Notes for lines 0-1017 ed. Bernice W. Kliman
| 79 He smot the {sleaded pollax} <sledded Pollax> on the ice. | 1.1.63 |
|---|
78 79 2156 2743+14 2743+15 2743+16 3871
16-- Milton
Milton
79 smot] Milton (apud Todd, ed. 1801, 5: 457n), according to an ealier editor (Warton) , uses smote in the sense of destroying dew. See also Psalm 121.6.
ck. this note before entering
1723 pope1
pope1
79 pollax] Pope (ed. 1723): “Pole-axe in the common editions; he speaks of a prince of Poland whom he slew in battle. He uses the word Polack again, act 2. Scene 4. [his 2.4 = 2.2];
1723- mtby2
mtby2
79 pollax]: “nb angry parle.”
1730 Bailey
Bailey
79 sleaded] Bailey (1730) defines Sled and Sledge, fr. Du. or fr. a Sax. word meaning to slide: “a sort of Carriage without, or with broad low Wheels used in Holland; also a Sort of Trough or Cart, in which Traitors are carried to Execution.”
Bailey
79 pollax] Bailey (1730): “[[prob. of Poland, q. d. Polish Ax]] a Sort of Ax.”
1733- mtby3
mtby3 = mtby2
79 pollax]
1743 Anon.
Anon.
79 sleaded pollax] Anon. (1743, p. 221): “Persons of Distinction also take their Diversion at this Time in Sleds, which a Man, that scates behind, pushes forward with a long Pole: . . .At the Imperial, Saxon, and other Courts . . . [t]he Lords and Ladies run races is Sleds . . . . ”
1744 han1
han1
79 sleaded] Hanmer (ed. 1744, 6: Glossary): “carried on a sled or sledge”
1747 warb
warb = pope
79 pollax]
1747- mtby4
mtby4 = Anon 1743
79 Thirlby (1747-): “Dosinphon [?] of Holland p. 221: take their diversion in sleds wch a man that scates behind pushes forward with a long pole—at the Imperial, Saxon & other courts—the Lds & ladies run races in sled & 1. Hoc ibi.”
-1761 Rochester?
Rochester?
79 sleaded pollax on] Rochester? (-1761, p. 193): “Much Contention hath been about this Word Poll-axe: Many pretend to know Shakespear’s Meaning better than himself, say, it should be Polack, for a Polander, whom the King had slain. But then, what will they do with the epithet Sleader [sic]? that agrees with an Axe, but not with a Man; and signifies loaded with lead, or other great Weight like a Sledge-hammer that Smiths use for their heaviest Work. The King was then in an angry Parle (which can’t signify Fighting), and because he could not have his Will, most furiously struck his loaded or heavy Battle-axe into the Ice, on which he then stood.”
Ed. note: See Browne; Rochester in alphabib, and below in v1877, which does not mention that Rochester is a forgery (with, however, some original ideas).
1765 john1
john = pope, via warb + verse in magenta underlined
79 pollax] Johnson (ed. 1765): “Polack was, in that age, the term for an inhabitant of Poland: Polaque, French. As in a [F. Davison’s] translation of Passeratius’s epitaph on Henry III. of France, published by Camden: ‘Whether thy chance of choice the hither brings, Stay , passenger, and wail the best of kings. This little stone a great king’s heart doth hold, Who rul’d the fickle French and Polacks bold: So frail are even the highest earthly things. Go, passenger, and wail the hap of kings.’”
1773 jen
jen = han1 without attribution
79 sleaded]
1773 v1773
v1773 = john
79 pollax]
v1773
79 sleaded] Steevens (ed. 1773): “A sled, or sledg] Is a carraige without wheels, made use of in cold countries. Steevens.”
1778 v1778
v1778 = v1773 +
79 pollax] Steevens (ed. 1778): “Again, in Vittoria Corombona, &c. 1612: ‘—I scorn him Like a shav’d Pollack—’”
v1778 = v1773 +
79 sleaded] Steevens (ed. 1778): “So, in Tamburlaine or the Scythian Shepherd, 1590. ‘—upon an ivory sled. Thou shalt be drawn among the frozen poles.’ Steev.”
1784 ays1
ays1 ≈ john
79 pollax] Ayscough (ed. 1784): “He speaks of a prince of Poland whom he slew in battle. Polack was, in that time, the term for an inhabitant of Poland: Polaque, French. ”
ays1 ≈ v1773
79 sleaded] Ayscough (ed. 1784): “A sled, or sledge. is a carriage made use of in the cold countries.”
1785 Heron (Pinkerton)
Heron: v1773 + in magenta underlined
79 pollax] Heron (1785, p. 310): “Polack is from the French; but the annotator seems not to know that polaque in French is the same with polacre, a coasting vessel. It is in old French that Polaque is equivalent to Polonois, a Polander. Montaigne, in his Travels, Paris 1775, speaking of the Pope, ‘Outre cela il a baffi des collieges pour les Grecs, pour les Anglois, Escoffois, François, pour les Allemands, et our les Polacs.’ The editor’s note on the last word is, ‘Les Polonois. On ecrit Polaques: et ce nom vient de la Polaquie qui est le Palatinat de Bieliko.’ Montaigne wrote about Shakspere’s time; tho his Travels, which are indeed not worth publishing, were never printed till 1775.”
1785 v1785
v1785 = v1778
79 sleaded]
1787 ann
ann = v1785 minus the part of john on Passeratius’s epitaph
79 pollax]
1790 mal
mal: john on Polack, Steevens on sledded, with Tam ref. +
79 sleaded pollax] Malone (ed. 1790): “All the old copies have Polax.—Mr. Pope, and the subsequent editors read—Polack; but the corrupted word shews, I think, that Shakespeare wrote —Polacks.”
