smrt (Serbian) - death + Mord (ger) - murder + morte (fr) - death + 'Zmorde - God’s Death! (after the archaic Shakespearean oaths, ’Sdeath! ("God's Death!"), ’Sblood! ("God's Blood!"), ’Zounds ("God's Wounds!) etc.).
Mild und leise (German) - softly and gently → Wagner: Tristan und Isolde: Liebestod: 'Mild und leise wie er lächelt' (German) - 'gentle and soft how he smiles' (the opening words from Isolde).
fierce + Thomas Moore, Irish Melodies: Desmond's Song: 'By the Feal's wave benighted' (Thomas, the heir of the Desmond family, had accidentally been so engaged in the chase, that he was benighted near Tralee, and obliged to take shelter at the Abbey of Feal, in the house of one of his dependents, called Mac Cormac. Catherine, a beautiful daughter of his host, instantly inspired the Earl with a violent passion, which he could not subdue. He married her, and by this inferior alliance alienated his followers, whose brutal pride regarded this indulgence of his love as an unpardonable degradation of his family.)
behauptet (ger) - asserted + hough - trans. To disable by cutting the sinew or tendons of the hough, to hamstring.
despond - depression or dejection of spirits through loss of resolution or hope
song.
ancestress - a female ancestor thanatos (gr) - death + kestreus (gr) - hungry + thanasimos (gr) - deadly, fatal + thanatephoros (gr) - death-bringing + that ancestral.
swallowed + swollen up.
save = safe - affording security or immunity, not exposing to danger.
brickdust - powdered brick + Genesis 3:19: 'for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return' + FDV: This earth ourth is not but brickdust.
humus - the dark-brown or black substance which forms the soil in which plants grow
rune - to compose or perform poetry or songs; to lament + Habakuk 2.2: Then the LORD answered me and said, "Record the vision And inscribe it on tablets, That the one who reads it may run ('he may run that readeth it').
rede - interpret,explain, surmise, predict + FDV: He who runes may read it.
on all fours - on hands and knees + to run on all fours - fairly, evenly, not to limp like a lame dog.
OLDCASTLE - Town, County Meath, 64 miles from Dublin.
crumble - to break down into small crumbs; to reduce to crumbs or small fragments + The 4 Royal Manors of County Dublin, established under Henry II, were Esker, Newcastle, Saggart, and Crumlin.
sell (obs) - to give
sooth - truth
Dublin + humble - submissive.
sift - to pass (something) through a sieve, in order to separate the coarse from the fine particles; intr. To use a sieve, to do sifting + FDV: But speak siftly.
moulder - a worker who makes molds, one that exerts a determining influence on course of development
whisht - hush, silence + wish + bí i do thost (Irish) - be quiet! FDV: Be in your whisht.
whysht - wish + what + FDV: Whyst? 'Tis viking viceking's soil.
gyand - giant
forficula - a genus of earwigs
amnis (l) - river
fay - fairy + Morgan le Fay is a powerful sorceress in the Arthurian legend. As her epithet "le Fay" (from the French la fée, meaning fairy) indicates, the figure of Morgan appears to have been originally a supernatural being.
waist - the portion of the trunk of the human body that is between the ribs and the hip-bones; waste + west
howe - hollow, depression, valley; how + THING MOTE - The assembly place, usually on a mound, established by the Vikings whenever they settled. In Dublin, the Thing Mote was on a low hill South of the present Dame Street. The hill of the Thing Mote was called the Howe, Haugh, or "Howe over the Stein" (Steyne), from haugr, Old Danish "hill, sepulchral mound."
viceking - viceroy + Viking + Henrik Ibsen: The Viking's Barrow.
grab - seize, snatch + Grab (ger) - grave.
hvad (Danish) - what
are + øre: (Norwegian) - ear.
astonished + stone age.
