Glossary (words starting with R)
rabble
crowd, mob
race
family; kind of people
race
family (OED n6, I 1a)
rack
instrument of torture, on which a body is tied and stretched to prompt a confession of guilt; punning on the rack of a manger, at which a horse is tied
racked
charged excessive rent, known as rack-rent
racked
stretched to an extreme degree, which is what happened to people tortured on a rack
racks
vertically barred frames for holding animal fodder (OED rack n4, 1a)
radiancy
radiance (OED); OED’s earliest citation is 1646, but the earliest example I have found is in John Davies, Mirum in Modum: A Glimpse of God’s Glory and the Soul’s Shape (London, 1602): ‘They must, with wings display’d, defend their eye, / From being confounded with his radiancy’ (sig. G1r)
railer
someone who rails, or rants abusively (OED n2)
railing
railings: instances of railing; rants, taunts (OED n2. 2)
railing
the action of the verb; abusing, abuse (OED n. 2)
rails
utters abusive language, rants
raiment
garments, clothing
raise
wake up, cause to get out of bed (OED v1. 4a)
raise
'rouse or stir up (a number of persons, a district, etc.) for the purpose of common action, esp. for attack or defence' (OED raise v1, 5)
raise
restore, recover
raised
conjured forth, invoked, roused up, summoned
raised
induced; punning on conjured, invoking spirits or familiars, a crime of witchcraft
rakeshame
disreputable or dissolute person; a rogue (OED)
rammy
rank or pungent (or like a ram) in smell (OED adj, 1)
rampant
lustful (but often with connotations of vicious)
range
roam, wander
rankly
of a luxuriant, gross or coarse quality; gross, highly offensive or loathsome; (in later use especially) grossly coarse or indecent
ranky
a variant of rank (OED a III 11: grossly rich, heavy, or fertile, or 13: lustful, licentious)
rap
a slight but sharp blow
rapier
a long, thin pointed sword usually used for thrusting in fencing
rapine
seizing the property of others, pillage
rapine
violent robbery or pillage
rapture
the expression, in words or music, of intense delight or enthusiasm; a rhapsody
rare
exceptional; splendid
rare
exceptional, unusual, remarkable, excellent (but here used with profound irony)
rare
excellent; splendid (an exclamation expressing admiration, astonishment, etc.)
rare
extraordinary, bizarre
rare
exceptional
rarest
most unusual, most exceptional (OED a1, 5a); most excellent (OED a1, 6b)
rarest
finest, worthiest (OED rare adj 1 , 5a)
rarity
unusual excellence (OED n. 3)
rascal
(n) wretch, villain
rascal
(a) wretched, mean (OED adj. 2), with implications of low class status
rash
hasty, impetuous (OED adj. 2a)
rat
(you) contemptible individual, (you) rag, (you) scrap (perhaps here used as a pejorative reference to Nanulo's dwarf-like stature)
rate
standard of living, level of domestic expenditure
rate
price
rates
estimates
ratified
settled, confirmed
ratsbane
rat poison, usually arsenic
ravelin
in fortifications, an outwork consisting of two faces which form a salient angle, constructed beyond the main ditch and in front of the curtain (OED)
ravenous
ferocious, predatory (OED adj. 1a)
ravish
captivate, perhaps in a sexual sense
ravish
snatched; tore away; broke off
ravish
entrance, enrapture (OED v. 3b)
ravish
snatch; seize
raw
unripened, unready, in a natural state not yet fashioned into something more sophisticated
re-estate
to reinstate, re-establish (very common in the seventeenth century)
re-mediate
mediate again (Mad Couple is the only usage cited in OED v1.)