1791- rann
rann ≈ v1785
79 sleaded pollax] Rann (ed. 1791-): “In a fierce engagement he slew a prince of Poland, bourne on a sledge, the usual carriage in such cold countries.”
1793 v1793
v1793 = mal +
79 pollax] Steevens (ed. 1793): “We cannot well suppose that in a parley the King belaboured many, as it is not likely that provocation was given by more than one, or that on such occasion he would have condescended to strike a meaner person than a prince.”
v1793 = v1778, mal
79 sleaded]
1803 v1803
v1803 = v1793
79 sleaded pollax]
1813 v1813
v1813 = v1803
79 sleaded pollax]
1819 cald1
cald1: mal without attribution, v1778 +
79 sleaded pollax] Caldecott (ed. 1819): “When in an angry conference on the ice, he dealt out his blows upon the Poles, who are accustomed to travel in sleds. i.e. sledges. on the ice.
“The Poles were formerly called Polacks, in all the old editions written Pollax; the spelling doubtless, in conformity with the pronunciation.
“ ‘The Polonian, whom the Russe calleth laches, noting the first author or founder of the nation, who was called Laches or Leches, whereunto is added Po, which signifieth people, and so is made Polaches; that is, the people or posteritie of Laches: which the Latines [? illeg.], after their manner of writing, call Polanos.’ Giles Fletcher’s Russe Commonwealth, 12mo. 1591, fol. 65. ”
1821 v1821
v1821 = v1813 +
79 pollax] Boswell (ed. 1821): “After all it is just possible that the old reading may be right. Poleax may, by a not uncommon figure, be put for the person who carried the pole-axe, a mark of some rank among the Muscovites; as ‘the wry-necked fife,’ is used for fifer ; or, as we should talk at this day, of the gold stck in waiting. ‘After that the same day he sent a great and glorious Duke, one of them that held the golden pole-ax, with his retinue, and sundry sorts of meath to drink merrily with the Ambassador.’ Milton’s Brief Hist. of Moscovia.”
1822 Nares
Nares: standard, Steevens +
79 pollax] Nares (1822): “A Polander; Polaque, French. [quotes 79].
“Pole was also used; both occur together afterwords: [quotes 2743+14-2743+16].
“In the former passage, the early editions all read Poleaxe, which perhaps was only intended for the plural of this word. The weapon of that name was spelt poll-axe, or pole-axe. But of Polack in this place, the singular is more dignified, and perhaps more probable, as it was in a parle, when a general slaughter was not likely to ensue. Mr. Steevens, however, thought that the plural was intended. [quotes White Devil, O. Pl. vi. 267—‘I scorn him Like a shav’d Polack.’—where the word seems to mean an individual, and Witches 4to D 3, by Heywood and Br. Lanc.—where Polack stands for the people as a whole.].”
Ed. note: Nares used Q3 not Q2
1825 European Magazine
"Gunthio" pseudonym: v1793; mal on Polacks, without attribution
79 pollax] "Gunthio" (1825, p. 343): “It has been recommended, upon the authority of this reading [TLN 78-9], to substitute Polacks for Polack, but of this I cannot approve. In the first place, ’pollax,’ the old mode of spelling poleaxe, doubtless found a place in the text solely through a blunder of the [Q1] transcriber, who either heard the word indistinctly, or perhaps knew not what Polack meant; and secondly, as Steevens remarks [quotes v1793].”
Ed. note:: note that here Gunthio differs from col1, which accepts the plural, as do many of its predecessors. See textual notes.
1826 sing1
sing1: john without attribution, v1793 without attribution, mal, Boswell
79 sleaded pollax] Singer (ed. 1826) “ ‘sledded Polack’ i.e. sledged Polander; Polaque, Fr. The old copy reads Pollax. Malone therefore thinks that Shakspeare wrote Polacks, not considering that it was in a parley, and [from v1793] that a general slaughter was hardly likely to ensue. Mr. Boswell suggests that it is just possible the old reading may be right, pole-ax being put for the person who carried the pole-axe, a mark of rank among the Muscovites, as he has shown from Milton’s Brief History of Muscovy.”
1832 cald2
cald2 = cald1 + in magenta underlined
79 sleaded pollax]
Caldecott (ed. 1832): “
i.e. when in an angry conference on the ice, he dealt out his blows upon the Poles, who are accustomed to travel in sleds. i.e. sledges.
carriages without wheels, on the ice.
“The Poles were formerly called Polacks, in all the old editions written Pollax : the spelling doubtless, in conformity with the pronunciation.
“ ‘The Polonian, whom the Russe calleth laches, noting the first author or founder of the nation, who was called Laches or Leches, whereunto is added Po, which signifieth people, and so is made Polaches; that is, the people or posteritie of Laches: which the Latines, after their manner of writing, call Polanos.’ Giles Fletcher’s Russe Commonwealth, 12mo. 1591, fo. 65. “Steevens [v1778] cites Vittoria Corombona, 1612. ‘I scorn him like a shav’d Polack.’ ”
1833 valpy
valpy: standard
79 sleaded pollax] Valpy (ed. 1833): “Sledged Polanders.”
1839 knt1
knt1: Steevens; knt1 = mal without attribution
79 pollax] Knight (ed. 1839): “In the old copies the word is spelt Pollax, according probably with the pronunication. Steevens reads Polack, ‘as it is not likely that provocation was given by more than one.’ ”
1843 knt2
knt2 ≈ knt1
79 pollax]
1843 col1
col1: standard
79 sleaded pollax] Collier (ed. 1843): “i.e. the sledged Polanders; ‘Polacks’ (spelt Pollax) was the name by which they were known in Shakespeare’s time.”
1845 Hunter
Hunter: standard + analogue in magenta underlined
79 sleaded]Hunter (1845, 2:213 ): “Sled is a sledge. In the Synonymous Sylva, 1595, it stands as equivalent to dray.”