oye - grandchild + øye: (Norwegian) - eye + I
terrorstruck + thunderstruck + Ragnarøkr (Old Norse) - destruction of the Norse gods + Thonar or Thon - god worshipped in England and on the Continent, maybe a form of Thor because his name is that of the Teutonic word for 'thunder'.
stoop - to bow down; an act of stooping; a post, pillar + Stop, please stop... (motif) + FDV: Stoop, if you are abcedminded, [to this claybook,] what curios of signs, (please stoop) in this allaphbed, a hatch, a celt, an earshare for to the pourquose of which was to cassay the earthcrust at all [of] hours [furroward & bagowards bogowards like an ox yoxen at the turnpath]!
absentminded - paying no attention to, and receiving no impression from, present objects or events + Joyce's note: 'abced' + abecede (Old English) - alphabet + ABCDE-minded = literate.
claybook (Joyce's note) → Clodd: The Story of the Alphabet 89: (of cuneiform writing) 'the abundant clay of the alluvial country afforded material whose convenience and permanence brought it into general use. Upon this the characters were impressed by a reed or square-shaped stylus, the clay-books being afterwards baked or sun-dried'.
curious + kurios (gr) - lord.
alaphbet (Joyce's note) → Clodd: The Story of the Alphabet 122: (quoting Canon Taylor) 'the very word ALPHABET... is obviously derived from the names of the two letters alpha and beta... which are plainly identical with the names aleph and beth borne by the corresponding Semitic characters' + (riverbed).
rede - read
Lane-Poole: The Speeches & Table-Talk of the Prophet Mohammad xl: 'the "we" (God), and "thou" (Mohammad), and "ye" (the audience), of the Koran'.
have it out - to settle or clear up the matter by free discussion or a fight
mina (also mna) - an ancient Near Eastern unit of weight equivalent to 50 shekels. The mina, like the shekel, was also a unit of currency. From earliest Sumerian times, a mina was a unit of weight. At first, talents and shekels had not yet been introduced. By the time of Ur-Nammu, the mina had a value of 1/60 talents as well as 60 shekels.
miscegenation - a mixture of races
tekel = Armaic equivalent of shekel - any of several ancient units of weight or of currency. The first usage is from Mesopotamia around 3000 BC. Initially, it may have referred to a weight of barley (the first syllable "she" was Akkadian for barley). This shekel was about 180 grains (11 grams or .35 troy ounces). The earliest shekels were a unit of weight, used as other units such as grams and troy ounces for trading before the advent of coins. Coins were invented by the early Anatolian traders who stamped their marks to avoid weighing each time used.
closing line of the novel (FW 628.15-16), and FW 418.10 in the fable The Ondt and the Gracehoper
forsin - ruined by sin, burdened with sin + forsan (l) - perhaps + upharsin - half of mina.
kingdom + Thingmote + In the book of Daniel, King Belshazzar of Babylon during a drunken feast takes sacred golden and silver vessels, which had been removed from Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem by his predecessor Nebuchadnezzar. Using these holy items, the King and his court praise 'the gods of gold and silver, brass, iron, wood, and stone'. Immediately, the disembodied fingers of a human hand appear and write on the wall of the royal palace the words מנא ,מנא, תקל, ופרסין (Mene, Mene, Tekel u-Pharsin). Although usually left untranslated in English translations of Daniel, these words are known Aramaic names of measures of currency: MENE, a mina, TEKEL, a spelling of shekel, PERES, half a mina. Despite various inducements, none of the royal magicians or advisors can interpret the omen. The King sends for Daniel, an exiled Jew taken from Jerusalem, who had served in high office under Nebuchadnezzar. Rejecting offers of reward, Daniel warns the King of the folly of his arrogant blasphemy before reading the text. The meaning that Daniel decrypts from these words is based on passive verbs corresponding to the measure names. And this is the writing that was inscribed: MENE, MENE, TEKEL, and PHARSIN. This is the interpretation of the matter: MENE, God has numbered the days of your kingdom and brought it to an end; TEKEL, you have been weighed on the scales and found wanting; PERES, your kingdom is divided and given to the Medes and Persians. That very night King Belshazzar is slain, and Darius the Mede becomes King.
