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Commentary notes (CN):

1. SMALL CAPS Indicate editions. Notes for each commentator are divided into three parts:

In the 1st two lines of a record, when the name of the source text (the siglum) is printed in SMALL CAPS, the comment comes from an EDITION; when it is in normal font, it is derived from a book, article, ms. record or other source. We occasionally use small caps for ms. sources and for works related to editions. See bibliographies for complete information (in process).

2. How comments are related to predecessors' comments. In the second line of a record, a label "without attribution" indicates that a prior writer made the same or a similar point; such similarities do not usually indicate plagiarism because many writers do not, as a practice, indicate the sources of their glosses. We provide the designation ("standard") to indicate a gloss in common use. We use ≈ for "equivalent to" and = for "exactly alike."

3. Original comment. When the second line is blank after the writer's siglum, we are signaling that we have not seen that writer's gloss prior to that date. We welcome correction on this point.

4. Words from the play under discussion (lemmata). In the third line or lines of a record, the lemmata after the TLN (Through Line Number] are from Q2. When the difference between Q2 and the authors' lemma(ta) is significant, we include the writer's lemma(ta). When the gloss is for a whole line or lines, only the line number(s) appear. Through Line Numbers are numbers straight through a play and include stage directions. Most modern editions still use the system of starting line numbers afresh for every scene and do not assign line numbers to stage directions.

5. Bibliographic information. In the third line of the record, where we record the gloss, we provide concise bibliographic information, expanded in the bibliographies, several of which are in process.

6. References to other lines or other works. For a writer's reference to a passage elsewhere in Ham. we provide, in brackets, Through Line Numbers (TLN) from the Norton F1 (used by permission); we call these xref, i.e., cross references. We call references to Shakespearean plays other than Ham. “parallels” (//) and indicate Riverside act, scene and line number as well as TLN. We call references to non-Shakespearean works “analogues.”

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Notes for lines 0-1017 ed. Bernice W. Kliman

For explanation of sigla, such as jen, see the editions bib.

370 Would I had met my dearest foe in heauen	1.2.182

1723 - mtby2

mtby2

370 dearest] Thirlby (ms. notes in Pope, ed. 1723): “[5:262, line 5] Shall it not grieve thee dearer than thy death v. que ibi annotanter Infra 494.31 By his dear absence [Desdemona] in 236.4. Their dear loss [Bellarius in Cym.] 248.3 which art my near’st & dearest enemy [1H4]”

1729 mtheo2

mtheo2

370 dearest] Theobald to Warburton (5 Feb. 1730, fol. 32v; Nichols, Illus., 2:476): “Dear Peril. i.e. dread, deep. So [JC 3.1.196 (1418)]. Shall it not grieve thee Dearer than thy Death, &c. [AYL 1.3.33 (490)] For my Father hated his Father DEARLY. — [Ham. 370] Would I had met my Dearest Foe in Heav’n, &c et alibi passim.

1733 theo1: Tim.

theo1: Tim. 5:298-9 n. 39

370 dearest] Theobald (ed. 1733, 5:298-9 n. 39) re Tim. 5.1.228 (2473) “our dear peril”: <p. 298> “Thus [i.e. the emendation to dead Peril] Mr. Rowe and Mr. Pope have given us the Passage, but is it not strange that the Athenians’ Peril should be dead, </p. 298> <p. 299> one of their Hopes was dead? Such a Disappointment must naturally give fresh Life and Strength to their Danger. We must certainly read with the Old Folio’s; ‘In our dear Peril.’ i.e. dread, deep. So in [AYL 1.3.33 (490). ‘For my Father hated his Father dearly.’ So in [JC 3.1.196 (1418)] ‘Would it not grieve thee dearer than thy Death, &c.’ And in Hamlet; ‘Would I had met my dearest Foe in Heav’n, &c.’

“And in an hundred other passages, that might be quoted from our Author.” </p. 299>

1733- mtby3

mtby3

370 dearest] Thirlby (ms. notes in Theobald, ed. 1733): Thirlby concurs with Theobald that the correct reading in Tim. is dear or deere. He also has parallels to Ham.in the JC reference for Tim.