Ed. note: A dray is a lowly cart, not likely to hold a fit adversary for a king.— See also Pepys, below.
Hunter: standard + analogue
79 pollax]
Hunter (1845, 2: 213-14): <p. 213>“‘Polack’ is French. It occurs everywhere in
Les </p. 213><p. 214>
Croniques et Annales de Poloigne, by Blase de Vigenere, 4to, 1573, where we say Pole.” </p. 214>
1856 hud1
hud1 ≈ col1 without attribution
79 sleaded pollax]
1856 sing2
sing2 = sing1 minus mal ref.
79 sleaded pollax]
1857 fieb
fieb
79 smot] Fiebig (ed. 1857): “To smite; pret. smote; pass. smit, smitten; to strike, to kill.”
1857 dyce1
dyce1 = Steevens, with attribution, perhaps via v1821,≈ mal without attribution, + in magenta underlined
79 sleaded pollax] Dyce (ed. 1857): “Spelt in old eds. ‘pollax’ and ‘Pollax,’ &c.—Pope printed ‘Polack.’ &c. and Steevens observes, ‘We . . . prince.’ It would seem, however, that here the ‘polax’ of the old eds. was intended for the plural; since, afterwards in this play, their spelling of the singular is ‘Polacke,’ ‘Pollacke,’ ‘Poleack,’ ‘Polock,’ and ‘Polake.’
1858 col3
col3 = col1 text and note
79 sleaded pollax]
1860 stau
stau ≈ dyce1 without attribution
79 sleaded pollax] Staunton (ed. 1860): “The sledged Polanders; though it may be doubtful whether the original ‘Pollax’ was intended as the singular or plural: many editors read, ‘Polack.’”
1862 cham
cham : standard; pope; Steevens
79 sleaded pollax] Carruthers & Chambers (ed. 1862): “The sledged Poles or Polanders. In the old copies, it is Pollax. Pope and Steevens preferred the singular Polack, holding it to signify a Polish Prince.”
1864 bickers
bickers: standard
79 sleaded] Clarke & Clarke (ed. 1864, Glossary): “Borne in a sled, or sledge.”
bickers: standard
79 pollax] Clarke & Clarke (ed. 1864, Glossary): “Polack. A Polander.”
1864 N&Q
Leo:
79 sleaded pollax]
Leo (
N&Q v.6, ser. 3 [Nov. 19, 1864]: 410-11)
apud Leo,1885, pp. 79-80): <p. 79>“I have always regarded
sleaded or, as the modern editors read,
sledded as nonsense. What a ridiculous position it must have been to see a king, in full armour, smiting down a sledded man,
i.e., a man sitting in a sledge! It would not have been a kinglike action. And it was of course not a remarkable, not a memorable fact, that in the cold Scandinavian country in wintertime people were found sitting in a sledge; nobody would have wondered at it—perhaps more at the contrary.”
“When the king frowned in an angry parle, he must have been provoked to it by an irritating behaviour of the adversary, and Horatio, remem- </p.79 ><p. 80> bering the fact, will surely also bear in mind the cause of it, and so, I suppose, he used an epithet which points out the provoking manner of the Polack; and, following as much as possible the word sleaded, I should like to propose the word sturdy, or as it would have been written in Shakespare’s time—sleaded. sturdie.” </p. 80>
1864 mLatham
mLatham: re 2156 Folger c. a. 25 (2) (vol. iv of Ingleby letters).
79 pollax] Latham (1864): “A very very Peacock,Paddock,Piaycock”
“Assume that Shakespear made Hamlet talk like a Dane of the beginning of the 16th century, and there is term of abuse and contempt which would fit the hiatus under notice in the way of extreme form as well as any thing suggested, and, in the way of sense, better. This is Polack = Pole; as in another line of the play in question—‘He smote the sledded Polaik on the ice.’ Until the rise of the Brandenburg Prussians, and the Muscovite Russians, the power of Poland along the southern coats of the Baltic was considerable: indeed it, as the Pomerania, was more or less Polish, Poland was nimium vianca Cremonæ in respect to Denmark. Add to this numerous Polish & Swedish alliances, none of which the Danes liked. The result was [?] the bète noiri of the Dane was the Pole; and Polack was the common Danish term of abuse or dislike. It was rife in Shakespears time: and I believe it may be heard even now. The latest instance of it in fact [?] which I remember is in a song of Rapbek’s [?], a writer of the present century: where it specifically means a ‘man who flinches his glass’ but it also means a ‘snob’ in general— Bear yourselves as men: A Polack is not to be borne: To morrow we die: This evening we drink.’ Of course, if I were a Shakespearian commentator I should suggest this reading—not because I thought that Shakespear wrote it (for the preliminary assumption is doubtful; but because it could show that I knew Danish his— a much more important matter. Ever yours most [?] R G Latham. original [quotes his song in Danish]”.
1865 hal
hal: standard + Smith, Pepys in magenta underlined
79 sleaded pollax] Halliwell (ed. 1865): “ ‘Polacks, that is, Poles. inhabitants of Poland. ‘Colleaguing himself to many potent princes, especially the mightie Polacks, heretofore the most mortall enemie to the Russie,’ Sir Thomas Smithes Voiage and Entertainment in Russia, 1605.
Going to take water upon Tower Hill, me met with three sleddes standing there to carry my Lord Monson and Sir H. Mildnay to the gallows and back again with ropes about their necks.—Pepys Diary, 1662.”
1866 dyce2
dyce2 = dyce1 +
79 sleaded pollax] Dyce (ed. 1866): “—1865. The highly descriptive epithet in this line ‘sledded’ (i.e. borne or mounted on a sled) is pronounced to be ‘nonsense’ by Professor Leo, who ‘should like to propose the word “sturdy”’ in its stead; see Notes and Queries for Nov. 19, p. 410.”
