouth:

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Thomas Mowbray
CONTEXT:
KING RICHARD II
Norfolk, for thee remains a heavier doom,
Which I with some unwillingness pronounce:
The sly slow hours shall not determinate
The dateless limit of thy dear exile;
The hopeless word of ‘never to return’
Breathe I against thee, upon pain of life.
THOMAS MOWBRAY
A heavy sentence, my most sovereign liege,
And all unlook’d for from your highness’ mouth:
A dearer merit, not so deep a maim
As to be cast forth in the common air,
Have I deserved at your highness’ hands.

DUTCH:
Een drukkend vonnis, hooge vorst en heer,
En nooit verwacht van uwer hoogheid mond;

MORE:
CITED IN LAW: 2008] Bancoult, R (On The Application of) v Secretary of State For Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs [2008] UKHL 61 (22 October 2008)/3 WLR 955, [2009] 1 AC 453, [2009] AC 453, [2008] UKHL 61, [2008] 4 All ER 1055
Quoetd by Lord Mance in his dissenting opinion in the British Indian Ocean Territory case, concluding: “the Chagossians were entitled to say, like the Duke of Norfolk…‘A heavy sentence, my most sovereign liege, And all unlook’d for from your Highness’ mouth.’ To which in my opinion the Crown cannot here simply reply: ‘It boots thee not to be compassionate; After our sentence plaining comes too late’.”

Doom=Judgment. (Doom (or ‘dome’) was a statute or law (doombooks were codes of laws); related to the English suffix -dom, originally meaning jurisdiction. Shakespeare is credited for first using doom to mean death and destruction in Sonnet 14.)
Regreet=Return to
Dateless=Indefinite
Dear=Painful
Dearer merit=Greater reward, recompense
Maim=Wound
Determinate=Put an end to

Compleat:
Doom=Vonnis, oordeel, verwyzing
A heavy doom=een zwaar vonnis
Dooms-man=een Rechter, Scheidsman
Dear-bought experience=Een duurgekogte ondervinding
Maim=Wond, verlamming

Topics: cited in law, language, punishment

A thousand flatterers sit within thy crown, Whose compass is no bigger than thy head

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: John of Gaunt
CONTEXT:
Now He that made me knows I see thee ill;
Ill in myself to see, and in thee seeing ill.
Thy death-bed is no lesser than thy land
Wherein thou liest in reputation sick;
And thou, too careless patient as thou art,
Commit’st thy anointed body to the cure
Of those physicians that first wounded thee:
A thousand flatterers sit within thy crown,
Whose compass is no bigger than thy head;
And yet, incaged in so small a verge,
The waste is no whit lesser than thy land.
O, had thy grandsire with a prophet’s eye
Seen how his son’s son should destroy his sons,
From forth thy reach he would have laid thy shame,
Deposing thee before thou wert possess’d,
Which art possess’d now to depose thyself.

DUTCH:
Een duizend vleiers zitten in uw kroon,
Haar omtrek is niet grooter dan uw hoofd,
En toch, gesperd in zulk een enge ruimte,
Verbrassen zij niet minder dan uw land.

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Proverb: Better in health than in good conditions

Punning on ‘Ill’=Sick (a); wrongly, blamefully (b)
Lesser=Less
Physicians=The flatterers, who harm with their flattery rather than heal
Grandsire=Edward III
Deposing=Removing from the throne
Possessed=In possession of; posssessed by (an evil spirit)
Whit=Point, jot (used negatively)(not in the least, not at all)

Topics: proverbs and idioms, wellbeing, flattery

A while to work, and after holiday.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Henry Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
Come, lords, away.
To fight with Glendower and his complices;
A while to work, and after holiday.

DUTCH:
Dank, waardige oom. — Komt, Heeren, op! met lust
Nog Glendower bestreden en zijn aanhang;
Een korte wijl aan ‘t werk, — en dan volgt rust.

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Topics: work, duty

All places that the eye of heaven visits Are to a wise man ports and happy havens.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: John of Gaunt
CONTEXT:
All places that the eye of heaven visits
Are to a wise man ports and happy havens.
Teach thy necessity to reason thus;
There is no virtue like necessity.
Think not the king did banish thee,
But thou the king. Woe doth the heavier sit,
Where it perceives it is but faintly borne.

DUTCH:
Elk oord, welk ook, waar ‘s hemels oog op neêrblikt,
Is voor den wijze een haven van geluk.

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Proverb: A wise man may live anywhere
Proverb: Make a virtue of necessity
Proverb: Injuries slighted become none at all
Proverb: A wise (valiant) man make every country his own

Topics: virtue, neccessity, wisdom, proverbs and idioms, still in use, sorrow

And dull unfeeling barren ignorance Is made my gaoler to attend on me

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Thomas Mowbray
CONTEXT:
The language I have learn’d these forty years,
My native English, now I must forego:
And now my tongue’s use is to me no more
Than an unstringed viol or a harp,
Or like a cunning instrument cased up,
Or, being open, put into his hands
That knows no touch to tune the harmony:
Within my mouth you have engaol’d my tongue,
Doubly portcullis’d with my teeth and lips;
And dull unfeeling barren ignorance
Is made my gaoler to attend on me.
I am too old to fawn upon a nurse,
Too far in years to be a pupil now:
What is thy sentence then but speechless death,
Which robs my tongue from breathing native breath?

DUTCH:
En maakt tot stokbewaarder, ter bewaking,
Onwetendheid, die dof is, stomp, gevoelloos.
Ik ben reeds te oud tot staam’len met een voedster,
Te veel op jaren om ter school te gaan;

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A semi-literal allusion to a proverb of the time, ‘Good that the teeth guard the tongue’ (1578) and the virtue of silence. Ben Jonson recommended a ‘wise tongue’ that should not be ‘licentious and wandering’. (See also the Lucio in Measure for Measure: “’tis a secret must be locked within the
teeth and the lips”.)

Cunning=Skilful
Sentence=Verdict (punning on language)
Breathing native breath=Speaking native English (and breathing English air)

Compleat:
Cunning=Behendig

Topics: language, understanding, identity, proverbs and idioms

And that’s the wavering commons: for their love Lies in their purses, and whoso empties them By so much fills their hearts with deadly hate.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
GREEN
Besides, our nearness to the king in love
Is near the hate of those love not the king.
BAGOT
And that’s the wavering commons: for their love
Lies in their purses, and whoso empties them
By so much fills their hearts with deadly hate.
BUSHY
Wherein the king stands generally condemn’d.
BAGOT
If judgement lie in them, then so do we,
Because we ever have been near the king.

DUTCH:
De wank’lende gemeenten! hare liefde
Ligt in haar buidels, en wie deze leêgt,
Vult wis haar hart met doodelijken haat.

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Wavering=Fickle
Commons=The common people, commoners

Compleat:
Wavering=Waggeling; wapperende, twyffelachtig, ongestadig
The common (vulgar) people=Het gemeene Volk

Topics: love, money, respect, judgment

And yet your fair discourse hath been as sugar, Making the hard way sweet and delectable.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER: Northumberland
CONTEXT:
Believe me, noble lord,
I am a stranger here in Gloucestershire:
These high wild hills and rough uneven ways
Draws out our miles, and makes them wearisome,
And yet your fair discourse hath been as sugar,
Making the hard way sweet and delectable.
But I bethink me what a weary way
From Ravenspurgh to Cotswold will be found
In Ross and Willoughby, wanting your company,
Which, I protest, hath very much beguiled
The tediousness and process of my travel:
But theirs is sweetened with the hope to have
The present benefit which I possess;
And hope to joy is little less in joy
Than hope enjoy’d: by this the weary lords
Shall make their way seem short, as mine hath done
By sight of what I have, your noble company.

DUTCH:
Dit land vol wilde heuvels, ruwe wegen,
Rekt tot vermoeinis toe ons elke mijl;
Maar uw schoon onderhoud was suiker; ‘t maakte
Den zuren weg ons zoet en recht verkwikk’lijk.

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Proverb: Good company makes short miles

Discourse=Conversation
Beguiled=To deceive pleasingly, to drive away by an agreeable delusion, charm
Process=Course, the act of going on and passing by (of time)
Hope to=Anticipation of

Compleat:
Discourse=Gesprek
Beguile=Bedriegen, om den tuin leiden

Topics: proverbs and idioms, friendship

As doth the blushing discontented sun
From out the fiery portal of the east.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
Let’s march without the noise of threatening drum,
That from this castle’s tottered battlements
Our fair appointments may be well perused.
Methinks King Richard and myself should meet
With no less terror than the elements
Of fire and water, when their thundering shock
At meeting tears the cloudy cheeks of heaven.
Be he the fire, I’ll be the yielding water:
The rage be his, whilst on the earth I rain
My waters; on the earth, and not on him.
March on, and mark King Richard how he looks.
See, see, King Richard doth himself appear,
As doth the blushing discontented sun
From out the fiery portal of the east,
When he perceives the envious clouds are bent
To dim his glory and to stain the track
Of his bright passage to the occident.

DUTCH:
Ziet, ziet daar, koning Richard zelf verschijnt,
Zooals de blakende en verstoorde zon
Vooruit treedt uit de vuur’ge poort van ‘toosten

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Proverb: A red morning foretells a stormy day

Tottered=Jagged, irregular, ragged
Occident=West
Fair appointments=Fine equipment, furniture, appearance
Be he=Allow him to be
Yielding=Submissive, giving way, not opposing
Discontented=Dissatisfied

Compleat:
Tattered=Gescheurd, haveloos
Occident=Het westen
Yielding=Overgeeving, toegeeving, toegeeflyk, meegeeflyk
Discontented=Misnoegd, knyzig, ‘t onvreede

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, nature

Be swift like lightning in the execution

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: John of Gaunt
CONTEXT:
God in thy good cause make thee prosperous!
Be swift like lightning in the execution;
And let thy blows, doubly redoubled,
Fall like amazing thunder on the casque
Of thy adverse pernicious enemy:
Rouse up thy youthful blood, be valiant and live.

DUTCH:
God geve u voorspoed bij uw goede zaak!
Wees plotsling, als de bliksem, met uw wapen

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Proverb: As swift as lightning

Casque=Head-piece, helmet
Redoubled=Repeated often
Adverse=On the opposing side (in combat)
Pernicious=Mischievous, malicious, wicked

Compleat:
Redouble=Verdubbelen, herdubbelen
Pernicious=Schadelyk, verderflyk

Topics: haste, proverbs and idioms, still in use

But since correction lieth in those hands Which made the fault that we cannot correct

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: John of Gaunt
CONTEXT:
Alas, the part I had in Woodstock’s blood
Doth more solicit me than your exclaims,
To stir against the butchers of his life!
But since correction lieth in those hands
Which made the fault that we cannot correct,
Put we our quarrel to the will of heaven;
Who, when they see the hours ripe on earth,
Will rain hot vengeance on offenders’ heads.

DUTCH:
Doch wijl de straf in de eigen handen rust,
Die pleegden, wat wij zelf niet kunnen straffen,
Bevelen we onze zaak den hemel aan.

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Proverb: Vengeance belongs only to God

To solicit=Entreat, petition
Stir=Act
Put we our quarrel to=Put our dispute before, submit our dispute to
See the hours ripe=The time has come
Rain hot vengeance=Divine punishent (Genesis 19:24-5)
Correction=Punishment

Compleat:
Correction=Verbetering, tuchtiging, berisping
Ripe=Ryp
When things are ripe for action=Als het tyd is om aan ‘t werk te gaan
A design ripe for execution=Een ontwerp dat ryp is om ter uitvoer te brengen
Vengeance=Wraak

Topics: dispute, offence, resolution, justice, punishment, proverbs and idioms, time

Cover your heads and mock not flesh and blood With solemn reverence: throw away respect, Tradition, form and ceremonious duty,

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
For God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground
And tell sad stories of the death of kings;
How some have been deposed; some slain in war,
Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed;
Some poison’d by their wives: some sleeping kill’d;
All murder’d: for within the hollow crown
That rounds the mortal temples of a king
Keeps Death his court and there the antic sits,
Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp,
Allowing him a breath, a little scene,
To monarchize, be fear’d and kill with looks,
Infusing him with self and vain conceit,
As if this flesh which walls about our life,
Were brass impregnable, and humour’d thus
Comes at the last and with a little pin
Bores through his castle wall, and farewell king!
Cover your heads and mock not flesh and blood
With solemn reverence: throw away respect,
Tradition, form and ceremonious duty,
For you have but mistook me all this while:
I live with bread like you, feel want,
Taste grief, need friends: subjected thus,
How can you say to me, I am a king?