1746 Upton

Upton

370 dearest] Upton (1746, p. 303) notes as an example of his Rule 2 (p. 289, “He makes Latin words English, and uses them according to their original idiom and latitude.”) that dearest comes “Perhaps from the Latin dirus, dire, dear. In the translation of Virgil by Douglas ‘tis spelt dere, which the Glossary thus explains, ‘Dere, to hurt, trouble: Belg. Deeren, Deren. F. Theut. Deran A.S. Derian, nocere. It. hurt, injury.’ And should it not be thus spelt in Shakespeare? But instances of our poet’s using words contrary to the modern acceptation of them are numberless.”

1747 warb

warb in Tim.

370 dearest]

1755 Johnson Dict.

Johnson ≈ theo1 Tim., without attribution; warb Tim., without attribution

370 dearest] Johnson (1755). 4. “It seems to be used sometimes in Shakespeare for deer sad; hateful; grievous.”

1765 john1

john1 ≈ theo1 Tim. without attribution; warb Tim. without attribution

370 dearest] Johnson (ed. 1765): “Dearest, for direst, most dreadful, most dangerous.”

john1 AYL ≈ theo1 without attribution

370 dearest] Johnson (ed. 1765, 2: 22 n. 3), in a note for AYL1.3.33 (490); “Dear is used by Shakespeare in a double sense, for beloved, and for hurtful, hated, baleful. Both senses are authorized, and both drawn from etymology, but properly beloved is dear, and hateful is dere.”

john1 LLL

370 dearest] Johnson (ed. 1765, 2:221 n*), for LLL 5.2.864 (2825) “Deaf’d with the clamours of their own dear groans,” writes, in a note inserted late (as indicated by the asterisk instead of a numeral), “*—dear should here, as in many other places, be dere, sad, odious.”

john1 1H4

370 dearest] Johnson (ed. 1765, 4:186 n*) for IH4 says that dear means “most fatal, most mischievous.”

1768-70 mwar2

Ed. note: mwar2 must be completed.

1771 han3

han3 = Upton +

370 dearest] Hawkins (ed. 1771, 6: Glossary): “for direst, most dreadful, most dangerous. So [Mac. 5.2.3 (2178)] — ‘For their dear causes Wou’d to &c.’ ”

1773 v1773

v1773 = john1; theo on Tim. without attribution + in magenta underlined

370 dearest] Steevens (ed. 1773): “Dearest signifies most consequential, important. So in [Rom. 5.3.31 (2884)] : ‘A ring that I must use In dear employment.’ So in [Tim. 5.1.228 (2474)] ‘In our dear peril.’ Again in [TN 5.1.71 (2222)]: ‘Whom thou in terms so bloody and so dear Hast made thine enemies.’ So in [1H4 3.2.123 (1943): ‘Which are my nearest and dearest enemy.’ Steevens.”

1773 jen

jen: Upton +

370 dearest] Jennens (ed. 1773): “I would beg leave to add another perhaps, that as we call our greatest friend our dearest friend, so Shakespeare takes the liberty to apply dearest in the same manner to foe as well as friend. Besides, dear frequently signifies (not beloved, but) of great price or consequence.”

1774 Richardson

Richardson

370 dearest] Richardson (1774, rpt. 1812, p. 87): After [Hamlet’s] sardonic joke of the previous line, “Yet he is too violently agitated to preserve, uniformly, the character of a cheerful satirist. He becomes serious.”

Ed. note: See also 368-9

1778 v1778

v1778 = v1773 immaterial variation in magenta not underlined; + in magenta underlined,

370 dearest] Steevens (ed. 1778): “Dearest is most immediate, consequential, important. . . . employment.’ Again, in B[eaumont] and Fletcher’s, Maid in the Mill: ‘You meet your dearest enemy in love, With all his hate about him.’ [Then Tim., TN, 1H4] Again, in Any Thing for a quiet Life, 1662: ‘He was my nearest and dearest enemy.’ Steevens.”

1780 mals1

mals1

370 dearest] Malone (1780, 1: 612 n. 8) says that “Dearest [in Son. 37.3] is most operative,” offering Ham 370 as a parallel.