1868 c&mc
c&mc ≈ dyce2 without attribution
79 sledded] “‘Sledded’ is used to express ‘borne in a sled,’ or sledge . . .”
c&mc ≈ sing2 without attribution + in magenta underlined
79 pollax]
Clarke & Clarke (ed, 1868): “‘
Polack’ means ‘Polander,’ ‘native of Poland.’
The old copies spell the word ‘Pollax,’ which has led some to suppose that the author intended to give the word ‘Polacks.’ Inasmuch, however, as twice elsewhere in the play Shakespeare employs ‘Polack,’ in the singular, to express the Polish people collectively, we think he probably wrote ‘Polack’ here (see Note 34, Act ii.), even if he meant to designate a body of Polanders; but the word ‘parle’ seems to imply that the Polish leader only was intended.”
1869 strat
strat
79 sleaded pollax] Stratmann (ed. 1869): “‘sleaded (sledded)’ may be a mistake, but ‘pollax’ is certainly not.”
1872 cln1
cln1: standard +
79 sleaded] Clark & Wright (ed. 1872): “sledded, from ‘sled.’ Cotgrave (French Dict.) gives ‘Train, a sled, a drag, or dray without wheeles.’”
cln1
79 pollax] Clark & Wright (ed. 1872): “The word occurs four times in Hamlet. For ‘the sledded Polacks’ Moltke reads ‘his leaded pole-axe.’ But this would be an anti-climax, and the poet having mentioned ‘Norway’ in the first clause, would certainly have told us with whom the ‘angry parle’ was held.”
1872 hud2
hud2 = hud1
79 sleaded pollax]
1873 rug2
rug2
79 Moberly (ed. 1873): “It must be remembered that Finland, Esthonia, and Livonia, the icy regions along the Baltic, where sledges would be most used, belonged to the kingdom of Poland before they were ceded to Charles XI of Sweden; and that it was only in 1703 that Russia began to come in contact with the Baltic. The name ‘Polack’ would appear to be a pronunciation of the collective ‘Polesia,’ a name still applied to the part of Poland near Kiew.”
1875 Athenaeum 3 April 1875
C. Eliot Browne: Rochester
79 sleaded pollax]
79 sleaded pollax]
Schmidt (1875): “probably = having a sled or sledge, i.e., a heavy hammer, to it [i.e. the pollax], or similar to a heavy hammer. . . . Hamlet, provoked to anger in a conference with the king of Norway, struck the ice with his pole-axe as with a mighty hammer.” He argues that sleaded pollax cannot mean “Polanders conveyed on sledges . . . .” The whole scene is evidently taken from a war against Norway, where ice-fields may be expected.”
1877 v1877
v1877: tieck, Friesen, del, elze, tsch, Leo, molt, cln1, G. Eliot, Browne, john, mal, dyce, Steevens, Boswell + in magenta underlined
79 sleaded pollax]
Furness (ed. 1877): “
German commentators have found more difficulty in this phrase than the English.
Tieck supposes (and so translates) that the king ‘dashed his sliding Pole axe on the ice.’ ‘Sledded,’ he adds, ‘according to a license frequent in Sh., stands for ‘sledding,’
which Tieck mistook for ‘sliding.’ The folly of this interpretation and its errors were exposed by Delius. But the spelling of Qq sleaded, and the lack of a capital P in pollax, together with its Roman letters (proper names in the old copies being usually printed in italics), still presented inexplicable difficulties.
v1877
79 sleaded pollax]
Friesen (apud Furness, ed. 1877) inclines to Tieck, believing it more ‘conceivable that the king dashed down on the ice his
sleaded battle-axe (whatever that might be) than that he struck an enemy or smote him to the ground, for in this case, the king’s visor would have been down, and Horatio could not have seen the frown on his face.’ Wherefore, he concludes, there is greater likelihood of finding verbal obscurities in Sh.’s text than downright nonsense.
v1877: elze; del
79 sleaded pollax]
Furness (ed. 1877): “
Elze and
Delius follow the English commentators, and scout the idea of ‘poleaxe.’ The former follows Pope, on the ground that Polack is generally found in the singular, and refers to the Polish king, just as ‘the Dane’ is used in [21] of this scene.”
v1877: tsch
79 sleaded pollax]
Furness (ed. 1877): “
Tschischwitz also follows Pope, because the plural
Polacks would signify the whole Polish army, and it would be monstrous to suppose that the whole army could travel in sleighs; the ‘sledded Polack’ is therefore merely the Polish king, who, and who alone, had come to the conference on a sled. If the word ‘Poleaxe’ be adopted, insuperable difficulties attend the interpretation of ‘sledded.’ If it means
sledged , it refers to the battle-axe, to which a war-club (Old North German
sleggja) has been added, and the words ‘on the ice’ are
used instead of the more natural phrase
on the ground to indicate that the parle took place on some frozen neutral river.”
v1877: molt
79 sleaded pollax] “Moltke (apud ed. 1877) believes that he has discovered the correct reading on aesthetic as well as philological grounds; Sh. wishes to portray to us the character of the deceased king, which must be full of grandeur and dignity. Such rage as Tieck’s interpretation implies would be most unseemly; besides, by dashing down his poleaxe, he would disarm himself, which would be silly. The idea, therefore, conveyed by the word ‘smite’ must be personal to the king; it must be some gesture, not a blow delivered on an enemy. What, therefore, more natural than that he should strike his Poleaxe violently on the ice, just as any honest citizen is wont by way of emphasis to strike his fist on the table? ‘Sledded’ is a sophistication of the printers, and the correct text is his leaded poleaxe, i.e. his poleaxe loaded with lead; or his edged poleaxe, i.e. sharpened; or, for aught to the contrary, his sledged poleaxe.”