DUTCH:
Bedekt uw hoofd, drijft niet door huldebrenging
Den spot met vleesch en bloed; verzaakt den eerbied,
Gebruik en vorm en statig plichtbetoon

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Antic=Buffoon, practising odd gesticulations (a fool in old farces, whose main purpose was to disrupt the more serious actors)
Tradition=Traditional practices, established or customary homage (‘state’ and ‘pomp’)
Humoured=Indulged
Mock=Treat with exaggerated respect (hence solemn reverence)
Subjected=(a) turned into a subject under the dominion of the king; (b) subjugated, exposed
Monarchize=Play at being King (OED cites this from Nashe (1592) suggesting a mockery that is not so evident in this use of the term)

Compleat:
To humour=Involgen, believen, opvolgen, naar den mond spreeken
Tradition=Overleevering van leerstukken of gevoelens
Mock=Bespotting, beschimping
Subject=Onderworpen; onderdaan

Topics: equality, status, order/society, respect, custom

Cry woe, destruction, ruin and decay:

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
KING RICHARD II
Mine ear is open and my heart prepared;
The worst is worldly loss thou canst unfold.
Say, is my kingdom lost? why, ’twas my care
And what loss is it to be rid of care?
Strives Bolingbroke to be as great as we?
Greater he shall not be; if he serve God,
We’ll serve Him too and be his fellow so:
Revolt our subjects? that we cannot mend;
They break their faith to God as well as us:
Cry woe, destruction, ruin and decay:
The worst is death, and death will have his day.
SIR STEPHEN SCROOP
Glad am I that your highness is so arm’d
To bear the tidings of calamity.
Like an unseasonable stormy day,
Which makes the silver rivers drown their shores,
As if the world were all dissolved to tears,
So high above his limits swells the rage
Of Bolingbroke, covering your fearful land
With hard bright steel and hearts harder than steel.
White-beards have arm’d their thin and hairless scalps
Against thy majesty; boys, with women’s voices,
Strive to speak big and clap their female joints
In stiff unwieldy arms against thy crown:
The very beadsmen learn to bend their bows
Of double-fatal yew against thy state;
Yea, distaff-women manage rusty bills
Against thy seat: both young and old rebel,
And all goes worse than I have power to tell.

DUTCH:
Roep wee, verlies, vernieling, val en nood;
De dood is ‘t ergst, en komen moet de dood.

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Proverb: All men must die (The worst is death, and death will have his day.)

Care=Worry, responsibillity
His fellow=Equal
Mend=Remedy
Bear the tidings of calamity=Cope with calamitous news
Women’s voices=High, shrill voices
Double-fatal=Dangerous or deadly in two ways (on account of the poisonous quality of the leaves, and of the wood being used for instruments of death)
Billls=Weapons
Distaff=The staff from which the flax is drawn in spinning

Compleat:
Care=Zorg, bezorgdheid, zorgdraagendheid, zorgvuldigheid, vlytigheid
He has not his fellow=Hy heeft zyns gelyk niet, hy heeft zyn weerga niet
Bill=Hellebaard, byl
Distaff=Een spinrok, spinrokken

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, death, life

Cut off the heads of too fast growing sprays,
That look too lofty in our commonwealth:

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Gardener
CONTEXT:
GARDENER
Go, bind thou up yon dangling apricocks,
Which, like unruly children, make their sire
Stoop with oppression of their prodigal weight:
Give some supportance to the bending twigs.
Go thou, and like an executioner,
Cut off the heads of too fast growing sprays,
That look too lofty in our commonwealth:
All must be even in our government.
You thus employ’d, I will go root away
The noisome weeds, which without profit suck
The soil’s fertility from wholesome flowers.
SERVANT
Why should we in the compass of a pale
Keep law and form and due proportion,
Showing, as in a model, our firm estate,
When our sea-walled garden, the whole land,
Is full of weeds, her fairest flowers choked up,
Her fruit-trees all upturned, her hedges ruin’d,
Her knots disorder’d and her wholesome herbs
Swarming with caterpillars?

DUTCH:
En gij, sla als een dienaar des gerichts
Den kop af aan die al te weel’ge spruiten,
Die zich te hoog in onzen staat verheffen

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Apricock=Abricot
Spray=Small branches, shoots
Noisome=Harmful
Compass of a pale=Within a fenced area, enclosure
Firm=Well-ordered, stable
Knots=Intricate flowerbeds and plots

Compleat:
Apricock, abricock=Apricot
Noisom=Besmettelyk, schaadelyk, vuns, leelyk, vuil
Pale=Een paal, bestek
Pale fence=Een afschutsel met paalen
Compass=Omtrek, omkreits, begrip, bestek, bereik
Firm=Vast, hecht
Knot (difficulty)=Eene zwaarigheid
A garden with knots=Een bloemperk met figuuren

Topics: merit, envy, order/society

Discomfort guides my tongue
And bids me speak of nothing but despair.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Earl of Salisbury
CONTEXT:
Nor near nor farther off, my gracious lord,
Than this weak arm: discomfort guides my tongue
And bids me speak of nothing but despair.
One day too late, I fear me, noble lord,
Hath clouded all thy happy days on earth:
O, call back yesterday, bid time return,
And thou shalt have twelve thousand fighting men!
To-day, to-day, unhappy day, too late,
O’erthrows thy joys, friends, fortune and thy state:
For all the Welshmen, hearing thou wert dead.
Are gone to Bolingbroke, dispersed and fled.

DUTCH:
Ontroostbaarheid
Bestuurt mijn tong en slechts van wanhoop spreekt zij.

MORE:

Proverb: It is too late to call again yesterday

Discomfort=Want of hope, discouragement
State=Rank, position

Compleat:
Discomfort=Mistroostigheid, mismoedigheid

Topics: proverbs and idioms, time, regret

Each substance of a grief hath twenty shadows Which shows like grief itself but is not so.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Bushy
CONTEXT:
Each substance of a grief hath twenty shadows
Which shows like grief itself but is not so;
For sorrow’s eyes, glazed with blinding tears,
Divides one thing entire to many objects,
Like perspectives, which rightly gazed upon
Show nothing but confusion, eyed awry
Distinguish form. So your sweet majesty,
Looking awry upon your lord’s departure,
Find shapes of grief, more than himself, to wail;
Which, look’d on as it is, is nought but shadows
Of what it is not. Then, thrice-gracious queen,
More than your lord’s departure weep not: more’s not seen;
Or if it be, ’tis with false sorrow’s eye,
Which for things true weeps things imaginary.

DUTCH:
Het wezen van elk leed heeft twintig schimmen,
Die wel als leed er uitzien, maar ‘t niet zijn.

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Perspectives=(a) Multifaceted crystal balls, often mounted; (b) A type of painting which, when viewed obliquely, reveals another (more complex or deeper) meaning

Schmidt:
Shadow=Any thing unsubstantial or unreal, a reflected image, having the appearance of reality
Rightly=From directly in front (hence perspective painting)
Eyes awry distinguish form=Viewed from an angle to reveal the meaning

Compleat:
Perspective=Een verschiet, doorzigt
A piece of perspective=Een afbeelding in ‘t verschiet
A perspective glass=Een verrekyker
Awry=Scheef, krom, verdraaid

Topics: grief, sorrow, imagination, perception

For do we must what force will have us do.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
So far be mine, my most redoubted lord,
As my true service shall deserve your love.
KING RICHARD II
Well you deserve: they well deserve to have,
That know the strong’st and surest way to get.
Uncle, give me your hands: nay, dry your eyes;
Tears show their love, but want their remedies.
Cousin, I am too young to be your father,
Though you are old enough to be my heir.
What you will have, I’ll give, and willing too;
For do we must what force will have us do.
Set on towards London, cousin, is it so?

DUTCH:
Wij moeten doen, wat overmacht gebiedt. —
Naar Londen; — neef, niet waar, daar gaan wij heen

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Proverb: They that are bound must obey

Redoubted=Feared, respected (often used to address a monarch)
Want=Fail to provide (a remedy)

Compleat:
Redoubted=Geducht, ontzaglyk
Want=Gebrek

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, status, remedy, merit

For now the devil that told me I did well
Says that this deed is chronicled in hell.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.5
SPEAKER: Exton
CONTEXT:
KING RICHARD II
How now! what means death in this rude assault?
Villain, thy own hand yields thy death’s instrument.
Go thou, and fill another room in hell.
That hand shall burn in never-quenching fire
That staggers thus my person. Exton, thy fierce hand
Hath with the king’s blood stain’d the king’s own land.
Mount, mount, my soul! thy seat is up on high;
Whilst my gross flesh sinks downward, here to die.
EXTON
As full of valour as of royal blood:
Both have I spill’d; O would the deed were good!
For now the devil, that told me I did well,
Says that this deed is chronicled in hell.
This dead king to the living king I’ll bear
Take hence the rest, and give them burial here.

DUTCH:
Aan moed zoo rijk, als koninklijk van bloed!
‘k Vergoot die beide; — waar’ mijn daad slechts goed!
Nu zegt de duivel, die mij heeft gedreven,
Dat in de hel die daad is aangeschreven.

MORE:

Rude=Brutal
Stagger=To cause to reel, to fell
Chronicle=To record, to register

Compleat:
Rude=Ruuw
To stagger (move or shake)=Schudden, beweegen, doen waggelen
To chronicle=In eenen kronyk aanschryven

Topics: loyalty, conspiracy, death

For though mine enemy thou hast ever been,
High sparks of honour in thee have I seen.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.6
SPEAKER: Henry Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
HENRY PERCY
The grand conspirator, Abbot of Westminster,
With clog of conscience and sour melancholy
Hath yielded up his body to the grave;
But here is Carlisle living, to abide
Thy kingly doom and sentence of his pride.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
Carlisle, this is your doom:
Choose out some secret place, some reverend room,
More than thou hast, and with it joy thy life;
So as thou livest in peace, die free from strife:
For though mine enemy thou hast ever been,
High sparks of honour in thee have I seen.

DUTCH:
Mijn vijand waart gij steeds, doch ik waardeer
In u een man van plicht en moed en eer.

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Clog=Any thing hung upon an animal to hinder motion; encumbrance
Doom=Judgment. (Doom (or ‘dome’) was a statute or law (doombooks were codes of laws); related to the English suffix -dom, originally meaning jurisdiction. Shakespeare is credited for first using doom to mean death and destruction in Sonnet 14.)

Compleat:
Clog=Een blok; belemmering
Doom=Vonnis, oordeel, verwyzing
A heavy doom=een zwaar vonnis

Topics: conscience, judgment

Forget, forgive; conclude and be agreed:

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
Wrath-kindled gentlemen, be ruled by me.
Let’s purge this choler without letting blood.
This we prescribe, though no physician.
Deep malice makes too deep incision.
Forget, forgive; conclude and be agreed.
Our doctors say this is no month to bleed.—
Good uncle, let this end where it begun;
We’ll calm the Duke of Norfolk, you your son.

DUTCH:
Gramstorige edellieden, volgt mijn raad.
Verdrijft de galzucht zonder aderlating.
Ofschoon geen arts, schrijf ik u dit toch voor: —
Een diepe wrok snijdt al te diep, snijdt door, —
Vergeeft, vergeet, houdt op elkaar te haten;
Het is, zegt de arts, geen maand van aderlaten

MORE:

Proverb: Forgive and forget

Wrath-kindled=Furious
Be ruled=To prevail on, to persuade (used only passively)
Choler=Anger, bile
Purge=To cure, to restore to health
Month to bleed=Physicians would consult the almanac to determine best time for bloodletting

Compleat:
Wrath=Toorn, gramschap
Wrathfull=Toornig, vertoornd, vergramd, grimmig
Cholerick=Oploopend, haastig, toornig. To be in choler=Toornig zyn
Purge=Zuiveren, reinigen, den buik zuiveren, purgeeren
To purge (clear) one’s self of a crime=Zich van eene misdaad zuiveren
To bleed one=Iemand bloed aftappen, laaten; bloedlaating, bloeding

Burgersdijk notes:
Het is, zegt de arts, geen maand van aderlaten. Vroeger lieten ook gezonden zich op geregelde
tijden sferlaten om te zekerder gezond te blijven. In de almanakken van dien tijd, — er is zulk een Engelsche almanak bekend van 1386, — werd aangegeven, welke maanden er het best voor
waren.

