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Two Middle English Lexical Notes
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 April 2026
Extract
And al men speken of huntyng, How they wolde slee the hert with strengthe, And how the hert had, upon lengthe, So moche embosed, y not now what.
Book of the Duchess 350-3
The above passage in Chaucer's well-known poem has been variously interpreted. In the glossary to the Aldine edition, revised by Richard Morris, the word embosed is defined as ‘sheltered in a wood’. In Robert Bell's edition, somewhat revised by Skeat in 1878, there is a note: ‘Embosed is a technical term applied to a deer when so hard pressed as to foam at the mouth, and hang out the tongue.‘ These were the two most widely used editions prior to the publication of the Oxford Chaucer, freshly edited by Skeat in 1894, and both were several times reprinted. They also represent the two alternative explanations of embosed.
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- Copyright © 1961 Linguistic Society of America
References
1 I use the reprint of 1893.
2 I use the reprint of 1880.
3 Romanic rev. 13.115–50.
4 Elsewhere in his article Emerson shows that he understood the meaning of this expression.
5 The Master of Game, by Edward, Second Duke of York: The oldest English book on hunting, ed. Wm. A. and F. Baillie-Grohman (London, 1909).
6 The best edition is that of G. Tilander in Studier i modern Sprakvetenskap 14.49–103 (1940).
7 Ed. G. Tilander 2 vols. (Paris, 1932).
8 Canterbury Tales, ed. J. M. Manly (1928).
9 Rotuli Parliamentorum 5.60–61, cited in S. William Beck, The drapers' dictionary (London, 1882). I owe this reference to Grace L. Rogers, Curator of Textiles, Smithsonian Institution.