Furness continues with
cln1’s objection to
Moltke. Then follows with “Curiously enough, this emendation of Moltke’s has been anticipated not by a German. but by an Englishman. In the
Athenæum, 3d April, 1875,
C. Eliot Browne gives some notes on
Hamlet by the Earl of Rochester, 1761, and on the present passage is the following:
79 sleaded pollax] Rochester (1761, apud ed. 1877): “Sleaded agrees with an axe, but not with a man; and signifies loaded with lead . . . the king was then in an angry parle (which can’t signify fighting), and because he could not have his will most furiously struck his loaded or heavy battle-axe into the ice.”
1880 meik
meik: rug2 without attribution on political boundaries.
79 pollax] Meikeljohn (ed. 1880): “Polack {as in H. Ger. Die Polachen) was the O. E. word for Pole or Polander. Webster (quoted by Mr. Rolf) has the phrase: ‘Like a shav’d Polack.’ The word does not occur anywhere else in S. (except in [3871] ) [also in 1088, 1100, 2743+16, all of which he does not mention]; nor does sledded.”
1881 hud3
hud3 = hud2
79 sleaded pollax]
1883 wh2
wh2 : standard
79 pollax] White (ed. 1883): “Poles.”
1885 macd
macd: standard on pole-ax;
Schmidt + 79 sleaded pollax]
MacDonald (ed. 1885): “The usual interpretation is ‘the sledged Poles’; but not to mention that in a parley such action would have been treacherous, there is another far more picturesque, and more befitting the
angry parle at the same time more characteristic and forcible: the king in his anger smote his loaded pole-axe on the ice. There is some uncertainty about the word
sledded or
sleaded (which latter suggests
lead), but we have the word
sledge and
sledge-hammer, the smith’s heaviest, and the phrase, ‘a sledging blow.’ The quarrel on the occasion referred to rather seems with the Norwegians (see
Schmidt’s
Shakespeare-Lexicon: Sledded) than with the Poles; and there would be no doubt as to the latter interpretation being the right one, were it not that
the Polacke, for the Pole, or nation of the Poles, does occur in the play. That is, however, no reason why the Dane should not have carried a pole-axe, or caught one from the hand of an attendant. In both our authorities, and in the 1
st Q. also, the word is
pollax—as in Chaucer’s
Knight’s Tale: ‘No maner schot, ne pollax, ne schort knyf,’—in the
Folio alone with a capital; whereas not once in the play is the similar word that stands for the Poles used in the plural. In the 2
nd Quarto there is
Pollacke three times,
Pollack once,
Pole once; in the 1
st Quarto, Polacke twice; in the
Folio, Poleak twice,
Polake once.The Poet seems to have avoided the plural form.”
1885 Leo
79 sleaded pollax]
Leo (1885, pp. 78-80): <p. 78> “The Quarto of 1604 gives the following form—
He smot the sleaded Pollax on the Ice. [He’s wrong about the capital P and I] Malone says: ‘All the old copies have Polax. </p. 78><p. 79> Mr. Pope and the subsequent editors read
Polack; but the corrupted word shows, I think, that Shakespeare wrote
Polacks.’
“This conclusion seems to be somewhat weak. Why does the corrupted words show, that Shakespeare wrote Polacks? Why does it not show that he wrote Pole-axe? The corruption would be a lesser one and the meaning clearer and better. I mist recur to some of the same words I wrote in Note and Queries (III.v.410):
“‘I have always regarded sleaded or, as the modern editors read, sledded as nonsense. What a ridiculous position it must have been to see a king, in full armour, smiting down a sledded man, i.e., a man sitting in a sledge! It would not have been a kinglike action. And it was of course not a remarkable, not a memorable fact, that in the cold Scandinavian country in wintertime people were found sitting in a sledge; nobody would have wondered at it—perhaps more at the contrary.’
“In the following words of my note I contend for the word sturdy:
“‘When the king frowned in an angry parle, he must have been provoked to it by an irritating behaviour of the adversary, and Horatio, remem- </p.79 ><p. 80> bering the fact, will surely also bear in mind the cause of it, and so, I suppose, he used an epithet which points out the provoking manner of the Polack; and, following as much as possible the word sleaded, I should like to propose the word sturdy, or as it would have been written in Shakespeare’s time—sleaded. sturdie.’
“I do not agree with
sturdy to-day, because I do not agree with ‘the Polacks;’ but notwithstanding I must say:
If any one adheres to ‘Polacks’—and many do—he cannot find a better adjective than
sturdy. It is in every case far from being such nonsense as
sledded, and I am sure it does not merit the smiling irony of my most honoured friend H. H.
Furness. Mr. Pope says: ‘He speaks of a prince of Poland whom he slew in battle.’
“I never heard of a battle called a ‘parle,’ and I cannot suppose that a parliamentary negotiation between two monarchs would end in a row. No! Horatio speaks of two positions he has seen the dead king in: the first, when he went to war against Norway—Horatio remembers the very armour the king had on; the second, when he </p. 80><p. 81> became angry in the course of a discussion, and—to vent his anger—smote his steeled pole-axe on the ice. (For ‘to smite’ in the same sense, see Lucrece, 176.) You must see him how he frowned, how he tried to overcome his passion, and how at last this grew upon him, and he lifted his arm, and battered the axe down on the ice! There is more life, more action and nature in this picture, than in the poor Polack, who tumbles down and falls on his nose.” </p. 81>
1890 irv2
irv2: standard VN; standard gloss; : dyce, cald on Fletcher, mal, Boswell on Milton; ≈ macd without attribution +
79 sleaded pollax] Marshall (ed. 1890) weighs possibilities for leaded, pole-ax, &c. without coming to any firm conclusion
1899 ard1
ard1: standard gloss; Rochester; Cotgrave;
Schmidt 79 sleaded]
1900 ev1
ev1: mal; ≈ macd
79 sleaded pollax] Herford (ed. 1900): “the ‘pole-axe weighted with a sledge or hammer at the back.’ Malone proposed ‘Polacks,” i. e. the Poles in their sledges; which many editors adopt. But there is little doubt that, as the advocates of ‘pole-axe’ urge, the tenor of the description suggests a momentary outburst of fury rather than a prolonged fight. The chief difficulty in this view is the word ‘sledded.’ ‘Sled’ is a dialectic and archaic form for ‘sledge’ the vehicle (that which slides), but no other example of its use for ‘sledge’ a hammer (that which slogs), the former sledge itself probably owing its unetymological palatal to confusion with the latter. But this very confusion tends to justify our assignment to ‘sledded’ here in the proper meaning of ‘sledged.’”