1784 Davies

Davies

370 foe in heauen] Davies (1784, 3:12): “This strongly marks the resentful, not to say implacable, disposition of Hamlet; and is of a piece with his not putting his uncle to death, in the third act of the play, when he was at his devotion, lest, in that instant, he should send his soul to heaven.”

1785 v1785

v1785 = v1778 minus (john1 and some of Steevens)

370 dearest] Steevens (ed. 1785): “Dearest is most immediate, consequential, important. So in [Rom. 5.3.31 (2884)]: ‘a ring that I must use In dear employment’; Again, in B[eaumont] and Fletcher’s, Maid in the Mill: ‘You meet your dearest enemy in love, With all his hate about him.’ [Then Tim., TN, 1H4] Again, in Any Thing for a quiet Life, 1662: ‘He was my nearest and dearest enemy.’ Steevens.”

1787 ann

ann = v1785

370 dearest]

1790 mal

mal = v1785; ≈ Steevens on Tim. // without attribution

370 dearest] Malone (ed. 1790): “See [Tim. 8:130 n.6]. Malone.”

mal ≈ Steevens for Ham. without attribution

370 dearest] Malone (ed. 1790, 9:469 n. 2), Oth. 1.3. 85 (424) “their dearest action”: “i.e. their most important action. See [8:130 n. 6]. Malone.”

mal ≈ Steevens for Ham. without attribution

370 dearest] Malone (ed. 1790, 8:130, Tim. 5.1.228 (2474): “Dear, in Shakespeare’s language, is dire, dreadful. So in Hamlet: [quotes 370] . Malone.”

1791- Wesley ms. in v1785

Wesley: john, Steevens +

370 dearest] Wesley (1791-, p. 43): “Johnson’s explanation makes the better sense, but Steevens’s are quotations shrewdly adduced.”

1790- mTooke

mTooke:

370 dearest] Tooke (1790-): Opposite Steevens’s note defining dearest: “How do you know this?”

1791- rann

rann: john1 +

370 dearest] Rann (ed. 1791-): “direst, greatest, most fell, or abhorred.”

1793 v1793

v1793 = mal

370 dearest]

v1793 Tim. ≈ Theobald Tim.

370 dearest] Warburton (apud Steevens, ed. 1793, Tim. 5.1.228 (2474) in 11: 649 n. 7): “So the folios, and rightly. The Oxford editor [Hanmer] alters dear to dread, not knowing that dear, in the language of that time, signified dread, and is so used by Shakspeare in numberless places. Warburton.”

v1793

370 dearest] Steevens (ed. 1793, 11:650 n. 7) “Dear may, in the present instance, signify immediate, or imminent. It is an enforcing epithet with not always a distinct meaning. To enumerate each of the seemingly various senses in which it may be supposed to have been used by the author, would at once fatigue the reader and myself.

“In the following situations, however, it cannot signify either dire or dreadful: ‘Comfort with me in loud and dear petition.’ [Tro. 5.3.9 (3207)] ‘Some dear cause Will in concealment wrap me up a while.’ [Lr. 4.3.52]. Steevens.” He then cites two xref where dear cannot mean dire: one in Tro. and one in Lr.

Ed. note: After quoting his own Ham. note from mal, rather than v1778, Steevens follows w a Malone ref to XI, p.650, n.7. So instead of going back to his own note to Tim, he simply copies mal’s note, which credits Malone instead of himself.

1803 v1803

v1803 = v1793+

370 dearest] malone (apud ed. 1803): “See [Tim. 5.1.228 (2474)]. Vol. XIX. Malone.”

1805 Tooke

Tooke’s dissertation on Dearth from the AS verb to dere

370 dearest] Tooke (1805, 2:412): “Johnson and Malone, who trusted in their Latin to explain his English, for Deer and Deerest, would have us read Dire and Direst; not knowing that De<r>e and De<r>ien∂ mean hurt and hurting, mischief and mischievous: and that their Latin Dirus is from the Anglosaxon De<r>e, which they would expunge*.”

Ed. note: *Tooke’s note * quotes Junius, Skinner, Festus, Nannius, Servius, and Vossius and Dacier,

1807 Pye

Pye = mal

370 dearest] Pye (1807, p. 309) says that Malone [sic: he means Steevens] “is obviously right. So in [Oth. 1.3.8 (424)], dearest action, which Mr. Malone there also properly explains by most important action.”