Topics: resolution, remedy, anger, proverbs and idioms

Glad am I that your highness is so arm’d To bear the tidings of calamity.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Sir Stephen Scroop
CONTEXT:
KING RICHARD II
Mine ear is open and my heart prepared;
The worst is worldly loss thou canst unfold.
Say, is my kingdom lost? why, ’twas my care
And what loss is it to be rid of care?
Strives Bolingbroke to be as great as we?
Greater he shall not be; if he serve God,
We’ll serve Him too and be his fellow so:
Revolt our subjects? that we cannot mend;
They break their faith to God as well as us:
Cry woe, destruction, ruin and decay:
The worst is death, and death will have his day.
SIR STEPHEN SCROOP
Glad am I that your highness is so arm’d
To bear the tidings of calamity.
Like an unseasonable stormy day,
Which makes the silver rivers drown their shores,
As if the world were all dissolved to tears,
So high above his limits swells the rage
Of Bolingbroke, covering your fearful land
With hard bright steel and hearts harder than steel.
White-beards have arm’d their thin and hairless scalps
Against thy majesty; boys, with women’s voices,
Strive to speak big and clap their female joints
In stiff unwieldy arms against thy crown:
The very beadsmen learn to bend their bows
Of double-fatal yew against thy state;
Yea, distaff-women manage rusty bills
Against thy seat: both young and old rebel,
And all goes worse than I have power to tell.

DUTCH:
t Verheugt mij, dat mijn vorst gewapend is,
Om tijdingen van onheil te vernemen.

MORE:

Care=Worry, responsibillity
His fellow=Equal
Mend=Remedy
Bear the tidings of calamity=Cope with calamitous news
Women’s voices=High, shrill voices
Double-fatal=Dangerous or deadly in two ways (on account of the poisonous quality of the leaves, and of the wood being used for instruments of death)
Billls=Weapons
Distaff=The staff from which the flax is drawn in spinning

Topics: preparation, strength, fate/destiny, failure, conflict

God save the king! Will no man say amen? Am I both priest and clerk? well then, amen.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
Lords, you that here are under our arrest,
Procure your sureties for your days of answer.
Little are we beholding to your love,
And little look’d for at your helping hands.
KING RICHARD II
Alack, why am I sent for to a king,
Before I have shook off the regal thoughts
Wherewith I reign’d? I hardly yet have learn’d
To insinuate, flatter, bow, and bend my limbs:
Give sorrow leave awhile to tutor me
To this submission. Yet I well remember
The favours of these men: were they not mine?
Did they not sometime cry, ‘all hail!’ to me?
So Judas did to Christ: but he, in twelve,
Found truth in all but one: I, in twelve thousand, none.
God save the king! Will no man say amen?
Am I both priest and clerk? well then, amen.
God save the king! although I be not he;
And yet, amen, if heaven do think him me.
To do what service am I sent for hither?

DUTCH:
Den koning heil! — zegt niemand „Amen”? Moet ik
En priester zijn en leek? Nu goed dan, — Amen!
Den koning ,heil! schoon ik het niet meer zij ;
En Amen óók, erkent de hemel mij. —
Tot welken dienst werd ik hierheen gebracht?

MORE:

Cited in Shakespeare’s Legal Maxims (William Lowes Rushton)

Under our arrest=Any restraint upon a person binding him to be responsible to the law, bound to appear on the trial date set (Rest under gage – See: “Lords appellants, Your differences shall all rest under gage”.)
Beholding=Indebted, obliged (beholden)
Procure your sureties=Arrange for guarantors
Days of answer=Defence
Bend my limbs=Bow, go on bended knee
Wherewith=With which
Insinuate=To ingratiate oneself (in a negative sense)
Favour=Face
Clerk=Reader of responses in church service, usually minor cleric or a lay person

Compleat:
Arrest=Raadsbesluit
Beholding, beholden=Gehouden, verplicht, verschuldigt
Surety=Borg, vastigheid
To bend his knees=Zyne knien buigen
Insinuate=Inboezemen, inflyen, inschuiven, indringen
Clerk=Een Kerkelyke, geestelyke, Kerk, schryver; Sekretaris

Topics: law/legal, respect, order/society, status, appearance, defence

God, the widow’s champion and defence

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: John of Gaunt
CONTEXT:
JOHN OF GAUNT
God’s is the quarrel; for God’s substitute,
His deputy anointed in His sight,
Hath caused his death: the which if wrongfully,
Let heaven revenge; for I may never lift
An angry arm against His minister.
DUCHESS
Where then, alas, may I complain myself?
JOHN OF GAUNT
To God, the widow’s champion and defence.

DUTCH:
Aan God de wrake, want zijn plaatsvervanger,
Zijn stedehouder, voor zijn oog gezalfd,
Is de oorzaak van zijn dood; is deze een gruwel,
Dan wreke ‘t God, want ik mag nimmer toornig
Den arm verheffen tegen zijn gezant.

MORE:

Minister=Representative, proxy (the King)
God’s quarrel=It is in God’s hands
Complain myself=Complain

Topics: dispute, offence, death, punishment

Grace me no grace, nor uncle me no uncle

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER: Duke of York
CONTEXT:
DUKE OF YORK
Show me thy humble heart, and not thy knee,
Whose duty is deceiveable and false.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
My gracious uncle—
DUKE OF YORK
Tut, tut!
Grace me no grace, nor uncle me no uncle:
I am no traitor’s uncle; and that word ‘grace.’
In an ungracious mouth is but profane.
Why have those banish’d and forbidden legs
Dared once to touch a dust of England’s ground?
But then more ‘why?’ why have they dared to march
So many miles upon her peaceful bosom,
Frighting her pale-faced villages with war
And ostentation of despised arms?
Comest thou because the anointed king is hence?
Why, foolish boy, the king is left behind,
And in my loyal bosom lies his power.
Were I but now the lord of such hot youth
As when brave Gaunt, thy father, and myself
Rescued the Black Prince, that young Mars of men,
From forth the ranks of many thousand French,
O, then how quickly should this arm of mine.
Now prisoner to the palsy, chastise thee
And minister correction to thy fault!

DUTCH:
Niets van genade, en oom is doof voor oomen.

MORE:

Grace me no grace: Shakespeare uses the same form of reproach in R&J (Thank me no thankings, nor proud me no prouds.)
Ungracious=(a) Insolent; (b) Profane
Ostentation=Boastful display, brandishing
Palsy=Paralysis, weakness

Compleat:
Grace=Genade, gunst, bevalligheid, fraajigheid, aardige zwier
Ungracious=Van genade ontbloot, godloos, onzalig, verwaaten, heilloos
Ostentation=Beroeming, snorkery, gebral, ydele eer, roemzucht
Palsy=Beroerdheid, geraaktheid, popelsy

Topics: TRAITOR

Grief makes one hour ten

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Henry Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
JOHN OF GAUNT
O, to what purpose dost thou hoard thy words,
That thou return’st no greeting to thy friends?
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
I have too few to take my leave of you,
When the tongue’s office should be prodigal
To breathe the abundant dolour of the heart.
JOHN OF GAUNT
Thy grief is but thy absence for a time.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
Joy absent, grief is present for that time.
JOHN OF GAUNT
What is six winters? they are quickly gone.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
To men in joy; but grief makes one hour ten.

DUTCH:
Voor vreugde; smart vertienvoudt ieder uur.

MORE:

Schmidt:
Prodigal=Lavish, profuse
Dolour=Grief

Compleat:
Prodigal=Quistig, verquistend
Dolor=Droefheid, smerte

Topics: grief, language, sorrow, time

He prays but faintly and would be denied.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.3
SPEAKER: Duchess of York
CONTEXT:
Pleads he in earnest? look upon his face;
His eyes do drop no tears, his prayers are in jest;
His words come from his mouth, ours from our breast:
He prays but faintly and would be denied;
We pray with heart and soul and all beside:
His weary joints would gladly rise, I know;
Our knees shall kneel till to the ground they grow:
His prayers are full of false hypocrisy;
Ours of true zeal and deep integrity.
Our prayers do out-pray his; then let them have
That mercy which true prayer ought to have.

DUTCH:
Hij spreekt slechts met den mond, wij met het hart;
Hij wenscht een weig’ring op zijn zwakke bede,

MORE:

Proverb: He that asks faintly begs a denial

In jest=Not serious
Hypocrisy=False seeming, deceitful appearance, dissimulation

Topics: proverbs and idioms, appearance

His rash fierce blaze of riot cannot last, For violent fires soon burn out themselves

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: John of Gaunt
CONTEXT:
Methinks I am a prophet new inspired
And thus expiring do foretell of him:
His rash fierce blaze of riot cannot last,
For violent fires soon burn out themselves;
Small showers last long, but sudden storms are short;
He tires betimes that spurs too fast betimes;
With eager feeding food doth choke the feeder:
Light vanity, insatiate cormorant,
Consuming means, soon preys upon itself.

DUTCH:
Zijn dol en wulpsch geflakker kan niet duren,
Want ieder heftig vuur brandt schielijk uit

MORE:

Proverb: Nothing violent can be permanent
Proverb: Untimeous [untimely] spurring spoils the steed

Expiring=(a) Dying; (b) Expiration
Riot=Dissolute behaviour
Betimes=Early, at an early hour

Compleat:
Expiration=Eindiging, uitgang, verloop, uitblaazing van den laatsten adem
To expire=Den geest geeven, sterven
To riot=Optrekken, rinkinken, pypestellen
Betimes=Bytyds,vroeg

Topics: proverbs and idioms, invented or popularised, fate/destiny, haste

How high a pitch his resolution soars!

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
KING RICHARD II
How high a pitch his resolution soars!
Thomas of Norfolk, what say’st thou to this?
THOMAS MOWBRAY
O, let my sovereign turn away his face
And bid his ears a little while be deaf,
Till I have told this slander of his blood,
How God and good men hate so foul a liar.
KING RICHARD II
Mowbray, impartial are our eyes and ears:
Were he my brother, nay, my kingdom’s heir,
As he is but my father’s brother’s son,
Now, by my sceptre’s awe, I make a vow,
Such neighbour nearness to our sacred blood
Should nothing privilege him, nor partialize
The unstooping firmness of my upright soul:
He is our subject, Mowbray; so art thou:
Free speech and fearless I to thee allow.

DUTCH:
Wat vlucht ten wolken neemt zijn koene geest!
Thomas van Norfolk, wat zegt gij hierop?

MORE:

Pitch=Highest point of soaring flight for a hawk or falcon
Neighbour nearness=Extremely close proximity
Partialize=Prejudice
Unstooping=Unbending (Stoop is another falcony ref. meaning to come down or pounce on the prey)
Fearless=Bold
Blood=Ancestry

Compleat:
To stoop=Buigen, bokken of bukken
A hawk that makes a stoop at a partridge=Een valk die op een Patrys valt
Fearless=Schroomeloos, onbevreesd, onvertzaagd, onbeschroomd, onverschrokken

Topics: resolution, strength, truth, relationship, honour

How long a time lies in one little word!

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Henry Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
KING RICHARD II
Uncle, even in the glasses of thine eyes
I see thy grieved heart: thy sad aspect
Hath from the number of his banish’d years
Pluck’d four away.
Six frozen winter spent,
Return with welcome home from banishment.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
How long a time lies in one little word!
Four lagging winters and four wanton springs
End in a word: such is the breath of kings.

DUTCH:
Wat tijd en macht ligt in een enkel woord!
Vier trage winters en vier dartle Mei’s
Zijn adem, niets, — doet hun een vorst dien eisch.

MORE:

Proverb: The eye is the window of the heart (mind)

Schmidt:
Glasses of thine eyes=Eyeballs
Aspect=Look, glance; possible reference to astrology, with the aspect being the position of one planet in relation to others and its potential to exert influence
Wanton=Bountiful, luxuriant

Compleat:
Aspect=Gezigt, gelaat, aanschouw, stargezigt
Of fierce aspect=Van een straf gelaat

Topics: time, nature, punishment, appearance, proverbs and idioms, still in use

How sour sweet music is,
When time is broke and no proportion kept!

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.5
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
Ha, ha! keep time: how sour sweet music is,
When time is broke and no proportion kept!
So is it in the music of men’s lives.
And here have I the daintiness of ear
To cheque time broke in a disorder’d string;
But for the concord of my state and time
Had not an ear to hear my true time broke.
I wasted time, and now doth time waste me;
For now hath time made me his numbering clock:
My thoughts are minutes; and with sighs they jar
Their watches on unto mine eyes, the outward watch,
Whereto my finger, like a dial’s point,
Is pointing still, in cleansing them from tears.