c. 1900 lee
lee
79 sleaded pollax] Lee (ed. c. 1900): “Fynes Morison, in his Itinerary, 1617 (pt. i, 63, and pt. iii, 104), notes that Poles habitually travelled in ‘sledges.’ He also (pt. iii, 170-1) describes them as wearing, when under arms, ‘shooes of leather and also of wood both painted & both shodde under the heele and toes with pieces of Iron making a great noise as they goe,’— a description which has suggested that ‘sledded’ or ‘sleaded’ may refer to the heavy manner in which the Poles were shod. Possibly ‘sledded,’ as an epithet of ‘pole-axe,’ might also mean either ‘leaded’ pr ‘sledge’ (i.e. heavy) as in ‘sledge-hammer.’ But it is more reasonable to assume that during a hard winter the elder Hamlet lost his temper in some negotiation with Polish foes (whether ‘sledded’ refers to their sledges or their heavy boots) and struck them, than that a heavy pole-axe was his weapon of war. War between Norway and Poland is noticed [1100-5], infra.”
1903 rlf3
79 sleaded pollax] Rolfe (ed. 1903): “The objection to this interpretation is the utter insignificance of the act [striking the ice with a pole-ax],—like stamping his foot on the ice. The frown might be remembered as characteristic by one who had seen it, but to add the mention of the act would be a most ‘lame and impotent’ conclusion to the statement . . . . also Webster, White Devil: ‘Like a shav’d Polack.’”
1905 rltr
rltr: standard
79 sleaded] Chambers (ed. 1905): “sleigh-borne.”
1907 bull
bull: standard
79 Bullen (ed. 1907, 10: 432) finds the theories listed in v1877 “miracles of ineptitude,” especially Moltke’s idea.
1891 dtn1
dtn1: standard for sledded Polacks; john
79 the sleaded pollax] Deighton (ed. 1891): “the Poles fighting from their sledges; it is not of course necessary to suppose that all the Polish army was in sledges, the word sledded being used merely as a graphic touch; [quotes john].”
1913 tut2
tut2: VN, mal, Pope,
contra Schmidt, Cotgrave (≈
rlf3)
79 sleaded pollax]
Goggin (ed. 1913): “ . . . there is no authority for
sled as a form of
sledge in [
Schmidt’s] sense.”
1924 vand
vand: pope, mal, molt; contra knt, Greg
79 sleaded pollax]
Van Dam (1924, p. 141) objects to the image, depicted in Knight’s ed., of King Hamlet smoting “Polacks on the ice. If old Hamlet had been endowed with Herculean strength he could have done this” but to have done so in a
parle is beyond belief. The problem is solved by emending
sleaded to
dreaded. Van Dam also objects to Greg’s idea that the poleaxe could be like a sledge-hammer: “It would be better not to have such suppositions printed unless there be added to them a passage from Shakespeare or from one of his contemporaries from which appears that there may be some ground for such a supposition.”
1929 adam
adam
79 pollax] Adams (ed. 1929): “Polack: the King of Poland; the elder Hamlet, angered in the conference, probably struck him with his glove or hand.”
1929 trav
trav: Onions; NED (1919); mal; pope +
79 the sleaded pollax]
Travers (ed. 1929), who thinks this may mean something like
sledge hammer, discusses the various interpretations. He calls the pole-ax “a formidable
short-handled weapon,” and does not think that such a fierce action as striking it on the ice remarkable for the period, however odd it might seem in the 20th century. “‘
The ’ also is a difficulty, since it seems to point to this arm [i.e. armament] as characteristic of the Danes (or, at leasr, of the people of that part of Europe); which there is no reason for thinking.” He thinks, on the other hand, that the interpretation that has the King of Denmark strike the King of Poland during a parley “is sufficiently in accord with the barbarous times suggested. It would also render the parallelism with [77] all . . . that might be wished.” But only textual evidence can prove this case.
1931 crg1
crg1 : standard gloss; Rochester;
Schmidt
79 sleaded pollax]
Craig (ed. 1931) accepts the standard interpretation, Poles on sledges, but also mentions the contrary view of Rochester, accepted by
Schmidt.
1934 rid1
rid1
79 sleaded pollax] Ridley (ed. 1934): “The usual reading, sledded Polacks, and its interpretation, that he fell upon the sledged Poles, seem to me equally untenable. In the first place it is odd that Q2, having just printed Norway normally in italics, should two lines lower print a proper name in roman and will a lowercase initial; and not less off when we find in [1088] the normal singular normally printed Pollacks, and in [3871] Pollack. In the second places, as a matter of behaviour, it is odd that he should fall upon his enemies in a ‘parle’ however angry, and, even if he did, even odder that in the heat and rapid movement of action what should be noticed about him was his frown. It seems clear to me that the picture is of a man frowning in anger and striking his poleaxe on the ice. Sleaded is still difficult. Just possibly we should read his loaded for the sleaded.”