reach
extend
reader
'curate' is how the character is described in the dramatis personae; but possibly the usage implies too a lay person employed to read lessons in chapel where no trained clergy officiated
readily
promptly, eagerly, willingly
ready
dressed
ready
eager; vigilant
ready
as cash in hand, the sum proposed in actual coins
ready coin
cash in hand
ready money
cash or funds immediately available for use
ready money
in the form of cash for immediate payment
ready money
cash
ready money
immediate payment in coin
ready-made
finished, immediately available to wear
reals
small Spanish silver coins (eight of these made up the more famous "pieces of eight")
rear
restore, recover, in the sense of raise again to his feet, animate (with possible comic overtones, given the reference in the context to the patient being reduced to a skeleton, of bringing back from the dead)
rear
set up (OED v1. 1a)
reason
reasoning, thinking (OED n1. 10); statement, remark (OED n1. 3a); ground, cause (OED n1. 6)
reason
evidence used to support a particular argument (OED n1. 1a); reasons for taking a particular course of action (OED n1. 5a)
reason
my reasoning, an explanation
reason
judgement
rebated
moderated
recalculate
go over again, recount, ‘calculate afresh’ (OED) (a very rare word)
recall
bring back, recover, restore
recall
recollect; restore, revive (OED v1. 3c and 4)
recant
renounce, abjure (OED v1. 1b); publicly confess as an error (OED v1. 3)
recant
retract, renounce as erroneous
recantation
retraction or renunciation of a mistaken opinion or belief; OED (recant v1, 1) notes that ‘recant’ is used especially ‘with formal or public confession of error in matters of religion’
recanted
renounced
receipt for
place for receiving (OED receipt n, IV 11a)
receipts
recipes (whether culinary or, as here, medical), prescriptions
receive
welcome, admit into their company
receive
catch in my arms (OED v. 3b); give accommodation or shelter to (OED v. 11a); ‘to admit (a person) into some relation with oneself, esp. to familiar or social intercourse; to treat in a familiar or friendly manner’ (OED v. 8a); greet or acknowledge (OED v. 9a); take or accept (often used in the context of marriage) (OED 13a)
receive
greet, salute on arrival, admit into one's presence (but in the context the word also carries sexual overtones: take into one's possession)
recipe
remedy, prescription
recipes
prescriptions (in 1638 these often comprised a list of ingredients and instructions about their combining as a medicine)
reckoned
estimated, valued
reckoning
calculated period of pregnancy (OED has first usage in 1638, but Brome deploys this sense in The Northern Lass in the published form in 1632)
reckoning
account, computed sum owing or due to someone; used especially of a bill at a tavern, but here implying a paying-back or settling of differences between parties (OED vbl. n, 3a and 5)
reckoning
reputation
reckonings
bills
recollect
compose, rally one's spirits (OED v1. 4 and 6)
recompense
reward, payment
recorder’s
office of the recorder, a magistrate or judge with responsibility for a city or borough
recreation
pleasure, entertainment, comfort
recreation
pleasure, entertainment
recreation
pleasures, entertainments, comforts
recreation
(place for) pastime or amusement
rectify
set right, reform, remedy
rector
one exercising supreme or directive control
redamnation
renewed damnation (this is OED’s only citation)
redeem
regain, recover
redeem
rescue (OED v. 4)
redemption
freedom from captivity
redemption
ransom
redress
remedy for trouble; assistance; compensation (for wrong)
reduce
adapt (OED v. 11a and b)
reduce
to bring persons to or into a certain state or condition, belief or code of values; to make conformable to a particular standard; to correct (OED v. 10 and 11)
reducing
removing (from the more common sense of reducing as lessening, diminishing) (OED reduce v, 26b)
reek
steam, emit hot vapour (OED reek, v1 2): often used of freshly-shed blood (OED reek, v1 2b); compare Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, 3.1.158: ‘Now, whilst your purpled hands do reek and smoke, / Fulfill your pleasure’; also used to refer to people or animals in a heated/perspiring state (OED reek, v1 2b), but it does not seem to be used to refer to unpleasant smells until the eighteenth century (OED reek, v1 3)
reels
the parts of spinning apparatus onto which thread is wound
refer
commit, entrust
refined
purified, especially by some technical process
reformado
one who is reformed (OED 2)
reformation
improvement, ‘correction or removal of defects or errors’ (OED n. 2); radical political change (OED n. 3)
refulgent
radiant, resplendent, gleaming, brilliantly shining
refuse
reject, decline
regard
consideration (for) (OED n. 14b)
regard
attention
regard
affection, consideration
regardless
heedless, indifferent, careless
regent
ruling, governing, controlling (as sovereign)
regiment
number of individuals formed into a body or group (OED 8c)
region
condition, area
region
realm, kingdom (OED 1a); sphere or realm of something (OED 3b); ‘A part or division of the body or its parts’ (OED 6b)
region
land, country (in the sense of a distinct realm)
reins
kidneys (the seat of lust)
relate
tell, narrate
relate
restore (but also with intimation of bringing a person into relation to another, and with the further intimation of giving an account, good or bad, of one person to another)
relater
narrator, the one who told me
relation
gift to establish good relations between two people
relation
narration, account
relic
an object venerated in Christianity (particularly the Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox churches) as a material remnant and a memorial of a dead saint
relicts
survivors (OED relict n, 3a , which cites as a characteristic usage the Argument to Ben Jonson's The New Inn (acted 1629): "The eldest daughter, Frances...is the sole relict of the family.")
