Line 2577+5 - Commentary Note (CN) 
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.”
7. Further information: See the Introduction for explanations of other abbreviations.
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Notes for lines 2023-2950 ed. Frank N. Clary
| 2577+5 {For tis the sport to haue the enginer} | 3.4.207 |
|---|
1812 Lofft
Lofft: Seneca analogue
2577+5-2577+6 tis . . . petar] Lofft (1812, p. 440): “‘Nec Lex est æquior ulla Quam Necis Artifices Arte perire sua.’ Ov. ‘Metus in Auctorem redit.’ Seneca.”
1843+ mcol1
mcol1
2577+5 enginer] Anon. (ms. notes in Collier, ed. 1843): [In ink, pasted in] “Enginer | Sir John Dersham in his Poem “To the King” State Poems I. 33) has Engineer. ‘If thou art Minos be a judge severe, | And in’s own Maze confine the Engineer.” [In pencil] x Then here to stay and be a mutiner, T. Heywoods If you know not me to Part I, 1605.’ Sign E2 *This was the old word not engineer. G. Harvey in his ‘Purces Supererrogation’ 1593 calls Nash “the dreadfull enginer of phrases.’ Sig. Bb”
Transcribed by HLA from copy BM 134.f.1.vol. 7. BWK has “Mines” for “Minos”; “Key words” for “Heywood”; “Haring” for “Harvey”; “Pieces” for “Purces” [actually Pierces]; “Trash” for “Nash” HLA’s is preferred here. Collier’s note in col3 has “Denham” for “Dersham”
1854 del2
del2
2577+5 enginer] Delius (ed. 1854): “énginer, von engine, nicht engineer mit dem Tone auf der Endsylbe, ist Sh.’s Wort.” [Shakespeare’s word is énginer from engine, not engineer with the stress on the end syllable.]
1858 col3
col3 ≈ mcol1
2577+5 enginer] Collier (ed. 1858): “We would now say engineer, but the older word was ‘enginer;’ as in ‘Pierce’s Supererogation,’ 1593, Gabriel Harvey calls Nash ‘the dreadful enginer of phrases.’ Heywood has mutineer for ‘mutineer,’ though Shakespeare has it both ways; and the word engineer does not seem to have come into general use until after the Restoration: in his Poem ‘to the King,’ Sir J. Denham has engineer as the rhyme to severe.”
1870 Abbott
Abbott: Jonson
2577+5 enginer] Abbott (1870, §492): “Ben Jonson (p. 777) says all nouns, both disyllabic (if they be ‘simple) and trisyllabic, are accented on the first syllable. Perhaps this accounts for the accent on confessor, &c. The accent on the first syllable was the proper noun accent; the accent on the second (which in the particular instance of confessor ultimately prevailed) was derived from the verb.
“The double accent seems to have been disliked by the Elizabethans. They wrote and pronounced ‘muleters’ for ‘muleters,’ ‘enginer’ (Ham. [3.4.206 (2577+5)]) for ‘engineer,’ ‘pioners’ for ‘pioneers.’”
1872 cln1
cln1: KJ //
2577+5 the sport] Clark and Wright (ed. 1872): “Compare KJ [2.1.396 (710)]: ‘Smacks it not something of the policy?’”
cln1: Tro. , Oth. //s
2577+5 enginer] Clark and Wright (ed. 1872): “Compare Tro., [2.3.8 (1212)]: ‘Then there’s Achilles a rare enginer.’ For a cognate form ‘mutineer’ see note on [3.4.83 (2458)]. So we have ‘pioner’ for ‘pioneer.’ Oth. . [3.3.346 (1989)].”
1877 v1877
2577+5 enginer]
Furness (ed. 1877): “For list of nouns with the suffix -
er, signifying the agent, see
Walker (
Vers. 217), or
Abbott, § 443. For words with accent nearer the beginning that with us, see
Abbott, § 492. See ‘truster,’
[1.2.72 (360)]; ‘pioner,’ [1.5.163 (860)].”
1877 neil
neil: Beza
2577+5-2577+6 the engineer . . . petar] Neil (ed. 1877): “The eighth emblem in Theodore Beza’s Icones, 1580, shows a cannon bursting, and with one of its fragments killing the cannonier: and the Middle Age proverb ran, ‘Quibus rebus confidimus. iis maxime evertimur’ (To whatever things we trust, by these are we for the most part overthrown).”
1878 rlf1
rlf1: Abbott; Tro. Oth.//s; xrefs.
2577+5 enginer] Rolfe (ed. 1878): “The folio has the word also in Tro. [2.3.8 (1212)] and Oth. [2.1.65 (825)]; engineer not at all. Cf. pioner in. [1.5.163 (860)] above, mutiner (see on 83 above), etc. See Abbott 443; and for the accent, 492.”