1934 Wilson
Wilson MSH: mal
79 pollax] Wilson (1934, p. 303, p. 303n) considers this variant a spelling error. He sees no merit in the idea of a leaded poleaxe.
1934 cam3
cam3 = mal +
79 sleaded pollax] Wilson (ed. 1934): “A battle upon the ice is not at all impossible on or near the Baltic.”
1937 pen1
pen1: VNs +
79 sleaded pollax] Harrison (ed. 1937): “ [. . . ] Poleaxe is probably correct, for the axe was the national weapon of the Danes; as Nashe sneered: ‘the most gross and senseless proud dolts . . . are the Danes, who stand so much upon their unwieldy burly-boned soldiery, that they account of no man that hath not a battle axe at his girdle to hough dogs with.’ [[Piers Penniless, 1591, ed. McKerrow, i, 177.]] ”
1938 parc
parc
79 sleaded pollax] Parrott & Craig (ed. 1938) justify their choice with the argument that it “gives the sense of what Shakespeare intended, i.e. that the dead King once smote, i.e. defeated, the Poles (Shakespeare calls then Pollacks, cf. [1088] and [2743+16]) who ride in sleds in a battle fought upon a frozen lake or bay. To interpret, as some English and more German commentators do, the [Q2] sleaded pollax as sledged pole-ax, or halberd is to violate English idiom. One does not smite a weapon on an object but smites the object with the weapon, cf. numerous instances of this usage in N. E. D. There is, however, one instance in Shakespeare’s [Luc. 176], which runs contrary to common usage. ‘His falchion on a flint he softly smiteth.’”
Re lc pollax“ Wilson suggests that the minuscule p in [Q1 and Q2] is due to the fact that the secretary capital was so elaborate (cf. Kellner, p. 205) that an author writing hastily often used a minuscule instead.”
1939 kit2
kit2 ≈ parc without attribution + in magenta underlined
79 Kittredge (ed. 1939): the parley degenerated into a battle in which King Hamlet “smote (routed) the Polanders. Cf. Judges, 3:13: ‘And he [. . .] went and smote Israel.’”
kit2: standard
79 sleaded pollax] Kittredge (ed. 1939): The Polanders, who ride in sledges.
Ed note: In a separate textual note, Kittredge acknowledges his debt to mal for his variant sledded Polacksand lists other variants.
1947 cln2
cln2: standard gloss
79 sleaded pollax]
1952 har
har: standard +
79 sleaded pollax] Harrison (ed. 1952) points out, “There is no further reference to this incident.”
1956 N&Q
Murphy: mal; Steevens (on inappropriateness of blow) without attribution
79 sleaded pollax] Murphy (N&Q 201[Dec. 1956], 509): “Malone’s change of the word ‘pollax’ to ‘Polack’ [sic. Murphy is incorrect here] in the opening scene of Hamlet has been generally accepted: ‘ . . . in an angry parle He smote the sledded Polack on the ice.’ In Hamlet, II. ii [1088, 1100], Shakespeare twice uses ‘Polack’ in referring to Poles.
“But the elder Hamlet would be out of character in striking a Pole in a parley, especially so if the Pole were embedded in a sled.
“In the Fourth Folio the spelling was ‘Pole-axe’; in all the earlier editions ‘Pollax’ or ‘pollax.’ Lodge had so used the word in addressing the reader of Rosalynde.
“Might Shakespeare have written ‘studded pollax’? In the Færie Queene. V, XII. iv, Spenser wrote: ‘And in his hand an huge Polaxe did beare, Whose steale was yron studded, but not long.’ Pauline Henley here notes: ‘Specimens of ancient weapons, short and broad, and attached to handles by huge rivets are to be seen in the National Museum.’
“It would see that a compositor might as likely have changed ‘studded’ to ‘sledded” as to have changed ‘Polack” to ‘pollax.’
Mallie 
John Murphy.”
1958 fol1
fol1
79 sleaded pollax] sledded Polacks Wright & LaMar (ed. 1958): “that is, Polish soldiers in sleds. Textual scholars have long debated this passage. The early editions of the play printed the word ’pollax’ and some editors have held that it should be ’poleax.’ Edmund Malone was the first to emend it to ’Polacks.’ ”
1980 pen2
pen2
79 sleaded pollax] Barton (ed. 1980, p. 21): “weighted battle-axe”
1980 pen2
pen2
79 sleaded pollax] Spencer (ed. 1980) doubts that the king’s anger during a heated parley and his smiting of multiple Poles can be reconciled. He thinks the phrase means “long military axe, weighted with lead (like a ‘sledge-hammer’): a favourite Scandinavian weapon.
1982 ard2
ard2: on pole-axe D. Haley, SQ 29 (19??): 407-13, on sleaded, N&Q 201 (????): 509; for contiguity of Poland and Denmark in Sh.’s mind, Keith Brown, “Hamlet’s Place on the Map,” Sh. St. 4 (19??): 160-82; for sleds on ice several sources.
79 Jenkins (ed. 1982), in his Long Note where he also discusses parle, counters the arguments against Polacks, ascribing the virtual agreement of all three originary texts in error. He discusses the appearance of the plural form in R. Johnson, Kingdoms and Commonweals (The World, 1601), pp. 127, 128; Moryson, Itinerary, 1907-8 edn. iii. 380. He finds pointless the image of the king striking a weapon on the ice, but more important, it does not fit anything else in the play. Polacks, though, are woven through—in Polonius’s name, in the Polack wars.