relief
aid, help or assistance for the poor or needy or those in danger; in early modern England often refers specifically to financial assistance given to the poor from parish funds (OED n2. 3a)
relief
charitable support or sustenance for the impoverished
relief
aid, help, assistance; (especially in legal discourse) deliverance, redress (OED relief n2, 6a)
relief
aid, help, succour
relieve
rescue, assist (OED v. 1a); also used specifically to refer to legal relief (OED v. 1d)
relieve
offer release, free from an obligation (derived from the sense of being relieved from one's guard-duty, which is applicable here)
relieve
free from the obligation (to fulfil the terms of a contract)
relieve
find relief or release (from a burden or curse)
relieve
feed, used specifically of hares, but now obsolete (OED 2e) (It may also mean the men 'rally' in their second attempt at that day's hunting.)
relieve
assist in difficulty (OED v. 1a)
religiously
faithfully; devoutly
reliver
give up again, restore (OED v.); cf. Shakespeare, Measure for Measure (King’s Men, 1603-4): ‘And why meet him at the gates and reliver our authorities there?’ (4.4.5). Many editors of Shakespeare amend 'reliver' to 'redeliver'; N.W. Bawcutt, for instance, writes 'the other recorded uses of reliver and relivery date from the mid 15th c., and it is more probable that in splitting the word [it appears as re-/liuer] the compositor accidentally omitted a syllable' (Bawcutt, ed., Measure for Measure [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991], 199). However, there are additional seventeenth-century uses of the word not recorded by OED; see, for instance, the titlepage of The Honest Welsh Cobbler (London, 1647), who will 'endeavour herself to reliver herself in as cood tialect as her can for her hait plood'.
remit
resign, surrender
remit
allow a fee to remain unpaid
remitted
forgiven debt; abstained from exacting payment
remove
depart, withdraw, quit (this place)
remove
take (you) away; urge (your) departure
remove
relocate
removed
moved, relocated
render
deliver
render
return; deliver
render
give back, return
render
restore (OED v. I 3)
renders
makes
renders
grants, delivers
rendezvous
an appointed place of meeting or gathering (OED 2a)
renown
celebrate, honour
renown
as verb: make famous
rents
revenues; taxes; payments made by tenants
reparation
restoration (of a person to life); OED cites this example (2c)
reparation
repair
repeal
recall from banishment (OED n. 1)
repealed
recalled (often used to talk about return from exile)
repercussion
returned blow or stroke; resulting effect of a course of action; unintended reverberation (OED 6a)
repine
to feel or manifest discontent or dissatisfaction (OED, v.)
repining
grudging, grumbling
report
relate, give an account of (OED v. 1a)
reprobate
someone rejected by God or lost in sin (OED n. 1); ‘an abandoned or unprincipled person’ (OED n. 2)
reprobation
rejection, shame (OED 4. 1)
reproof
reproach, shame
repulse
rejection; also puns on ‘the act of repelling an assailant or hostile force’ (OED n. 1)
repulse
puns on ‘repel by force of arms’ (OED v. 1)
repulse
(n) rejection
repulse
(v) reject (OED v. 2)
repulsed
rejected; also puns on ‘the act of repelling an assailant or hostile force’ (OED repulse n, 1)
requisite
needful, necessary
requital
recompense, reward
requital
return for kindness
requite
retaliate, avenge
requite
repay
requited
rewarded
reserved
preserved
reserved
restrained (Interestingly Cawdrey in his Table Alphabetical of 1604 defines the word as kept safe "for the time to come", which has a subtle bearing on the plot.)
reservedness
reticence, caution
resistance
the power to resist
resolve
answer
resolve
answer (a question, argument, etc.); to solve (a problem of any kind); explain (something to someone) (OED n. 11a and 11c)
resolved
firm of purpose, determined
resort
frequent (OED v1. 9)
resorts
visits
resorts
habitual visitors, associates
resounds
celebrates (OED v1, 4)
respect
favour; esteem
respect
care, attention (OED n. 13c)
respect
consideration, regard, reason
respect
heed, pay attention to (OED v. 2b)
respectful
mindful (OED 1)
respectively
attentively; with becoming respect, deference, or courtesy
respects
considerations
respited
granted (especially from death or execution) (OED v. 1)
rest you
be at peace, be content (usually in the phrase "God rest you")
restitution
'The action of restoring or giving back something to its proper owner, or of making reparation to one for loss or injury previously inflicted' (OED 1a).