DUTCH:
Een zoete klank wordt bitter,
Wordt tijd miskend en regelmaat gestoord!

MORE:

CITED IN IRISH LAW: Judicial Review of Administrative Action: the Problem of Remedies (Working Paper No. 8-1979) [1979] IELRC 3 (December 1979) (in turn citing State (Kelly) v. District Justice for Bandon [1947] I.R. 258, 262, and State (Walsh) v. District Justice Maguire (not yet reported, Supreme Court, 19 February 1979)).

Proportion=Metre, cadence
Daintiness of ear=Acuity
Outward watch=The marks of the minutes on a dial-plate
Check=Censure
Concord=Harmony (of sound); agreement
Still=Continuously

Compleat:
Proportion=Evenredigheid, regelmaat
Check=Berisping, beteugeling, intooming
Concord=Eendragt, eendragtigheid, saamensstemming

Topics: cited in law, time, age/experience, leadership, unity/collaboration

I count myself in nothing else so happy
As in a soul remembering my good friends.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER: Henry Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
I thank thee, gentle Percy; and be sure
I count myself in nothing else so happy
As in a soul remembering my good friends;
And, as my fortune ripens with thy love,
It shall be still thy true love’s recompense:
My heart this covenant makes, my hand thus seals it.

DUTCH:
Ik acht me in niets ter wereld zoo bevoorrecht,
Dan dat mijn hart zijn vrienden steeds gedenkt;

MORE:

Ripens=Improves
Recompense=Reward

Compleat:
Recompense=Vergeldoing, beloning

Topics: friendship, memory

I do not sue to stand; Pardon is all the suit I have in hand.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.3
SPEAKER: Duchess of York
CONTEXT:
DUCHESS OF YORK
Nay, do not say, ‘stand up;’
Say, ‘pardon’ first, and afterwards ‘stand up.’
And if I were thy nurse, thy tongue to teach,
‘Pardon’ should be the first word of thy speech.
I never long’d to hear a word till now;
Say ‘pardon,’ king; let pity teach thee how:
The word is short, but not so short as sweet;
No word like ‘pardon’ for kings’ mouths so meet.
DUKE OF YORK
Speak it in French, king; say, ‘pardonnez-moi.’
DUCHESS OF YORK
Dost thou teach pardon pardon to destroy?
Ah, my sour husband, my hard-hearted lord,
That set’st the word itself against the word!
Speak ‘pardon’ as ’tis current in our land;
The chopping French we do not understand.
Thine eye begins to speak; set thy tongue there;
Or in thy piteous heart plant thou thine ear;
That hearing how our plaints and prayers do pierce,
Pity may move thee ‘pardon’ to rehearse.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
Good aunt, stand up.
DUCHESS OF YORK
I do not sue to stand;
Pardon is all the suit I have in hand.

DUTCH:
Ik vraag niet op te staan;
Neen, enkel om vergeving houd ik aan.

MORE:

Proverb: Short and sweet

Meet=Fitting, appropriate
Chopping=Changing the meaning of words
Plaints=Complaints
Sue=Beg
Suit=A request made to a prince, a court-solicitation
Nurse=Nanny

Compleat:
To chop=Ruilen, ruitebuiten
To chop at a thing=Iets aangrypen, vasthouden
Plaint=Klagte, aanklagte
Sue=Voor ‘t recht roepen, in rechte vervolgen
Suit=Een verzoek, rechtsgeding

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, language

I know your daring tongue Scorns to unsay what once it hath deliver’d.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Bagot
CONTEXT:
BAGOT
My Lord Aumerle, I know your daring tongue
Scorns to unsay what once it hath deliver’d.
In that dead time when Gloucester’s death was plotted,
I heard you say, ‘Is not my arm of length,
That reacheth from the restful English court
As far as Calais, to mine uncle’s head?’
Amongst much other talk, that very time,
I heard you say that you had rather refuse
The offer of an hundred thousand crowns
Than Bolingbroke’s return to England;
Adding withal how blest this land would be
In this your cousin’s death.

DUTCH:
Mylord Aumerle, ik weet, uw stoute tong
Versmaadt, wat ze eenmaal heeft gezegd, te looch’nen.

MORE:

Proverb: Kings have long arms

Unsay=Deny, retract
Dead=(a) deadly; (b) past
Of length=Long enough
Restful=Peaceful, quiet

Compleat:
Unsay=Ontkennen, ontzeggen
To say and unsay=Zeggen en ontkennen
Restful=In ruste, gerust

Topics: proverbs and idioms, law/legal, honour, authority

I see thy glory like a shooting star Fall to the base earth from the firmament

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.4
SPEAKER: Earl of Salisbury
CONTEXT:
CAPTAIN
’Tis thought the king is dead; we will not stay.
The bay-trees in our country are all wither’d
And meteors fright the fixed stars of heaven;
The pale-faced moon looks bloody on the earth
And lean-look’d prophets whisper fearful change;
Rich men look sad and ruffians dance and leap,
The one in fear to lose what they enjoy,
The other to enjoy by rage and war:
These signs forerun the death or fall of kings.
Farewell: our countrymen are gone and fled,
As well assured Richard their king is dead.
EARL OF SALISBURY
Ah, Richard, with the eyes of heavy mind
I see thy glory like a shooting star
Fall to the base earth from the firmament.
Thy sun sets weeping in the lowly west,
Witnessing storms to come, woe and unrest:
Thy friends are fled to wait upon thy foes,
And crossly to thy good all fortune goes.

DUTCH:
0 Richard, met een blik vol hangen kommer
Zie ik, gelijk een sterre die verschiet,
Uw glans van ‘t firmament ter aarde ploffen.

MORE:

Lean-looked=Thin-faced
Meteor=A bright phenomenon, thought to be portentous, harbinger of doom
Fixed stars=Symbol of permanence
Forerun=Precede
Assured=Convinced, persuaded
Witness=Portend
Wait upon=Serve
Crossly=Adversely

Compleat:
To assure=Verzekeren
Portend=Voorduiden, voorzeggen

Topics: reputation, failure, betrayal, friendship, loyalty, fate/destiny

I wasted time, and now doth time waste me.

DUTCH:
Doch voor den welstand van mijn staat en tijd
Had ik geen oor, al was de maat verbroken.
‘k Verdeed mijn tijd, nu doet de tijd het mij;

Proportion=Metre, cadence
Daintiness of ear=Acuity
Outward watch=The marks of the minutes on a dial-plate
Check=Censure
Concord=Harmony (of sound); agreement
Still=Continuously

Compleat:
Proportion=Evenredigheid, regelmaat
Check=Berisping, beteugeling, intooming
Concord=Eendragt, eendragtigheid, saamensstemming

Topics: cited in law, time, age/experience, leadership, unity/collaboration

I will despair, and be at enmity With cozening hope: he is a flatterer,

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Queen
CONTEXT:
QUEEN
So, Green, thou art the midwife to my woe,
And Bolingbroke my sorrow’s dismal heir:
Now hath my soul brought forth her prodigy,
And I, a gasping new-deliver’d mother,
Have woe to woe, sorrow to sorrow join’d.
BUSHY
Despair not, madam.
QUEEN
Who shall hinder me?
I will despair, and be at enmity
With cozening hope: he is a flatterer,
A parasite, a keeper back of death,
Who gently would dissolve the bands of life,
Which false hope lingers in extremity.

DUTCH:
Wie kan ‘t verbieden?
Ik wil het doen, wil met bedriegend hopen
In vijandschap nu zijn, het is een vleier,
Een tafelschuimer, die den dood terughoudt,

MORE:

Schmidt:
Prodigy=Portent, ominous apparition
Cozening=Deceitful

Compleat:
Prodigy (omen, portent)=Voorbeduidsel
Cozening=Bedrieging, bedriegende

Topics: hope/optimism

In peace was never gentle lamb more mild Than was that young and princely gentleman.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Duke of York
CONTEXT:
In war was never lion raged more fierce,
In peace was never gentle lamb more mild,
Than was that young and princely gentleman.
His face thou hast, for even so look’d he,
Accomplish’d with the number of thy hours;
But when he frown’d, it was against the French
And not against his friends; his noble hand
Did win what he did spend and spent not that
Which his triumphant father’s hand had won;
His hands were guilty of no kindred blood,
But bloody with the enemies of his kin.
O Richard! York is too far gone with grief,
Or else he never would compare between.

DUTCH:
In vrede geen geduldig lam ooit zachter,
Dan deze jonge, vorstlijke edelman.

MORE:

Proverb: As gentle (quiet, meek, mild) as a lamb (1530)

With the number of thy hours=At (when he was) your age
Win=Earn

Topics: proverbs and idioms, achievement

It boots thee not to be compassionate: After our sentence plaining comes too late.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
THOMAS MOWBRAY
(…) Doubly portcullis’d with my teeth and lips;
And dull unfeeling barren ignorance
Is made my gaoler to attend on me.
I am too old to fawn upon a nurse,
Too far in years to be a pupil now:
What is thy sentence then but speechless death,
Which robs my tongue from breathing native breath?
KING RICHARD II
It boots thee not to be compassionate:
After our sentence plaining comes too late.

DUTCH:
Vergeefsch dat roerend jamm’ren; ‘t geeft geen baat;
Uw klacht is, nu ons vonnis viel, te laat.

Cunning=Skilful
Sentence=Verdict (punning on language)
Breathing native breath=Speaking native English (and breathing English air)
No boot=No point, profit, advantage
Compassionate=Pitiful
Plaining=Making a formal complaint

Compleat:
Cunning=Behendig
No boot=Te vergeefs, vruchteloos

Topics: mercy, regret, pity, punishment

Landlord of England art thou and not king.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Gaunt
CONTEXT:
O, had thy grandsire with a prophet’s eye
Seen how his son’s son should destroy his sons,
From forth thy reach he would have laid thy shame,
Deposing thee before thou wert possessed,
Which art possessed now to depose thyself.
Why, cousin, wert thou regent of the world,
It were a shame to let this land by lease;
But, for thy world enjoying but this land,
Is it not more than shame to shame it so?
Landlord of England art thou now, not king.
Thy state of law is bondslave to the law,
And thou—

DUTCH:
Landheer van England zijt gij thans, niet koning;
Uw vorstlijk recht is nu de slaaf der wet

MORE:

Grandsire=Edward III
Deposing=Removing from the throne
Possessed=In possession of; posssessed by (an evil spirit)
Is bondslave=Has become slave to

Topics: wellbeing, failure, ruin

Let not my cold words here accuse my zeal

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Thomas Mowbray
CONTEXT:
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
(…) Thou art a traitor and a miscreant,
Too good to be so and too bad to live,
Since the more fair and crystal is the sky,
The uglier seem the clouds that in it fly.
Once more, the more to aggravate the note,
With a foul traitor’s name stuff I thy throat;
And wish, so please my sovereign, ere I move,
What my tongue speaks my right drawn sword may prove.
THOMAS MOWBRAY
Let not my cold words here accuse my zeal:
Tis not the trial of a woman’s war,
The bitter clamour of two eager tongues,
Can arbitrate this cause betwixt us twain;
The blood is hot that must be cool’d for this:
Yet can I not of such tame patience boast
As to be hush’d and nought at all to say:
First, the fair reverence of your highness curbs me
From giving reins and spurs to my free speech;
Which else would post until it had return’d
These terms of treason doubled down his throat.
Setting aside his high blood’s royalty,
And let him be no kinsman to my liege,
60I do defy him, and I spit at him;
Call him a slanderous coward and a villain:
Which to maintain I would allow him odds,
And meet him, were I tied to run afoot
Even to the frozen ridges of the Alps,
Or any other ground inhabitable,
Where ever Englishman durst set his foot.
Mean time let this defend my loyalty,
By all my hopes, most falsely doth he lie.