Ed.note: Pye’s Malone quotation is credited to Steevens in mal and indeed goes back to v1773. So Pye is not only obscure but also careless. Use him with care. Pye appears to be the 1st to relate this line in Ham with a xref in Oth.

1813 v1813

v1813 = v1803

370 dearest]

1818 oxb

oxb: standard

370 dearest] Oxberry (ed. 1818): “Dearest—Bitterest—to dere or feare, from which it is derived, signifies to annoy, to injure; it is far from being an uncommon expression with our writers.”

1819 cald1

cald1: Steevens def. without attribution; Steevens; Tooke +

370 dearest] Caldecott (ed. 1819): “Throughout Shakespeare and all the poets of his and a much later day, we find this epithet applied to that person or thing, which, for or against us, excites the liveliest and strongest interest. It is used variously, indefinitely and metaphorically to express the warmest feelings of the soul; its nearest, most intimate, home and heartfelt emotions: and here no doubt, though, as every where else, more directly interpreted signifying ‘veriest, extremest,’ must by consequence and figuratively import ‘bitterest, deadliest, most mortal.’ As extremes are said in a certain sense to approximate, and are in many respects alike or the same, so this word is made in a certain sense to carry with it an union of the fiercest opposites: it is made to signify the extreme of love and hatred.

“But to suppose, with Mr. Tooke, (Divers. of Purl. [2:409].) that in all cases it must at that time have meant ‘injurious,’ as being derived from the Saxon word dere, to hurt, is perfectly absurd. Dr. Johnson’s derivation of the word, as used in this place, from the Latin dirus, is doubtless ridiculous enough: but Mr. Tooke has not produced a single instance of the use of it, i.e. of the adjective, in the sense upon which he insists; except, as he pretends, from our author. In the instance cited in this place by Mr. Steevens, in support of the extraordinary interpretation (‘most consequential, important,’) he has here and elsewhere put upon the word, ‘A ring, that I must use in deere employment.’ [Rom. 5.3.31 (2884)], although the word is spelt after the fashion of the Saxon verb, it is impossible to interpret it ‘injurious;’ its meaning being most clearly, ‘anxious, deeply interesting.’ ‘Deere to me as are the ruddy drops that visit my sad heart.’ [JC 2.2.289 (931)] Bru. cannot admit of interpretation in any other sense than that in which Gray’s Bard understood it. ‘Dear as the ruddy drops, that warm my heart.’ In [Tro. 5.3], Andromache says, ‘Consort with me in loud and deere petition.’ And in Hector’s answer the word occurs thrice so spelt: ‘Life every man holds deere; but the deere man Holds honour far more precious, deere, than life.’

“And it is no less than impossible, in either of these instances, to put the sense of ‘injurious’ upon the word. With his mind possessed by the Saxon vern, to hurt, Mr. Tooke seems altogether to have forgotten the existence of the epithet, which answers to the Latin word charus. In the same sense it is used by Puttenham: ‘The lacke of life is the dearest detriment of any other.’ Arte of Engl. Poesie, 4to. 1589, p. 182. See ‘dearly,’ [Ham. 4.3] King. [ AYL 1.3, Celia; and [LLL 2.1,] Boyet; and ‘dear guiltiness,’ Ib. [5.2], Princess. We will add from Drayton’s Moses his birth, 4to. 1630, B. 1. that Sarah, about to expose her child, says, she has ‘her minde of misery compacted That must consent unto so deere a murther.’ i.e. distressing or heart-rending.”

1821 v1821

v1821 = v1813 +

370 dearest] Blakeway (apud Boswell, ed. 1821): “So in [TN, 5.1.?, (000)]. “Whom thou in terms so bloody and so dear Hast made thine enemies.’ ”

1826 sing1

sing1: v1821 TN ref.

370 dearest] Singer (ed. 1826): “See note on [TN 5.1.71 (2222)] p. 335.”