restraint
abridgement of liberty (OED 2c)
rests
remains
resume
(must) take to yourself again (something momentarily discarded; OED v. 1)
retail
the sale of commodities in small quantities
retinue
train, attending servants
retire
withdraw (LEME); disappear from sight, vanish (OED 3c), although the first citation is 1697, this scene a few lines later clearly indicates (‘within; without’) that while the spirits, visible or not, remain on stage, the witches go out
retirement
seclusions of self, withdrawals into privacy (OED retirement, 2a)
retirement
withdrawal from activity
retort
cast or throw out (OED 7b)
retorteth
returned, rejected; answered (back)
retract
draw or pull back
retribution
repayment, recompense, return on monies loaned
retrograde
contrary to the order of nature (in the astrological sense of moving counter to the rotation of planets and signs, thus connoting something abnormal)
return
say or state by way of reply or answer (OED v1. 19b)
returns
yield, interest or profit
revel it
make merry, be festive
revel-rout
company of revellers, usually loud and disorderly
revel-rout
occasion of festivity
Revels
music, dancing, and spectacles of wonder forming an evening's entertainment (here, ironic)
Revels
festivities, riotous merry-making; lively entertainment (often involving dancing, acting, masquing, etc.)
Revels
merry-making or festivity, usually with lively entertainment
Revels
dancing, acting, masquing
Revels
entertainments in royal or aristocratic households (as these were most often performed by professional acting troupes, the word was often added to the name of a company, such as the Children of the King's Revels)
reverence
a gesture indicative of respect; an obeisance; a bow or curtsy (OED reverence n, 2)
reverence
a gesture indicative of respect: here a curtsy (OED n. 2)
reverence
profound respect
reverend
honoured, honorable, worthy
reversion
right of succession after the death of the current holder of the title
reverted
directed backwards
revie
challenge it again; venture a larger stake than one’s opponent in card playing (OED v. 3)
review
inspect or examine again (OED v. 2)
rewing
scoring or marking out in lines (for foundations)
Rhenish
good white wine from the Rhine region
rhodomontadoes
extravagant boasting or bragging; vainglorious rhetoric (more hot air than real words)
rial
a Spanish coin (OED n. 4a)
riband
ribbon
ribands
ribbons
rich
valuable
rich
costly, splendid, made from superior material (OED adj. 5a)
rich
abundant, wealthy
riched
enriched (filled their coffers with wealth)
rid
ridden
rid
get rid or free of (OED v. 3c)
riddance
the getting rid
ride
(literally) mount a horse; (but in this figurative instance: mount the scaffold to conduct an execution)
ride a circuit
circle around on horseback; ride at regularly recurring times, as a judge does when he travels on circuit to assizes held in various localities
ridge
horizontal edge or line in which the two sloping sides of a roof meet at the top; the uppermost part or coping of a roof
riff-raff
the rabble; low, disreputable individuals
rifled
gambled (rifle also means ‘despoil’ or ‘plunder’ [OED rifle v1, 1], and this sense hovers above the word’s use here)
riflers
gamesters, participants in the raffle; those who want to ‘rifle’ Frances
riflers
gamesters
rifling
gambling, raffling (‘rifle’ also means to plunder or despoil, and the pun becomes increasingly pointed as The Demoiselle goes on)
rifling
two possible meanings: to shoot with a rifle (OED rifle v3, 2a); or to affect strongly or injuriously; to break or strip off (OED Rifle v2, 5); the first sense, 'to shoot with a rifle' is not recorded before the nineteenth century
right
disposed to doing good
right
legal, equitable or moral title to possess (OED n1. 9a): i.e. that of the husband over the wife
right
legal, equitable or moral title to possess (OED n. 1 9a)
right
healthy, properly developed in mind and body
right
extremely, truly (OED adv. 9b)
right
sane (OED adj. 13a)
right
(n) justifiable claim, title
right
(adv.) accurately, sensitively
right
(a) normal, in good spirits
right
correct
right
avenge
right
justly entitled to the name; having the true character of (OED 17)
righteous
just, morally upright
righter
one who establishes or settles rights (OED 3)
riot
debauchery, extravagance (OED n. 1a); violence, disorder (OED n. 4a)
riotous
dissolute, extravagant (OED riotous 3)
riots
loose living; debauchery, extravagance; noisy or wanton revelry; arising disturbances (OED n. 1a, 2a)
rip
bring up (in conversation); examine (OED v2. 4a)
rip
cut up
rip up
bring up (in conversation); examine (OED v2. 4a)