DUTCH:
Laat niet mijn koude taal mijn moed doen laken.
Niet de schermuts’ling van een vrouwentwist,
De bitt’re smaad van twee verwoede tongen,
Kan deze zaak beslechten tusschen ons;

MORE:

Miscreant=Villain, scoundrel
Good=Noble in rank
Crystal=Bright, transparent
Aggravate the note=Add weight, exacerbate, increase the reproach
Accuse=Belie, impugn
Zeal=Intense and eager interest or endeavour, ardour
Woman’s war=Ref to ‘women are words, men deeds’
Eager=Sharp, acidic
Curbs, reins, spurs=Equestrian metaphors
Post=Gallop

Compleat:
The crystalline heaven=De kristalyne Hemel
Aggravate=Verzwaaren
Zeal=Yver
Eager=Scherp, zuur, wrang

Topics: blame, dispute, language

Lords appellants, Your differences shall all rest under gage

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Henry Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
These differences shall all rest under gage
Till Norfolk be repeal’d: repeal’d he shall be,
And, though mine enemy, restored again
To all his lands and signories: when he’s return’d,
Against Aumerle we will enforce his trial.
BISHOP OF CARLISLE
That honourable day shall ne’er be seen.
Many a time hath banish’d Norfolk fought
For Jesu Christ in glorious Christian field,
Streaming the ensign of the Christian cross
Against black pagans, Turks, and Saracens:
And toil’d with works of war, retired himself
To Italy; and there at Venice gave
His body to that pleasant country’s earth,
And his pure soul unto his captain Christ,
Under whose colours he had fought so long.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
Why, bishop, is Norfolk dead?
BISHOP OF CARLISLE
As surely as I live, my lord.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
Sweet peace conduct his sweet soul to the bosom
Of good old Abraham! Lords appellants,
Your differences shall all rest under gage
Till we assign you to your days of trial.

DUTCH:
Geleide zoete vrede naar den schoot
Des goeden vader Abraham’s zijn ziele! —
Uw twisten, heeren klagers, zijn geschorst,
Tot wij u dagen om uw kamp te strijden.

MORE:

Proverb: Abraham’s bosom

Enforce=Ensure, demand with importunity
Signories=Feudal park; estate, landed property of a lord
Gage=Pledge (usu. a glove thrown on the ground) of a person’s appearance to do battle in support of his assertions, challenge
Differences rest under gage=Suspend the dispute
Toiled=Fatigued, exhausted
Streaming=Flying

Compleat:
Gage=Pand, onderpand
Toil=Slooven, zich afslooven, moe werken
Streamer=Wimpel
Inforce=Dwinge, opdringen, overhaalen

Topics: law/legal, dispute

Mine ear is open and my heart prepared

DUTCH:
Mijn oor is open, voorbereid mijn hart;
Wereldsch verlies is ‘t ergst, wat gij kunt melden.

Topics: preparation, strength, fate/destiny, failure, conflict

Mistake me not, my lord; ’tis not my meaning To raze one title of your honour out:

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER: Lord Berkeley
CONTEXT:
Mistake me not, my lord; ’tis not my meaning
To raze one title of your honour out:
To you, my lord, I come, what lord you will,
From the most gracious regent of this land,
The Duke of York, to know what pricks you on
To take advantage of the absent time
And fright our native peace with self-born arms.

DUTCH:
Versta mij goed, mylord; mijn doel is niet,
Een enklen eeretitel u te schrappen

MORE:

One form of punishment was apparently to deface the arms of traitors and rebels. (Camden’s “Remains”: How the names of them, which for capital crimes against majestie, were erased out of the public records, tables, and registers, or forbidden to be borne by their posteritie, when their memory was damned, I could show at large.”) Bolingbrook also refers to this punishment in 3.1.

Raze=Erase, scrap away
What lord you will=Whatever title you’d like me to use
Prick=Spur
Absent time=Time of (the king’s) absence

Compleat:
To raze out=Uitschrabben, doorhaalen, uitkladden, uitveegen
To prick=Prikken, steeken, prikkelen
Absence=Afwezendheid, afzyn, verstrooidheid

Topics: punishment, honour

Night-owls shriek where mounting larks should sing

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
NORTHUMBERLAND
My lord, in the base court he doth attend
To speak with you; may it please you to come down.
KING RICHARD II
Down, down I come; like glistering Phaethon,
Wanting the manage of unruly jades.
In the base court? Base court, where kings grow base,
To come at traitors’ calls and do them grace.
In the base court? Come down? Down, court!
down, king!
For night-owls shriek where mounting larks
should sing.

DUTCH:
De nachtuil krijscht, dan zwijgt de nachtegaal.

MORE:

Phaethon: In Greek mythology, Phaethon, a son of Helios the sun god, begged Helios to be allowed to drive his chariot and lost control (as Richard is losing control).

Base court=Lower courtyard of the castle
Base=Mean, vile
Jade=A term of contempt or pity for a worthless or maltreated horse

Compleat:
A base fellow=Een slechte vent, oolyke boef
Base=Ondergeschikt
Base (or inferior) court=Een ondergeschikt Hof, een minder Rechtbank
Jade=Een lompig paerd, knol, jakhals

Topics: respect

Now is this golden crown like a deep well That owes two buckets, filling one another, The emptier ever dancing in the air,

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
Give me the crown. Here, cousin, seize the crown;
Here cousin:
On this side my hand, and on that side yours.
Now is this golden crown like a deep well
That owes two buckets, filling one another,
The emptier ever dancing in the air,
The other down, unseen and full of water:
That bucket down and full of tears am I,
Drinking my griefs, whilst you mount up on high.

DUTCH:
Nu is de goudhand als een diepe put,
Een met twee emmers, die elkander vullen;
De ledige altijd dansend in de lucht,
De tweede omlaag en ongezien, vol water;
Ik hen die eene omlaag, vol, uit het oog,
Ik drink mijn kommer en hef u omhoog.

MORE:

Proverb: Like two buckets of a well, if one go up the other must go down

Topics: proverbs and idioms, judgment, equality, achievement, value

Patience is stale, and I am weary of it.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.5
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
KEEPER
My lord, I dare not: Sir Pierce of Exton, who
lately came from the king, commands the contrary.
KING RICHARD II
The devil take Henry of Lancaster and thee!
Patience is stale, and I am weary of it.
KEEPER
Help, help, help!
KING RICHARD II
How now! what means death in this rude assault?
Villain, thy own hand yields thy death’s instrument.
Go thou, and fill another room in hell.
That hand shall burn in never-quenching fire
That staggers thus my person. Exton, thy fierce hand
Hath with the king’s blood stain’d the king’s own land.
Mount, mount, my soul! thy seat is up on high;
Whilst my gross flesh sinks downward, here to die.

DUTCH:
Geduld is duf, ik heb een walg er van.

MORE:

Stale=Worse for age, vapid and tasteless, worn out by use
Stagger=To cause to reel, to fell

Compleat:
Stale=Oud
To stagger (move or shake)=Schudden, beweegen, doen waggelen

Topics: patience, good and bad

Rich men look sad and ruffians dance and leap, The one in fear to lose what they enjoy, The other to enjoy by rage and war:

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.4
SPEAKER: Captain
CONTEXT:
CAPTAIN
’Tis thought the king is dead; we will not stay.
The bay-trees in our country are all wither’d
And meteors fright the fixed stars of heaven;
The pale-faced moon looks bloody on the earth
And lean-look’d prophets whisper fearful change;
Rich men look sad and ruffians dance and leap,
The one in fear to lose what they enjoy,
The other to enjoy by rage and war:
These signs forerun the death or fall of kings.
Farewell: our countrymen are gone and fled,
As well assured Richard their king is dead.
EARL OF SALISBURY
Ah, Richard, with the eyes of heavy mind
I see thy glory like a shooting star
Fall to the base earth from the firmament.
Thy sun sets weeping in the lowly west,
Witnessing storms to come, woe and unrest:
Thy friends are fled to wait upon thy foes,
And crossly to thy good all fortune goes.

DUTCH:
De rijken zijn bedrukt en schelmen dansen; —
Die duchten het verlies van geld en goed,
En dezen hopen op geweld en oorlog;

Compleat:
To assure=Verzekeren
Portend=Voorduiden, voorzeggen

Topics: ruin, nature, conflict, fate/destiny

Small showers last long, but sudden storms are short

DUTCH:
Kort duurt een stortbui, zachte regens lang;
Wie vroeg te haastig spoort, is weldra moe;
Wie al te gulzig eet, hij stikt in ‘t eten;
Dwaze ijdelheid, die onverzaadbre gier,
Verslindt haar buit en aast dán op zich zelf.

MORE:

Proverb: Nothing violent can be permanent
Proverb: Untimeous [untimely] spurring spoils the steed

Expiring=(a) Dying; (b) Expiration
Riot=Dissolute behaviour
Betimes=Early, at an early hour

Compleat:
Expiration=Eindiging, uitgang, verloop, uitblaazing van den laatsten adem
To expire=Den geest geeven, sterven
To riot=Optrekken, rinkinken, pypestellen
Betimes=Bytyds,vroeg

Topics: proverbs and idioms, invented or popularised, fate/destiny, haste

Such is the breath of kings.

DUTCH:
Wat tijd en macht ligt in een enkel woord!
Vier trage winters en vier dartle Mei’s
Zijn adem, niets, — doet hun een vorst dien eisch.

MORE:

Proverb: The eye is the window of the heart (mind)

Compleat:
Aspect=Gezigt, gelaat, aanschouw, stargezigt
Of fierce aspect=Van een straf gelaat

Topics: time, nature, punishment, appearance, proverbs and idioms, still in use

Superfluous branches
We lop away, that bearing boughs may live

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Gardener
CONTEXT:
GARDENER
They are; and Bolingbroke
Hath seized the wasteful king. O, what pity is it
That he had not so trimm’d and dress’d his land
As we this garden! We at time of year
Do wound the bark, the skin of our fruit-trees,
Lest, being over-proud in sap and blood,
With too much riches it confound itself:
Had he done so to great and growing men,
They might have lived to bear and he to taste
Their fruits of duty: superfluous branches
We lop away, that bearing boughs may live:
Had he done so, himself had borne the crown,
Which waste of idle hours hath quite thrown down.

DUTCH:
Te gellé takken,
Die kappen wij, opdat de vruchttak leve;
Had hij zoo ook gedaan, hij droeg de kroon;
‘t Verlies is zijner tijdverspilling loon.

MORE:

At time of year=At appropriate times/seasons of the year
Confound=Spoil, destroy
Bear=Bear fruit
Waste of=Wasteful

Compleat:
Confound=Verwarren, verstooren, te schande maaken, verbysteren
To bear fruit=Vrucht draagen
To lop trees=Boomen snoeijen, kleine takjes afkappen

Topics: preparation, strength, nature

That I could forget what I have been,
Or not remember what I must be now!

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
O God, O God! that e’er this tongue of mine,
That laid the sentence of dread banishment
On yon proud man, should take it off again
With words of sooth! O that I were as great
As is my grief, or lesser than my name!
Or that I could forget what I have been,
Or not remember what I must be now!
Swell’st thou, proud heart? I’ll give thee scope to beat,
Since foes have scope to beat both thee and me.

DUTCH:
O, ware ik zoo groot
Als nu mijn smart, of kleiner dan mijn naam;
Of dat ik kon vergeten, wat ik was,
Of niet begrijpen, wat ik nu moet zijn!

MORE:

Words of sooth=Words of appeasement, comfort (‘sooth’ is sweet as well as true as in the verb ‘to soothe’)
Scope=(a) latitude’ (b) purpose, capabillity

Compleat:
Sooth=Zeker, voorwaar
To sooth up=Vleijen, flikflooijen
To sooth up (lull)=Aanmoedigen
Scope=Oogmerk, ,doelwit
To have free scope (latitude)=De ruimte hebben (vrye loop)

Topics: judgment, punishment, memory, integrity, value

That power that made you king
Hath power to keep you king in spite of all.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Bishop of Carlisle
CONTEXT:
BISHOP OF CARLISLE
Fear not, my lord: that Power that made you king
Hath power to keep you king in spite of all.
The means that heaven yields must be embraced,
And not neglected; else, if heaven would,
And we will not, heaven’s offer we refuse,
The proffer’d means of succours and redress.
DUKE OF AUMERLE
He means, my lord, that we are too remiss;
Whilst Bolingbroke, through our security,
Grows strong and great in substance and in power.

DUTCH:
Ducht niets, mijn vorst; Die u ten troon verhief,
Heeft macht uw troon te hoeden, tegen allen.