MEDIA - Ancient country in area now North-West part of Iran; became part of Persian empire under Cyrus, 6th century BC. Dan 5:25: "Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians."
Porson, Richard (1759-1808) - English classical scholar
meander - to wander deviously or aimlessly + Neanderthal - middle Paleolithic fossil hominid Homo neanderthalensis.
Heidelberg man - an early pleistocene man closely rel. to Neanderthal + Edinburgh.
imply - to indicate the truth or existence of (something) by suggestion rather than explicit reference
knit - weave, to conjoin as by knotting or binding together; to bind, join, or connect firmly
whet - hone, sharpen
convey - to transport, to transmit, be the medium of
sweeten - to add sugar, refine, purify
sensation - feeling, emotion
adhere - to stick fast, to become or remain firmly attached to
attachment - liking, affection, love, devotion
dog - to follow insidiously, to act as a dog, to guard as a dog
bitch - to spoil, botch, say mean things
entail - to bring on by way of necessary consequence
ensuance - the fact of ensuing + ensue - to follow, to result from.
reredos - an ornamental screen covering the wall at the back of an altar
Rama or Raman - several avatars of Vishnu + ram's bottom.
terricolous - (zoology) living in or on the ground + terricola (l) - earth-dweller.
vively - in a lively or energetic manner; clearly, vividly + vivlion viou - modern greek for biblion biou (book of life).
quaky - inclined to quake; of the nature of quaking + The Letter: Dear, and it goes on to...
hatch - hatchet
celt - an implement with chisel-shaped edge, of bronze or stone (but sometimes of iron), found among the remains of prehistoric man. It appears to have served for a variety of purposes, as a hoe, chisel, or axe, and perhaps as a weapon of war.
ear (obs) - a ploughing; to plough → ploughshare + (*E* the ploughshare, *A* the earth).
purpose + pourquoi (French) - the reason why.
casser (fr) - to break + assay - to determine the content or quality of (a metal or ore).
crust - the upper or surface layer of the ground (obs.)
turnpath + boustrophedon (gr) - turning like oxen in ploughing (of writing from left to right and right to left in alternate lines) + FDV: furroward & bagowards bogowards like an ox yoxen at the turnpath
say - see + FDV: Here are say figurines billicoose arming and mounting. Mounting & arming bellicose figurines are see there here.
figurine - a small carved or molded figure + (*V* and *C*).
bellicose - inclined to war or fighting; warlike + bill and coo - to interchange caresses (said of doves; also of demonstrative lovers).
arm - to embrace; to equip with weapons, to prepare for struggle
mount - to organize and equip (an attacking force); to get upon the back of a horse or other animal for the purpose of riding
futhorc - runic alphabet + further + Joyce's note: 'futhorc' → Clodd: The Story of the Alphabet 201: 'The primitive Gothic alphabet is named, on the acrologic principle, "futhorc", after the first six letters, f, u, t, h, o, r, c'.
effinge - to fashion, shape + little effigy + (*I*).
flint - a kind of hard stone + Vorfall (ger) - incident + fire-lighting flint + FDV: And ╕uthor, this little effingee stands (not completed) is for fire a fing called in flintgun flintforfall. ╒ace at the eased. O I fay!! ╕ ace at the waist. Ho you fie! Upwards & down them! ╓ ace to ╜ace!
east + 'Face to the east, Face to the west Face to the one you love the best' (children’s game).
fay - to fit closely together, to agree, succeed; to clean + see + say.
fie - exp. of disgust or the affectation of being shocked; to trust + see
wap - to fold up, bind, wrap + "Up guards and at 'em!" - Wellington's order in the last charge at Waterloo.
dump - to fall abruptly, to knock down [Joyce's note: 'dump']
san (gr) - old letter SS; numerical symbol 900