ripe
fully informed; thoroughly qualified (to execute)
ripe
fully developed (OED adj. 2b); ‘fully informed; thoroughly qualified by study and thought’ (OED adj. 4a); fully prepared (OED adj. 7a); ‘ready or fit for some end or purpose’ (OED adj. 7b); ‘quite prepared for action of some kind, esp. mischief’ (OED adj. 7c)
ripe
ready for harvest, fully prepared; sexually mature or marriageable (OED adj. 2b)
rippiers
those who carry fish to market
roarer
a noisy, riotous bully or reveller; a wild roisterer; the term was particularly associated with tavern culture in the Caroline period (OED, 1b)
roaring
riotous, noisy (‘roaring boy’ was a term for the rowdy young men who are a common feature of Jacobean and Caroline plays)
roaring
shouting in revelry, behave boisterously (OED v. 1b)
roaring
(a) noisy, riotous
rocks
distaffs (OED rock n2, 1)
rogues
mischievous rascals (common as a playful term of reproof or reproach, though perhaps not so playful here); (literally) vagrants, and hence appropriate usage (OED 5 and 1)
roisters
people who behave uproariously; roisterers
rooking
cheating, swindling (OED’s earliest example is from The Demoiselle, but it appears in a number of 1630s texts)
rose-footed
a rose is 'an ornamental knot of ribbon or other material in the shape of a rose, worn upon a shoe-front' (OED n. 15); someone "rose-footed", then, is fashionably dressed
rouncivals
large type of garden or field pea, thought to originate in the foothills of the Pyrenees
round
(1) liquor served around a company of guests, and/or drunk off at the same time by everyone; (2) catch, a form of song requiring at least 3 singers for its effect, each beginning one verse after the preceding voice, creating harmony
round
circular dance
round
plain-speaking, bold, harsh
round
of a sum of money: large, considerable in amount (OED 8a)
round
customary circuit, walk, or course; the beat or course traversed by a watchman, constable (OED n1. 15)
roundlier
thoroughly
roundly
plainly, bluntly; openly, frankly; straight; unsparingly; promptly
roundly
two meanings are relevant here: "promptly" and "unsparingly" (OED adv. 7 and 5)
roundly
plainly (OED 3a); completely, fully (OED 2)
rousers
those who stir things up, i.e. noisy friends (though OED doesn't list this latter meaning until 1732)
routs
rowdy fellows, company
rove
to aim in a random, general fashion (without a fixed mark; usually of shooting arrows; OED v1. 1b)
row
a number of houses standing in a line; a street (esp. a narrow one) formed by two continuous lines of houses (OED 4a)
rowel
sharply serrated disc at the extremity of a spur (OED n. 1a)
royal
absolute, total
royalest
(when used ironically) behaving like royalty, kingly in manner, absolutist in tendency
rub up
revive, call to mind (OED, rub, v1. 13a)
rude
uncivilised, barbarous; violent
rude
impolite, offensive; uncontrolled
rudeness
rough manners
rudeness
roughness; imperfection
rudiments
first principles of a branch of knowledge or art
ruff-peck and cassan
bacon and cheese (thieves' cant)
ruffiano
a ruffian (OED cites a usage in Thomas Coryat's Crudities of 1611: "Shee will either cause thy throate to be cut by her Ruffiano...or procure thee to be arrested" (268).)
ruffians
men of low character, villains
ruffin
devil (cant) (see, for example: 'As the Ruffin nap the Cuffin-quier, and let the Harmanbeck trine with his Kinchins about his Colquarron'; That is, Let the Devil take the Justice, and let the Constable hang with his children about his neck (Head, 1673, in LEME)
ruin
destruction, downfall
rule
control, govern
rum booze
wine (OED rum, a1, 2)
run mad upon
go mad with
run on
keep going
run out
exhaust, get through (OED v. 77 Ja and Jb)
run upon
seek; ‘engage in’ (OED, run, v. 70b and d)
runlet
cask or vessel of varying capacity; or the quantity of liquor contained therein
running
temporary, current
running disease
a) suppurating sore (in societal terms, but also suggestive of the physical side effects of visiting diseased prostitutes); b) continuous, or common, problem (OED, running, ppl.a. 17a)
running of
fleeing from
running sore
(literally) a sore that is discharging matter, or suppurating; especially of the eyes or nose, commonly occurring in cattle; (figuratively) a constant nuisance or irritation; a long-lasting trouble or problem (OED running, ppl a, 4)
runt
hag
russet
reddish-brown
rust
figuratively, deteriorate
rustical
rustic, rural
rusticity
(showing) a lack of breeding, culture, or refinement; clownishness, awkwardness
ruthful
compassionate (said ironically) (OED adj. 1); lamentable, sorrowful
ruthful
lamentable, piteous (OED adj. 2)