MORE:

Proverb: Help thyself and God will help thee

Succours and redress=Military reinforcement and support

Compleat:
Succour=Te hulp komen, bystaan
Succours=Hulpbenden, krygshulpe

Topics: conflict, authority, proverbs and idioms, security

That when the searching eye of heaven is hid,
Behind the globe, that lights the lower world,
Then thieves and robbers range abroad unseen

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
Discomfortable cousin! know’st thou not
That when the searching eye of heaven is hid,
Behind the globe, that lights the lower world,
Then thieves and robbers range abroad unseen
In murders and in outrage, boldly here;
But when from under this terrestrial ball
He fires the proud tops of the eastern pines
And darts his light through every guilty hole,
Then murders, treasons and detested sins,
The cloak of night being pluck’d from off their backs,
Stand bare and naked, trembling at themselves?
So when this thief, this traitor, Bolingbroke,
Who all this while hath revell’d in the night
Whilst we were wandering with the antipodes,
Shall see us rising in our throne, the east,
His treasons will sit blushing in his face,
Not able to endure the sight of day,
But self-affrighted tremble at his sin.
Not all the water in the rough rude sea
Can wash the balm off from an anointed king;
The breath of worldly men cannot depose
The deputy elected by the Lord:
For every man that Bolingbroke hath press’d
To lift shrewd steel against our golden crown,
God for his Richard hath in heavenly pay
A glorious angel: then, if angels fight,
Weak men must fall, for heaven still guards the right.

DUTCH:
Als achter de’ aardbol zich het spiedend oog
Des hemels bergt en de onderaard beschijnt,
Dan sluipen dieven, roovers, ongezien,
In moord en euveldaad hier bloedig rond;

MORE:

CITED IN US LAW: Re. the definition of “daylight”: US v Liebrich, 55 F.2d 341 (M.D.Pa. 1932); Funches v. State, 53 Ala. App. 330, 299 So.2d 771, 776 (Ala. Crim. App. 1984); Dinkler v. Jenkins, 118 Ga. App. 239, 163 S.E.2d 443 (1968)

Discomfortable=Causing discomfort
Searching eye=The sun
Terrestrial ball=The earth
Self-affrighted=Frightening one’s self
Rude=Stormy, turbulent
Breath=Words
Balm=Holy oil used to ‘anoint’ the king

Compleat:
He spended his breath in vain=Al zyn praaten was te vergeefs
Terrestrial=Aardsch
Affrighted=Verwaard, verschrikt, bang
Rude=Ruuw
Balm=Balsem
Discomfort=Mistroostigheid, mismoedigheid

Topics: cited in law, discovery, conflict

The children yet unborn Shall feel this day as sharp to them as thorn.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Carlisle
CONTEXT:
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
Go, some of you convey him to the Tower.
KING RICHARD II
O, good! convey? conveyers are you all,
That rise thus nimbly by a true king’s fall.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
On Wednesday next we solemnly set down
Our coronation: lords, prepare yourselves.
ABBOT
A woeful pageant have we here beheld.
BISHOP OF CARLISLE
The woe’s to come; the children yet unborn.
Shall feel this day as sharp to them as thorn.

DUTCH:
Nog volgt het wee; de thans nog ongeboor’nen
Zal deze dag eens steken, fel als doornen.

MORE:

Proverb: As sharp as a thorn

Convey=Carry, transport; to carry away mysteriously (and hence used to mean ‘steal’)
Conveyer=Thief
Pageant=Spectacle

Compleat:
Convey=Voeren, leiden, overvoeren, overdraagen (rechten)
Convey away=Wegvoeren
Conveyer=Overvoerder, vervoerder
Pageant=Een trioomfboog; grootsche vertooning, pracht

Burgersdijk notes:
Inhalen? goed! — Inhalig zijt gij allen. In ‘t Engelsch staat: O, good! convey? conveyers are you all. Convey beteekent: wegbrengen , weggeleiden, maar ook stelen.

Topics: proverbs and idioms, fate/destiny, consequence

The daintiest last, to make the end most sweet:

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Henry Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
O let no noble eye profane a tear
For me, if I be gored with Mowbray’s spear:
As confident as is the falcon’s flight
Against a bird, do I with Mowbray fight.
My loving lord, I take my leave of you;
Of you, my noble cousin, Lord Aumerle;
Not sick, although I have to do with death,
But lusty, young, and cheerly drawing breath.
Lo, as at English feasts, so I regreet
The daintiest last, to make the end most sweet:
O thou, the earthly author of my blood,
Whose youthful spirit, in me regenerate,
Doth with a twofold vigour lift me up
To reach at victory above my head,
Add proof unto mine armour with thy prayers;
And with thy blessings steel my lance’s point,
That it may enter Mowbray’s waxen coat,
And furbish new the name of John a Gaunt,
Even in the lusty havior of his son.

DUTCH:
Zie, als tot nagerecht naar eisch, begroet
Ik ‘t liefst het laatst, en zoo is ‘t einde zoet.

MORE:

Profane=To desecrate, to pollute (by crying)
Regreet=Salute
Regenerate=Reborn
Proof=A state of having been tried and having stood the test, especially defensive arms found to be impenetrable
Steel=To harden
Furbish=Polish, burnish
Haviour=Behaviour

Compleat:
To be come regenerated=Wedergebooren worden
Musquet proof=Daar een musket-kogel op afstuiten kan
To steel (or harden)=Hardmaaken, verharden
To furbish=Polysten, bruineeren, glad maaken

Topics: regret, conflict

The eyes of men, After a well-graced actor leaves the stage, Are idly bent on him that enters next

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.2
SPEAKER: Duke of York
CONTEXT:
As in a theatre, the eyes of men,
After a well-graced actor leaves the stage,
Are idly bent on him that enters next,
Thinking his prattle to be tedious;
Even so, or with much more contempt, men’s eyes
Did scowl on gentle Richard; no man cried ‘God save him!’
No joyful tongue gave him his welcome home:
But dust was thrown upon his sacred head:
Which with such gentle sorrow he shook off,
His face still combating with tears and smiles,
The badges of his grief and patience,
That had not God, for some strong purpose, steel’d
The hearts of men, they must perforce have melted
And barbarism itself have pitied him.
But heaven hath a hand in these events,
To whose high will we bound our calm contents.
To Bolingbroke are we sworn subjects now,
Whose state and honour I for aye allow.

DUTCH:
Gelijk der menschen oogen in den schouwburg,
Na ‘t heengaan van een hooggevierd acteur,
Zich achtloos wenden op wie na hem komt

MORE:

Idly=Indifferently, lacking interest
Prattle=Chatter
Badges=Marks, signs
For aye=For ever

Compleat:
Idly=Luiachtig
Prittle prattle=Gesnap, gepraat, gekakel

Topics: authority, leadership

The love of wicked men converts to fear; That fear to hate, and hate turns one or both To worthy danger and deserved death.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.1
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
KING RICHARD II
Northumberland, thou ladder wherewithal
The mounting Bolingbroke ascends my throne,
The time shall not be many hours of age
More than it is ere foul sin gathering head
Shalt break into corruption: thou shalt think,
Though he divide the realm and give thee half,
It is too little, helping him to all;
And he shall think that thou, which know’st the way
To plant unrightful kings, wilt know again,
Being ne’er so little urged, another way
To pluck him headlong from the usurped throne.
The love of wicked men converts to fear;
That fear to hate, and hate turns one or both
To worthy danger and deserved death.

DUTCH:
Bij snoode vrienden wordt licht liefde vrees,
De vrees tot haat, en haat brengt éen van beiden,
Of beiden, welverdiend gevaar en dood.

MORE:
Wherewithal=With which, by means of which (he is using your ladder)
Gathering head=Coming to a head
Sin=Transgression of the divine law
Helping=Having helped
Unrightful=Illegitimate
So little urged=With only the slightest encouragement
Headlong=Unceremoniously

Compleat:
Now my designs gathering to a head=Nu beginnen myn voornemens ryp te worden
Urged=Gedrongen, geprest, aangedrongen
Headlong=Vlak voorover, plotseling

Topics: loyalty, betrayal, conspiracy, corruption, consequence

The purest treasure mortal times afford
Is spotless reputation

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Thomas Mowbray
CONTEXT:
THOMAS MOWBRAY
Myself I throw, dread sovereign, at thy foot.
My life thou shalt command, but not my shame:
The one my duty owes; but my fair name,
Despite of death that lives upon my grave,
To dark dishonour’s use thou shalt not have.
I am disgraced, impeach’d and baffled here,
Pierced to the soul with slander’s venom’d spear,
The which no balm can cure but his heart-blood
Which breathed this poison.
KING RICHARD II
Rage must be withstood:
Give me his gage: lions make leopards tame.
THOMAS MOWBRAY
Yea, but not change his spots: take but my shame.
And I resign my gage. My dear dear lord,
The purest treasure mortal times afford
Is spotless reputation: that away,
Men are but gilded loam or painted clay.
A jewel in a ten-times-barr’d-up chest
Is a bold spirit in a loyal breast.

DUTCH:
De vlekken blijven. ‘k Gaav’ dit pand u, nam
Uw macht mij eerst den smaad af. Hoor mij, heer;
De reinste schat des levens is onze eer,
Die vlekk’loos blijven moet; want ja, ontneem
Den man zijn eer, hij is geschilderd leem.

MORE:

Proverb: A leopard (panther) cannot change his spots

No boot=No point, profit, advantage
Impeached=Accused of an offence
Baffle=Originally a punishment of infamy, inflicted on recreant knights, one part of which was hanging them up by the heels” (Nares).
Gage=Pledge, pawn pledge (usu. a glove thrown on the ground) of a person’s appearance to do battle in support of his assertions, challenge
Gilded loam or painted clay=Mere earth with a decorative coating

Compleat:
No boot=Te vergeefs, vruchteloos
To impeach=Betichten, beschuldigen, aanklagen
To impeach (or oppose) the truth of a thing=Zich tegen de waarheid van een zaak aankanten
Gage=Pand, onderpand
To baffle=Beschaamd maaken

Burgersdijk notes:
De leeuw maakt panthers tam. De koningen van Engeland voeren den leeuw, de Norfolks gouden
panthers in hun wapen.

Topics: reputation, honour, appearance, integrity, proverbs and idioms, still in use, invented or popularised

The time shall not be many hours of age More than it is ere foul sin gathering head Shalt break into corruption.

DUTCH:
De tijd zal niet veel ouder zijn dan nu,
Eer booze zonde rijpt en zich verzamelt
En openbreekt

Compleat:
Now my designs gathering to a head=Nu beginnen myn voornemens ryp te worden
Urged=Gedrongen, geprest, aangedrongen
Headlong=Vlak voorover, plotseling

Topics: loyalty, betrayal, conspiracy, corruption, time

Then call them to our presence; face to face,
And frowning brow to brow, ourselves will hear
The accuser and the accused freely speak:

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
KING RICHARD II
Tell me, moreover, hast thou sounded him,
If he appeal the duke on ancient malice;
Or worthily, as a good subject should,
On some known ground of treachery in him?
JOHN OF GAUNT
As near as I could sift him on that argument,
On some apparent danger seen in him
Aim’d at your highness, no inveterate malice.
KING RICHARD II
Then call them to our presence; face to face,
And frowning brow to brow, ourselves will hear
The accuser and the accused freely speak:
High-stomach’d are they both, and full of ire,
In rage deaf as the sea, hasty as fire.

DUTCH:
Zoo roept hen voor; vrij, aanschijn tegen aanschijn,
En fronsblik tegen fronsblik, willen wij
En klager en beklaagde hooren spreken.

MORE:

CITED IN IRISH LAW: Child Sexual Abuse, Consultation Paper on (LRC CP 2-1989) [1989] IELRC 4 (August 1989) (citing US Supreme Court law: 43 Crim L R 3226 (US Sup Ct 1988).

CITED IN US LAW:
Coy v. Iowa, 487 U.S. 1012 (1988):
“Simply as a matter of Latin as well, since the word “confront” ultimately derives from the prefix “con-” (from “contra” meaning “against” or “opposed”) and the noun “frons” (forehead). Shakespeare was thus describing the root meaning of confrontation when he had Richard the Second say: “Then call them to our presence – face to face, and frowning brow to brow, ourselves will hear the accuser and the accused freely speak . . . .” Richard II, Act 1, sc. 1.”