1826 sing1

sing1 TN = Tooke +

370 dearest] Singer (ed. 1826, 3: 382), on dear in TN 5.1.71 (2222), quotes Tooke (2:409) at length, then adds, “A most pertinent illustration of Tooke’s etymology has occurred to me in a MS poem by Richard Rolle the Hermit of Hampole: ‘Bot flatering lele and loselry, Is grete chepe in thair courtes namly, The most derthe of any, that is Aboute tham there, is sothfastnes.’—Spec. Vitae.”

1832 cald2

cald2 = Cald1 + magenta underlined

370 dearest] Caldecott (ed. 1832): “ i.e. bitterest: as ‘dearest enemy,’ [1H4 3.2.123 (943] K. Hen. “Throughout Shakespeare . . . signify the extreme of love and hatred. It may be said to be equivalent generally to very; and to import ‘the excess, the utmost, the superlative”† of that, whatever it may be, to which it is applied.

“[whole Tooke paragraphs, ending with Drayton example. caldecott inserts before Drayton example]: “ ‘dearest spight.’ [ref. to Son. 37, from malsi ] ; ‘dear (i.e. deep) offences,’ [H5 2.2.181 (810)] K. Henr.; ‘dear exile,’ [R2 1.2.151 (444)] K. Rich. ‘dear perfection,’ [AWW 5.3.18 (2717)] Laf. [and after Drayton] And from Lycidas ‘—By the dear might of him that walk’d the waves.’ i.e. the deep interest therein taken by that mighty miracle-worker. Dear might, more closely rendered, is ‘loving exercise of the mighty power.’ ”

<n†> We find, that Mr. Boucher in his Supplement to Johnson’s Dict. considers old (in his work Auld) in the same light: i.e. as a kind of superlative, or in a very high degree impressing the qualities of the subject treated. See ‘old abusing the King’s English. [Wiv. 1.4.5 (403)] Quickly.” </n† >

1833 valpy

valpy

370 dearest] Valpy (ed. 1833): “Most inveterate.”

1839 knt1

knt1: cald2

370 dearest] Knight (ed. 1839): “For an explanation of one of the apparently contradictory senses in which dear is used by Shakspere, see Note to [R2 1.3.151 (444)]. Upon the passage before us, Caldecott remarks, that throughout Shakspere, and all the poets of his day, and much later, ‘we find this epithet applied to that person or thing which, for or against us, excites the liveliest interest.”

1843 knt2

knt2 = knt1 [with the exception of the immaterial “Scene 3” for “Sc. iii” ]

370 dearest]

1843 col1

col1 standard

370 dearest] Collier (ed. 1843): “here direst. See [3:409] where this line is quoted.”

1844 verp

verp: cald

370 dearest] Verplanck (ed. 1844): “Caldecott proves (in opposition to Johnson and Horne Tooke,) that throughout Shakespeare, and all the writers of his age, the epithet dearest is applied to the person or thing, which, whether for us or against us, excites the liveliest interest. It answers to ‘veriest,’ ‘extremest.’ According to the context, therefore, it may mean the most beloed or most hated object.”

-1845 mHunter

mHunter

370 dearest] Hunter (-1845, fol. 223r): “‘Dearest’ is evidently used in that half serious half jocose spirit in which all he says in this scene is delivered. Milton has ‘Bitter constraint & sad occasion dear” Lycidas and in F. Q. IV.3.3.”

1854 del2

del2 standard +

370 dearest] Delius (ed. 1854): “dear ist bei Sh. Alles, was uns nahe geht oder nahe steht, in freundlichem wie in feindlichem Sinne. So kommt an andern Stellen Sh.’s dear peril, dear exile, dear absence, und terms so bloody and so dearvor.” [Dear ist in Sh. everything that is near to us, in a friendly as well as an unfriendly sense. Thus in other places Sh. has dear peril, dear exile, dear absence, und terms so bloody and so dear.]

1856 hud1

hud1 ≈ cald

370 dearest] Hudson (ed. 1856): “Caldecott has shown that in Shakespeare’s time dearest was applied to any person or thing that excites the liveliest interest, whether of love or hate. See [TN 5.1.71 (2222)] note 3. H.”