1984 Klein
Klein: a survey of most opinions to 1984
79 pollax]
Klein (ed. 1984): “the first great textual crux. Rowe emended to Pole-axe = sb. (1), ’a battle-axe,’ often spelt pollax and used once in Sh.:
LLL 5.2.571-2 [0000] (punning). Also
smite is used by Sh. once in this sense,
Lucr. 176 (Parrott/Craig). This interpretation has recently gained new defenders (e.g. Harrison, also, in great detail, M. Holmes,
The Guns of Elsinore [London, 1964], pp. 57-60). However, smiting an axe of whatever kind (leaded? —Moltke; sledged? —
Schmidt; studded? —D. Haley in the
Shakespeare Quarterly 29 [1978], pp. 407-13, etc.) would represent in this context a ridiculous anticlimax (consequently R.L. Greene pleads, in [
N&Q 29: 1974], pp. 128-30 that the soldier carrying this weapon was meant — which is hardly better). Pope thought only the Polish king could be intended and put
Polack; but an identical error of this type in all three early prints is unlikely. Malone’s reading as
Pollacks (phonetically spelt) is unrecorded, but not impossible, and it lends the passage relatively the best meaning (cf. Wilson, MSH, p. 303).
Polack, adj. (in Sh. only [3871]) and sb. (in Sh. only [1088 and 1100] as well as [2743+16], all singular, so that there is no absolute analogy) was the most common form of the name (the OED’s 1st example of
Pole sb.4 dates from 1656).”
Klein: OED; Cotgrave; cln1; //s, biblical analogues; kit2; parc
79 sleaded] Klein (ed. 1984): “the OED explains sledded as adj. (a) ’mounted on sleds’ (Hamlet the 1st and until 1821 only example; only here in Sh.), derived from sled sb. (1) ’a drag’, or (2) ’a sledge or sleigh’ (not in Sh.), cf. Cotgrave under Train (Clark/Wright). In this sense smote fits well as vb. (5c) ’to strike down in battle; to kill, slay’, cf. (in the sense of ’kill’) [Oth. 5.2.356 (3967)] and [Ant. 3.13.162 (2345)], also e.g. Joshua 10.19; alternatively as vb. (4) ’to visit with death, destruction, or overthrow’, cf. esp. Judges 3.13: ’And he [...] smote Israel.’ Thus Kittredge paraphrases with ’routed,’ Parrott/Craig with ’defeated. ”
1985 cam4
cam4 ≈ kit without attribution + in magenta underlined
79 sleaded pollax] Edwards (ed. 1985) considers sledded Polacks to be the better possibility, partly because sleaded does not work with poleax. “It is more likely that Horatio is talking of two encounters, one with Norwegians and one with Poles. In the second, in a confrontation, or after an angry exchange, he routed the Poles in their sledges.”
1987 oxf4
79 the sleaded pollax]
Hibbard (ed. 1987) argues that
the indicates that the phrase is the object of the verb
smote and can only mean Polacks on or equipped with sleds. Though
sledded does not appear elsewhere in Sh., it’s a typical Shn neologism, an adj. created from a noun by adding -ed, which, as
Schmidt observes, occurs frequently in Sh.(pp. 1417-18). A poleaxe would require
his.
1992 fol2
fol2: standard
79 smot] Mowat & Werstine (ed. 1992): “attacked or, perhaps, defeated“
fol2: standard
79 sleaded pollax] sledded Polacks Mowat & Werstine (ed. 1992): “Polish military riding in sleds“
1993 dent
dent: standard + in magenta underlined
79 Andrews (ed. 1993) offers the two interpretations, the weighted poleax and the sledded Poles. He also explains his retention of smot and other words that now end with e.
1999 OED
OED
79 pollax] OED: the derogatory connotation of the word Polacks did not enter until much later than Sh. In the 20th century, it seems. See also Polonius, 177.
1992 fol2
fol2
79 sleaded pollax] Mowat & Werstine (ed. 1992) have an illustration from Cesare Vercellio, Habiti antichi et moderni (1598) showing sledded warriors.
2000 Edelman
Edelman
79 pollax] Edelman (2000): “Polack [is] a native of Poland. According to Botero, the army Fortinbras would have met in 1600, the probable year of Hamlet’s first performance, was a magnificent fighting force. [ . . .] “as we read in a letter from ‘Simon Bassa, chief counsellor to Sultan Murad Can the Grand Signior, to the Sacred Majestie of Elizabeth, Queene of England,’ the Sultan’s subjects were being harrassed by certain theeves in the Partes of Polonia called Cosacks,’ so the Sultan ‘layd waste some parte of the kingdome of Poland,” and was about to launch an invasion that would ‘subvert and overthrowe’ the King, when the English ambassador, concerned for the welfare of England’s arms trade with Poland, persuaded the Sultan to desist.”
2006 ard3q2
ard3q2: standard; xref; Marlowe & Nashe; OED
79 sleaded pollax] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “a notoriously difficult phrase which is almost identical in all three early texts (see t.n.). Most recent editors emend ’pollax’ to ’Polacks’, i.e. Poles, and interpret ’sledded/sleaded’ as ’using sleds or sledges’, since this makes sense of the reference to ice. The word Polack occurs again at [1088] and [1100], [2743+16] and [3871]; it is not derogatory (as it has become in modern North American usage). In favour of ’pole-axe’ (the weapon), however, in Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Nashe’s Dido, Queen of Carthage (c. 1585, printed in 1594), Aeneas describes the destruction of Troy: ’Old men with swords thrust through their aged sides, / Kneeling for mercie to a Greekish lad / Who with steele Pol-axes dasht out their braines’ (Dido, 2.1.198-9). The ’Greekish lad’ is Pyrrhus and Shakespeare drew on this scene for the Player’s speech in 2.2 [1494 ff.]. But it is not clear what ’sleaded’ would mean: perhaps ’leaded’ or ’studded’ (as in modern ’sledgehammer’?: OED cites a 1495 reference to ’Sledge hamers of yron’).”