CITED IN US LAW: 487 US 1012, 1016, 108 Supreme Court 2798, 2800, 106 L.Ed.2d 219, 232 (1989). Justice Scalia “Shakespeare was thus describing the root meaning of confrontation when he had Richard II say ‘then call them to our presence (…. )”

CITED IN EU LAW: Y. v. SLOVENIA – 41107/10 – Chamber Judgment [2015] ECHR 519 (28 May 2015)
The right to confrontation has a long and rich history dating back to Roman law and has become widely developed in common-law systems, where its crux lies in a belief that “[i]t is always more difficult to tell a lie about a person ‘to his face’ than ‘behind his back’, and “even if the lie is told it will often be told less convincingly”. This was explained by Justice Antonin Scalia in the US Supreme Court’s landmark judgment in this respect, Coy v. Iowa[4]. In that judgment Justice Scalia traced the history of the right to confront as a “face-to-face encounter”, illustrated in Shakespeare’s Richard II:
“Shakespeare was thus describing the root meaning of confrontation when he had Richard the Second say:
‘Then call them to our presence-face to face, and
frowning brow to brow, ourselves will hear the accuser
and the accused freely speak.’[5]”
He concluded that “there is something deep in human nature that regards face-to-face confrontation between accused and accuser as ‘essential to a fair trial in a criminal prosecution’”. In California v. Green the right to confrontation was described as the “greatest legal engine ever invented for the discovery of the truth”[6].

Arden:
Apparent danger=Evident threat
Inveterate=Long-standing
Richard uses the royal ‘we’
Face to face, brow to brow=Accuser and accused
High-stomached=Courageous; Arrogant

Schmidt:
High-stomached=Haughty

Compleat:
Inveterate=Verouderd, ingeworteld
The inveterate hatred=Een ingeworteld haat
Stomach (heart or spirit)=Hart

Topics: cited in law, betrayal, language law/legal

Things past redress are now with me past care.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER: Duke of York
CONTEXT:
DUKE OF YORK
Well, well, I see the issue of these arms:
I cannot mend it, I must needs confess,
Because my power is weak and all ill left:
But if I could, by Him that gave me life,
I would attach you all and make you stoop
Unto the sovereign mercy of the king;
But since I cannot, be it known to you
I do remain as neuter. So, fare you well;
Unless you please to enter in the castle
And there repose you for this night.HENRY BOLINGBROKE
An offer, uncle, that we will accept:
But we must win your grace to go with us
To Bristol castle, which they say is held
By Bushy, Bagot and their complices,
The caterpillars of the commonwealth,
Which I have sworn to weed and pluck away.
DUKE OF YORK
It may be I will go with you: but yet I’ll pause;
For I am loath to break our country’s laws.
Nor friends nor foes, to me welcome you are:
Things past redress are now with me past care.

DUTCH:
Meegaan? misschien; beloven doe ik ‘t niet;
Ongaarne doe ik, wat ‘s lands wet verbiedt.
Doch welkom, — vriend of vijand, om het even;
Waar geen herstel op is, ‘t zij opgegeven.

MORE:
Proverb: Past cure past care -Things past redress… (see also Macbeth: Things without remedy, should be without regard.)

The issue=The result
Arms=Taking up of arms
Attach=Arrest
Stoop=Bow down
Neuter=Neutral
Win=Persuade
Complice=Accomplice
Caterpillars=Parasites
Weed=Remove

Compleat:
To take up arms=De wapenen opnemen
To attach=Beslaan, de hand opleggen, in verzekering neemen
To stoop=Buigen, bokken of bukken
Neuter=Onzydig, geenerley
Accomplice=Een Makker, medepligtige
To weed=Wieden, ‘t onkruid uitroeijen

Topics:

Things sweet to taste prove in digestion sour.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: John of Gaunt
CONTEXT:
Things sweet to taste prove in digestion sour.
You urged me as a judge; but I had rather
You would have bid me argue like a father.
O, had it been a stranger, not my child,
To smooth his fault I should have been more mild:
A partial slander sought I to avoid,
And in the sentence my own life destroy’d.
Alas, I look’d when some of you should say,
I was too strict to make mine own away;
But you gave leave to my unwilling tongue
Against my will to do myself this wrong.

DUTCH:
Wat zoet smaakt, is vaak moeilijk te verteren.

MORE:

Proverb: What is sweet in the mouth is oft sour (bitter) in the maw (stomach)

Urge=To press (here: for an opinion)
Partial slander=Accusation of bias, reproach of partiality
Strict=Severe, proceeding by exact rules

Compleat:
Partial=Eenzydig, partydig
Slander=Laster, lasterkladde

Topics: proverbs and idioms, judgment, justice, resolution, error

Think what you will, we seize into our hands His plate, his goods, his money and his lands.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
DUKE OF YORK
(…) If you do wrongfully seize Hereford’s rights,
Call in the letters patent that he hath
By his attorneys-general to sue
His livery, and deny his offer’d homage,
You pluck a thousand dangers on your head,
You lose a thousand well-disposed hearts
And prick my tender patience, to those thoughts
Which honour and allegiance cannot think.
KING RICHARD II
Think what you will, we seize into our hands
His plate, his goods, his money and his lands.
DUKE OF YORK
I’ll not be by the while: my liege, farewell:
What will ensue hereof, there’s none can tell;
But by bad courses may be understood
That their events can never fall out good.

DUTCH:
Denk, wat gij wilt; toch leggen wij de hand
Op al wat zijn was, geld en goed en land.

MORE:

Proverb: Take it as you will (list, please)

Seize=Act of seizure
Gripe=Grasp
Royalties=Rights and prerogatives granted by the King

Compleat:
Seised=Beslagen, aangetast
Seizing=Gryping, aangryping
Seizure=Arrest, op bevel van’t Gerecht
To gripe=Grypen, vatten, nypen
Royalties (royal rights)=De koninglyke rechten, voorrechten

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, law/legal, rights

This and much more, much more than twice all this,
Condemns you to the death. See them deliver’d over.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Henry Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
Till you did make him misinterpret me,
Have stoop’d my neck under your injuries,
And sigh’d my English breath in foreign clouds,
Eating the bitter bread of banishment;
Whilst you have fed upon my signories,
Dispark’d my parks and fell’d my forest woods,
From my own windows torn my household coat,
Razed out my imprese, leaving me no sign,
Save men’s opinions and my living blood,
To show the world I am a gentleman.
This and much more, much more than twice all this,
Condemns you to the death. See them deliver’d over
To execution and the hand of death.

DUTCH:
Dit, en veel meer, veel meer dan tweemaal dit,
Veroordeelt u ter dood. — Men stell’ hen dus
Terecht, en geev’ hen in de hand des doods.

MORE:

Cited in Shakespeare’s Legal Maxims (William Lowes Rushton)

One form of punishment was apparently to deface the arms of traitors and rebels. (Camden’s “Remains”: How the names of them, which for capital crimes against majestie, were erased out of the public records, tables, and registers, or forbidden to be borne by their posteritie, when their memory was damned, I could show at large.”) Berkeley also refers to this punishment in 2.3.

Fed upon=Lived off
Signories=Feudal park; estate, landed property of a lord
Dispark=To treat (a private park) as a common (by divesting it of its enclosures etc.)
Household coat=Coat of arms
Raze out=Erase, scrap away
Imprese=A device, emblem engraved or painted
Sign=Distinguishing mark of (aristocratic) status

Compleat:
To raze out=Uitschrabben, doorhaalen, uitkladden, uitveegen
Imprese=De zinspreuk van eenig wapenschild

Topics: law/legal, punishment, status

This music mads me; let it sound no more; For though it have holp madmen to their wits, In me it seems it will make wise men mad.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.5
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
Now sir, the sound that tells what hour it is
Are clamorous groans, which strike upon my heart,
Which is the bell: so sighs and tears and groans
Show minutes, times, and hours: but my time
Runs posting on in Bolingbroke’s proud joy,
While I stand fooling here, his Jack o’ the clock.
This music mads me; let it sound no more;
For though it have holp madmen to their wits,
In me it seems it will make wise men mad.
Yet blessing on his heart that gives it me!
For ’tis a sign of love; and love to Richard
Is a strange brooch in this all-hating world.

DUTCH:
Dol maakt mij die muziek, dat zij verstomme!
Want bracht zij dollen soms tot hun verstand,
In mij, zoo schijnt het, maakt zij wijsheid dol

MORE:

Clamorous=Vociferous, loud
Posting=Fast
Jack o’ the clock=Figure who would strike the bell on the clock
Holp=Short for holpen, helped. Have holp=May have helped
Wits=Senses
Brooch=Ornament

Compleat:
Holpen=Geholpen
Holp op=Opgeholpen
Wits=Zinnen, oordeel

Topics: time, regret, madness, wisdom

Thou canst help time to furrow me with age

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: John of Gaunt
CONTEXT:
JOHN OF GAUNT
But not a minute, king, that thou canst give:
Shorten my days thou canst with sullen sorrow,
And pluck nights from me, but not lend a morrow;
Thou canst help time to furrow me with age,
But stop no wrinkle in his pilgrimage;
Thy word is current with him for my death,
But dead, thy kingdom cannot buy my breath.
KING RICHARD II
Thy son is banish’d upon good advice,
Whereto thy tongue a party-verdict gave:
Why at our justice seem’st thou then to lour?

DUTCH:
Niet één minuut, o vorst, die gij kunt geven;
Mijn dagen kunt gij korten, ja, door zorgen,
Mij nachten rooven, — leenen — niet éen morgen,
Den tijd wel helpen rimpels mij te groeven,
Zijn doen te stremmen, zult gij niet beproeven;

MORE:

Schmidt:
Current= generally received, of full value, sterling, having currency (Come current as=have currency, be accepted as)
Party-verdict=Joint verdict given by more than one judge
Upon good advice=After careful deliberation, consideration
Lour=Frown, look sullen

Compleat:
Current=Gangbaar
To take a thing for current payment=Iets voor gangbaare munt aanneemen
To lowre=Stuursch kyken, donker uitzien
Lowring countenance=Een stuursch of donker gezigt
Advice=Raad, vermaaning, goedvinden

Topics: time, age/experience, concern , appearance, punishment

Though I did wish him dead,
I hate the murd’rer, love him murdered.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.6
SPEAKER: Henry Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
EXTON
Great king, within this coffin I present
Thy buried fear: herein all breathless lies
The mightiest of thy greatest enemies,
Richard of Bordeaux, by me hither brought.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
Exton, I thank thee not; for thou hast wrought
A deed of slander with thy fatal hand
Upon my head and all this famous land.
EXTON
From your own mouth, my lord, did I this deed.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
They love not poison that do poison need,
Nor do I thee: though I did wish him dead,
I hate the murderer, love him murdered.
The guilt of conscience take thou for thy labour,
But neither my good word nor princely favour:
With Cain go wander through shades of night,
And never show thy head by day nor light.

DUTCH:
Exton, ik dank u niet; voorwaar, ik gruw
Van zulk een daad, waardoor uw booze hand
Vloek brengt op mij en heel dit roemrijk land.

MORE:

Deed of slander=Reproach, disgrace, scandal

Compleat:
Slander=Laster, lasterkladde

Topics: regret, conscience, guilt

Thoughts tending to ambition, they do plot Unlikely wonders

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.5
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
I have been studying how I may compare
This prison where I live unto the world:
And for because the world is populous
And here is not a creature but myself,
I cannot do it; yet I’ll hammer it out.
My brain I’ll prove the female to my soul,
My soul the father; and these two beget
A generation of still-breeding thoughts,
And these same thoughts people this little world,
In humours like the people of this world,
For no thought is contented. The better sort,
As thoughts of things divine, are intermix’d
With scruples and do set the word itself
Against the word:
As thus, ‘Come, little ones,’ and then again,
‘It is as hard to come as for a camel
To thread the postern of a small needle’s eye.’
Thoughts tending to ambition, they do plot
Unlikely wonders; how these vain weak nails
May tear a passage through the flinty ribs
Of this hard world, my ragged prison walls,
And, for they cannot, die in their own pride.

DUTCH:
Eerzuchtige gedachten vormen plannen,
Zoo dol als moog’lijk, als: met zwakke nagels
Door dezer harde wereld kiezelribben

MORE:

Humours=Disposition, temperament
Scruples=Doubts
“Come, little ones”=Reference to the ease (and difficulty) of entering heaven. “Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God” and “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God” (Matthew 19:24)
Ambition=Desire of superiority, of honour and power
Plot=Contrive
Unlikely=Improbable
Flinty ribs=Castle walls

Compleat:
Every man bath his humour=Yder mensch heeft zyn eigen aart
Scrupule, scruple=Zwaarigheid
Ambition=Staatzucht, eergierigheid
Unlikely=Onwaarschynelyk

Topics: emotion and mood, plans/intentions/, imagination

Thus play I in one person many people, And none contented

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.5
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
Thoughts tending to content flatter themselves
That they are not the first of fortune’s slaves,
Nor shall not be the last; like silly beggars
Who sitting in the stocks refuge their shame,
That many have and others must sit there;
And in this thought they find a kind of ease,
Bearing their own misfortunes on the back
Of such as have before endured the like.
Thus play I in one person many people,
And none contented: sometimes am I king;
Then treasons make me wish myself a beggar,
And so I am: then crushing penury
Persuades me I was better when a king;
Then am I king’d again: and by and by
Think that I am unking’d by Bolingbroke,
And straight am nothing: but whate’er I be,
Nor I nor any man that but man is
With nothing shall be pleased, till he be eased
With being nothing. Music do I hear?