1856 sing2

sing2 = sing1

370 dearest]

sing2 TN = sing1 TN +

370 dearest] Singer (ed. 1856, 3:463), on TN 5.1.? (0000): “I leave this note as it was written in 1823 [sic]. Mr. Knight has since availed himself of Tooke’s acuteness, without mention of Tooke’s name!”

1858 col3

col3 = col1 + change in ref.

370 dearest] Collier (ed. 1858): “See [2:714].

1860 stau

stau = cald1

370 dearest] Staunton (ed. 1860): “On this use of dear, some examples of which will be found at p. 449, Vol. I, Caldecott has a good note:—[he quotes].”

1861 wh1

wh1: standard, closest to knt1

370 dearest] White (ed. 1861): “i.e., my greatest foe, he who is most my foe—a common use of ‘dearest’ in Shakespeare’s day.”

1862 cham

cham: john without attribution; cald1

370 dearest]

1868 c&mc

c&mc: standard

370 dearest] Clarke & Clarke (ed. 1868): “Here used with the sense of intensity wich we have before pointed out as included in this word by Shakespeare’s employment of it.” [ref. to notes for Tim. and JC.]

1869 tsch

tsch

370 Tschischwitz (ed. 1869, apud Furness, ed. 1877): “Note how averse Hamlet afterwards is to killing his ‘dearest foe,’ his uncle, lest he should send him to heaven.”

1872 cln1

cln1 : standard gloss, //s 1H4, R2

370 dearest]

1872 hud2

hud2 ≈ hud1 (minus ref. to cald)

370 dearest] Hudson (ed. 1872): “In Shakespeare’s time dearest was applied to any person or thing that excites the liveliest interest, whether of love or hate, See page 237, note 6,

hud2: TN 5.1.71 (2222): Tooke

370 dearest] Hudson (ed. 1872): “Dear is used in the same sense here as in [Ham. 370 quotes]. Tooke has shown that this is much nearer the original sense of the word than the meaning commonly put upon it: dear being from the Anglo-Saxon word to dere, which signifies to hurt. An object of love, any thing that we hold dear, may obviously cause us pain, distress, or solicitude: hence the word came to be used in the opposite senses of hateful and beloved.”

1873 rug2

rug2: parallells; comment ≈ Davies without attribution

370 dearest] Moberly (ed. 1873): “So Shakspere says, ‘so dangerous and dear a trust,’ ‘such dear offences,’ ‘fortune’s dearest spite:’ the meaning common to all the passages being ‘high-raised, superlative.’ We may remember, in reading this line, how unwilling Hamlet is at a later time to send his dearest foe to heaven.”

1877 v1887

v1877 = tsch

370 dearest]

v1877: Horne Tooke, sing, cald, dyce, Craik in Rom 5.3.32, cln1,Mätzner

370 dearest] Furness (ed. 1877): Tooke’s “plausible derivation, or rather explanation, of two distinct and contrary meanings of the word has been followed by Richardson in his Dictionary, and by [sing, cald, dyce], except Craik, who detected Tooke’s error in tracing the word, in both its meanings, to one root, by showing that the word dear = high-priced, precious, beloved, is the Anglo-Saxon deóre, dúre, dˆyre , from the verb deóran or D´yran, to hold dear, to love. Craik thus explains the different sense which the word assumes: the notion properly involved in it of love having first become generalized into that of a strong affection of any kind, thence passes on into that of such an emtoion the very reverse of love, or as Clarendon concisely states it: ‘dear’ is used of whatever touches us nearly either in love or hate, joy or sorrow. Mätzner (i, 196) gives a list of two hundred and thirty-five words which had originally different meanings), but which now are found in only one form; among them (i, 206) is dear, with the different original forms pointed out by Craik. See ‘dear soul,’ [1914].

Ed. note: Furness has no note at 1914 except a xref back to 370. See also, note on dearest in Furness’s Rom., which has references to Ham. Rom Variorum, pp. 272-3. 5.3.3, which repeats the information from sing, cald, dyce, Craik, with the ref. to Tooke, and a ref. to Chaucer.

1881 hud3

hud3 ≈ hud2

370 dearest]

1885 macd

macd: standard + in magenta underlined

370 dearest] MacDonald (ed. 1885): “Dear is not infrequently used as an intensive; but ‘my dearest foe’ is not ‘the man who hates me most,’ but ‘the man whom most I regard as my foe.”