1891 dtn
dtn
2577+5-2577+6 For tis . . . petar] Deighton (ed. 1891): “for it is the finest sport in the world to see the engineer blown into the air by his own engine of destruction.”
dtn: Abbott
2577+5 the sport] Deighton (ed. 1891): “for the emphatic definite article, see Abb. § 92.”
dtn: Abbott
2577+5 enginer] Deighton (ed. 1891): “for the form enginer, [see Abb.] § 443.”
1890 irv2
irv2 ≈ cln1 (incl. Tro., Oth. //s
2577+5 enginer] Symons (in Irving & Marshall, ed. 1890): “Q (1676) gives the modern form engineer. Compare Tro., [2.3.8 (1212)]: ‘Then there’s Achilles,—a rare enginer.’ And see cognate forms, such as pioner, Ham. [1.5.163 (860)] and Oth. [3.3.346 (1989)]. “
1903 rlf3
rlf3 = rlf1 minus Abbott for engineer (2577+5)
1931 crg1
crg1
2577+5 enginer] Craig (ed. 1931): “constructor of military works, or possibly, artilleryman.”
1939 kit2
kit2
2577+5 enginer] Kittredge (ed. 1939): “engineer. The Elizabethan accent was on the first syllable, as in other words in -eer; pioner, mutiner, muleter.”
1947 yal2
yal2
2577+5 enginer] Cross & Brooke (ed. 1947): “maker of military engines, sapper.”
1957 pel1
pel1 ≈ crg1
2577+5 enginer] Farnham (ed. 1957): “engineer, constructor of military engines or works.”
1974 evns1
evns1 ≈ pel1
2577+5 enginer] Evans (ed. 1974): “deviser of military ‘engines’ or contrivances.”
1980 pen2
pen2 ≈ yal2
2577+5 enginer] Spencer (ed. 1980): “maker of military ‘engines’.”
1982 ard2
ard2 ≈ ard1 (incl. xref.)
2577+5 enginer] Jenkins (ed. 1982): “maker of ‘engines’ of war. This Q2 spelling indicates the Elizabethan stress. Cf. pioner, [1.5.163 (860)].”
1984 chal
chal ≈ evns1 + magenta underlined
2577+5 enginer] Wilkes (ed. 1984): “a) maker of engines b) schemer.”
1988 bev2
bev2
2577+5 enginer] Bevington (ed. 1988): “maker of military contrivances.”
2000 Edelman
Edelman
2577+5-2577+6 enginer . . . petar] Edelman (2000): “One who designs or constructs engines or military works for attack or defence (OED sb 2 a, b).” Edelman quotes a source indicating that good engineers were scarce in Elizabethan England, and he remarks that Claudius is likened to a bad engineer. Petar : “A small engine of war used to blow in a door or gate or to make a breach in a wall; [. . . ] charged with powder, and fired by a fuse (Evans). The petard was a very new device when Richard Burbage, the first Hamlet, spoke of it on the London stage. [ . . .]
“Hamlet’s famous trope for his intent to somehow turn the murderous plans of Claudius and his agents, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, against themselves [quotes 3.4.206-9 (2577+5-2577+8)] is actually a double metaphor, referring to two powder charges that will (figuratively) blow up his enemies. The ‘engineer’ who will be hoist (lit. “raised aloft) with his own device is Claudius, who, in underestimating Hamlet’s resourcefulness, might be neglecting [contemporary advice by Robert Ward (qtd. in Blackmore, 1976, p. 238)]: having placed the petard on its hook and lit the fuse, he ‘must be careful to avoyd the danger of her reverse by retyring in a side line from it.’
“Petards, being small and designed expressly for doors and gates would be useful as a mined or counter-mined explosive. So while the engineer is Claudius, the mines Hamlet will delve ‘one yard below belong to his two ‘good friends,’ to be dispatched when a much larger charge is placed beneath them by Hamlet himself. Clear instructions on mined explosives were available in Peter Whitehorne’s additions to his translation of Machiavelli’s Art of Warre (1560 [fol. 38v-39v]), including a helpful diagram recommending 14 barrels of gunpowder for the job, surely sufficient to blow Rosencrantz and Guildenstern not just ‘at the moon,’ but to it.”
Transcribed by BWK.
2006 ard3q2
ard3q2: 860 xref
2577+5 enginer] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “maker of ’engines’: bombs and other devices. We retain the Q2 spelling to draw attention tot eh fact that the meaning is slightly different from that of modern ’engineer’ and the stress should be on the first syllable (like pioneer) at 1.5.162 [860].”
2577+5