DUTCH:
Zoo speel ik veel personen, gansch alleen,
Nooit een tevreed’ne

MORE:

Proverb: I am not the first and shall not be the last

Refuge=Protection from danger, expedient in distress

Compleat:
Refuge=Toevlugt, wyk, schuilplaats

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, poverty and wealth, money, satisfaction

To horse, to horse! urge doubts to them that fear.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Lord Ross
CONTEXT:
NORTHUMBERLAND
(…) If then we shall shake off our slavish yoke,
Imp out our drooping country’s broken wing,
Redeem from broking pawn the blemish’d crown,
Wipe off the dust that hides our sceptre’s gilt
And make high majesty look like itself,
Away with me in post to Ravenspurgh;
But if you faint, as fearing to do so,
Stay and be secret, and myself will go.
LORD ROSS
To horse, to horse! urge doubts to them that fear.
LORD WILLOUGHBY
Hold out my horse, and I will first be there.

DUTCH:
Te paard, te paard! nooit ducht de moed gevaar.

MORE:

Imp out=Mend (another falconry term, to imp a hawk, meaning to repair feathers that were broken or had dropped out)
Broking pawn=The custody of the pawnbroker
Sceptre’s gilt=Superficial display of gold (with ref also to ‘guilt’)
Faint=Are fearful, hesitant
Urge doubts=Speak about doubts
Hold out my horse=If my horse holds out

Compleat:
To shake off the yoke=Het juk afwerpen
To imp=Enten, korten, afknippen
To imp a feather in a hawk’s wing=Een veder in de vleugel van een valk steeken
To imp the wings of one’s fame=Iemands befaamdheid besnoeijen
To imp the feathers of time=Den tyd kortwieken
To hold out=Uithouden, duuren

Topics: courage, statuds, appearance

Towards our assistance we do seize to us The plate, corn, revenues and moveables

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
The ripest fruit first falls, and so doth he;
His time is spent, our pilgrimage must be.
So much for that. Now for our Irish wars:
We must supplant those rough rug-headed kerns,
Which live like venom where no venom else
But only they have privilege to live.
And for these great affairs do ask some charge,
Towards our assistance we do seize to us
The plate, corn, revenues and moveables,
Whereof our uncle Gaunt did stand possess’d.

DUTCH:
Zoo trekken wij tot onze hulp aan ons
Al ‘t zilverwerk, geld, renten, alles, wat
Aan tilb’re have onze oom van Gent bezat.

MORE:

Proverb: Life is a pilgrimage
Proverb: Soon ripe soon rotten

Ask some charge=Will involve expense
Where no venom else=St. Patrick had driven all snakes out of Ireland
Kerns=Irish foot soldiers

Topics: death, money, law/legal, conflict, proverbs and idioms

We thank you both: yet one but flatters us, As well appeareth by the cause you come; Namely to appeal each other of high treason.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
Many years of happy days befall
My gracious sovereign, my most loving liege!
THOMAS MOWBRAY
Each day still better other’s happiness;
Until the heavens, envying earth’s good hap,
Add an immortal title to your crown!
KING RICHARD II
We thank you both: yet one but flatters us,
As well appeareth by the cause you come;
Namely to appeal each other of high treason.
Cousin of Hereford, what dost thou object
Against the Duke of Norfolk, Thomas Mowbray?

DUTCH:
Hebt beiden dank; doch een is slechts een vleier;
De reden van uw hierzijn spreekt dit uit:
Gij legt elkander hoogverraad te last.

MORE:

Schmidt:
Liege=Term used to express allegiance to the king
Hap=Fortune
Appeal=Accuse

Compleat:
A liege Lord=Een Opperheer, die onder niemand staat

Topics: fate/destiny, law/legal, blame, dispute

We were not born to sue, but to command.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: King Richard
CONTEXT:
We were not born to sue, but to command;
Which since we cannot do to make you friends,
Be ready, as your lives shall answer it,
At Coventry, upon Saint Lambert’s day:
There shall your swords and lances arbitrate
The swelling difference of your settled hate:
Since we can not atone you, we shall see
Justice design the victor’s chivalry.
Lord marshal, command our officers at arms
Be ready to direct these home alarms.

DUTCH:
Niet smeeken, maar bevelen is mijn roeping.
Zoo staat, daar geen bevel u kan verzoenen,
Strijdvaardig, als u ‘t leven dierbaar is,
Te Coventry, op Sint Lambertusdag.
Daar zij door zwaard en lans de felle twist
Van uwen haat, die immer wast, beslist.
Daar vrede onmoog’lijk blijkt, spreke in ‘t gevecht
Des overwinnaars ridderschap nu recht.

MORE:

Saint Lambert’s Day. 17 September

Atone=Reconcile
Swelling difference=Growing dispute
Design=To mark out, demonstrate, show

Compleat:
Atone=Verzoenen, bevreedigen
Difference=Verschil
Swell=Oplopen

Topics: law/legal, conflict, justice, resolution

Well you deserve: they well deserve to have, That know the strong’st and surest way to get.

DUTCH:
0, veel verdient gij; — hij verdient te ontvangen,
Die vast en goed den weg weet om te erlangen. —

MORE:

Proverb: They that are bound must obey

Redoubted=Feared, respected (often used to address a monarch)
Want=Fail to provide (a remedy)

Compleat:
Redoubted=Geducht, ontzaglyk
Want=Gebrek

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, statys, remedy, merit

What is thy sentence then but speechless death,
Which robs my tongue from breathing native breath?

DUTCH:
Wat is uw vonnis, dan een stomme dood,
Nu ‘t mij mijn levensademklank verbood?

Cunning=Skilful
Sentence=Verdict (punning on language)
Breathing native breath=Speaking native English (and breathing English air)

Compleat:
Cunning=Behendig

Topics: language, understanding, identity, proverbs and idioms

What subject can give sentence on his king?

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Bishop of Carlisle
CONTEXT:
Worst in this royal presence may I speak,
Yet best beseeming me to speak the truth.
Would God that any in this noble presence
Were enough noble to be upright judge
Of noble Richard! then true noblesse would
Learn him forbearance from so foul a wrong.
What subject can give sentence on his king?
And who sits here that is not Richard’s subject?
Thieves are not judged but they are by to hear,
Although apparent guilt be seen in them;
And shall the figure of God’s majesty,
His captain, steward, deputy-elect,
Anointed, crowned, planted many years,
Be judged by subject and inferior breath,
And he himself not present?

DUTCH:
Kan ooit een onderdaan zijn koning richten?
En wie hier is niet Richards onderdaan?

MORE:

Worst=Lowest-ranking, meanest, most unfit (to speak in the royal presence)
Beseeming=Befitting
Learn him=Teach him
Forbearance=Act of abstaining, restraint, refraining from
Figure=Image
Inferior=Subordinate, lower in station

Compleat:
To beseem=Betaamen, voegen, passen
To learn (teach)=Leeren, onderwyzen
Forbearance=Verdraagzaamheid, verduldigheid, lydzaamheid, langmoedigheid
Forbearance is no acquittance=Uitstellen is geen quytschelden
Figure (representation)=Afbeelding
Inferior=Minder, laager

Topics: order/society, status, truth, appearance, guit, judgmnet

Where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: John of Gaunt
CONTEXT:
DUKE OF YORK
Vex not yourself, nor strive not with your breath;
For all in vain comes counsel to his ear.
JOHN OF GAUNT
O, but they say the tongues of dying men
Enforce attention like deep harmony:
Where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain,
For they breathe truth that breathe their words in pain.
He that no more must say is listen’d more
Than they whom youth and ease have taught to glose;
More are men’s ends mark’d than their lives before:
The setting sun, and music at the close,
As the last taste of sweets, is sweetest last,
Writ in remembrance more than things long past:
Though Richard my life’s counsel would not hear,
My death’s sad tale may yet undeaf his ear

DUTCH:
Vaak klemt het woord van hem, wiens stemme breekt,
Want waarheid ademt, wie zwaar-aad’mend spreekt.

MORE:

Proverb: Dying mean speak true (prophesy)

CITED IN US LAW: People v. Smith 214 Cal. App. 3d 904, 907 (Cal. Ct. App 1989)(Arabian, J).

Must=Can
Listened more=Heard, listened to more closely
Gloze=To make tirades, to make mere words. Veil with specious comments (OED)
Close=Closing phrase (musical)
Remembrance=In memory
Undeaf=To free from deafness

Compleat:
Remembrance=Gedachtenis, geheugenis
To gloze=Vleijen, flikflooijen

Topics: language, value, death, proverbs and idioms, cited in law

Why should we in the compass of a pale Keep law and form and due proportion

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Servant
CONTEXT:
GARDENER
Go, bind thou up yon dangling apricocks,
Which, like unruly children, make their sire
Stoop with oppression of their prodigal weight:
Give some supportance to the bending twigs.
Go thou, and like an executioner,
Cut off the heads of too fast growing sprays,
That look too lofty in our commonwealth:
All must be even in our government.
You thus employ’d, I will go root away
The noisome weeds, which without profit suck
The soil’s fertility from wholesome flowers.
SERVANT
Why should we in the compass of a pale
Keep law and form and due proportion,
Showing, as in a model, our firm estate,
When our sea-walled garden, the whole land,
Is full of weeds, her fairest flowers choked up,
Her fruit-trees all upturned, her hedges ruin’d,
Her knots disorder’d and her wholesome herbs
Swarming with caterpillars?

DUTCH:
Wat moeten we, in den omvang van een heining,
Naar wet en vorm en juistheid alles reeg’len,

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Apricock=Abricot
Spray=Small branches, shoots
Noisome=Harmful
Compass of a pale=Within a fenced area, enclosure
Firm=Well-ordered, stable
Knots=Intricate flowerbeds and plots (Curious-knotted: “thy c. garden,” Love’s Labour’s Lost)

Topics: merit, envy, order/society

Would he not stumble? would he not fall down

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.5
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
GROOM
I was a poor groom of thy stable, king,
When thou wert king; who, travelling towards York,
With much ado at length have gotten leave
To look upon my sometimes royal master’s face.
O, how it yearn’d my heart when I beheld
In London streets, that coronation-day,
When Bolingbroke rode on roan Barbary,
That horse that thou so often hast bestrid,
That horse that I so carefully have dress’d!
KING RICHARD II
Rode he on Barbary? Tell me, gentle friend,
How went he under him?
GROOM
So proudly as if he disdain’d the ground.
KING RICHARD II
So proud that Bolingbroke was on his back!
That jade hath eat bread from my royal hand;
This hand hath made him proud with clapping him.
Would he not stumble? would he not fall down,
Since pride must have a fall, and break the neck
Of that proud man that did usurp his back?
Forgiveness, horse! why do I rail on thee,
Since thou, created to be awed by man,
Wast born to bear? I was not made a horse;
And yet I bear a burthen like an ass,
Spurr’d, gall’d and tired by jouncing Bolingbroke.

DUTCH:
Hij struikelde dus niet? hij stortte niet, —
Trots komt toch vóór den val!

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Proverb: Pride will have a fall

Yearn=Grieve, vex (O. Edd. ‘yern’ and ‘ern’)
Jade=A term of contempt or pity for a worthless or maltreated horse
Bestrid=Sat astride, mounted
Spur-galled=Wounded by spurs

Compleat:
Jade=Een lompig paerd, knol, jakhals
To bestride=Op een paerd zitten
Galled=’t Vel afgseschaafd

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use

Wrath-kindled gentlemen, be ruled by me. Let’s purge this choler without letting blood.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: King Richard II
CONTEXT:
Wrath-kindled gentlemen, be ruled by me.
Let’s purge this choler without letting blood.
This we prescribe, though no physician.
Deep malice makes too deep incision.
Forget, forgive; conclude and be agreed;
Our doctors say this is no month to bleed.
Good uncle, let this end where it begun;
We’ll calm the Duke of Norfolk, you your son.

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Proverb: Forgive and forget

Topics: proverbs and idioms, anger, dispute, justice