1885 mull

mull: standard

370 dearest] Mull (ed. 1885): “most regarded as a foe.”

1899 ard1

ard1 = cln1 minus R2 //

370 dearest]

1929 trav

trav

370-1 Travers (ed. 1929) finds in these lines an explanation for Hamlet’s hesitation to kill the king at prayer in 3.3.

1939 kit2

kit2: standard ascribed to Clark and Wright + on proverbial cast

370 dearest] Kittredge (ed. 1939): "The formula devised by Clark and Wright to cover the Elizabethan meaning of this word cannot be improved: "Dear is used of whatever touches us nearly either in love or hate, joy or sorrow.’ My dearest foe is, then, ’my bitterest enemy.’ The whole speech has a proverbial cast; there is no allusion to any particular person."

1947 cln2

cln2: standard

370 dearest foe] Rylands (ed. 1947): "closest, i.e. bitterest, enemy."

1957 pel1

pel1: standard

370 dearest] Farnham (ed. 1957): “direst, bitterest.”

1958 fol1

fol1: standard

370 dearest] Wright & LaMar (ed. 1958): “bitterest, most hated. ’Dear’ was used to express intensity of feeling.”

1970 pel2

pel2 = pel1

370 dearest] Farnham (ed. 1970): “direst, bitterest”

1980 pen2

pen2: standard

370 dearest] Spencer (ed. 1980): “(closest, and therefore deadliest).”

1982 ard2

ard2: standard

370 dearest foe] Jenkins (ed. 1982): “ Cf. 1H4 3.2.123, ’my nearest and dearest enemy’. The phrase is influenced by the analogy of ’dearest friend’. But for dear = grievous, cf. R2 1.3.151, ’dear exile’; Tim. 5.1.226, ’dear peril’. This seems to be etymologically a different word (O.E. dēor) from dear = loved (O.E. dēore), though the two inevitably became indistinguishable, so that dear was naturally applied to whatever affects us closely, whether in a good or bad sense. (Cf. 3.4.193 (2567); 4.3.41 (2702)) See OED dear a.1 and a.2.”

1985 cam4

cam4; Kittredge

370 dearest] Edwards (ed. 1985): "closest. That the worst thing you can imagine is meeting your greatest enemy in heaven seems very strange. Kittredge suspected a proverbial saying. It is nevertheless characteristic of Hamlet to wish his opponents to go to hell (see [2368-2370] and [3549]); it is an aspect of his fierce conviction that moral discriminations ought to have a timeless value. See Introduction, p. 42."

1987 oxf4

oxf4

370 dearest] Hibbard (ed. 1987): "most inveterate. Compare [1H4 3.2.123 [1943] where the King describes the Prince as ‘my nearest and dearest enemy’. OED suggests that ‘dearest friend’ may have given rise to ‘dearest enemy’ as its antonym (dear a. [1.2.274 (1321]); but it also points to a likely connection between the phrase and another adjective dear, meaning dire, grievous, as in ‘The dateless limit of thy dear exile’ [R2 1.3.151 (444)]; see [OED] dear a3. Hamlet’s strong dislike of the idea that any enemy of his should go to heaven is a fascinating anticipation of the reason he gives for sparing the praying Claudius in 3.3."

1988 bev2

bev2: standard

370 dearest] Bevington (ed. 1988): “closest (and therefore deadliest).”

1992 fol2

fol2: standard

370 dearest] Mowat & Werstine (ed. 1992): “most grievous; bitterest”

1993 OED

OED

370 dearest] OED explains the difference between the two root words that were eventually merged. For the definition of dear, dere, a2, 2 it has ““Hard, severe, heavy, grievous; fell, dire.” Before Shakespeare, this sense was used by Spenser 1590, F. Q. 2.5.38.

2006 ard3q2

ard3q2: standard; //; xref

370 dearest] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “most significant, most bitter (see AYL 1.3.31 , ’my father hated his father dearly’). This line is a curious way of intensifying ’I would rather have died’; it anticipates Hamlet’s reluctance in [2350-71] to send the King to heaven.”