ACT III.
Scene 5. Page 369.
Bour. They bid us—to the English dancing schools,
And teach lavoltas high, and swift corantoes.
The lavolta, as the name implies, is of Italian origin. The man turns the woman round several times, and then assists her in making a high spring or cabriole. This dance passed from Italy into Provence and the rest of France, and thence into England. Monsieur Bodin, an advocate in the parliament of Paris, and a very savage and credulous writer on demonology, has gravely ascribed its importation from Italy into France, to the power of witches. The naiveté with which that part of the lavolta which concerns the management of the lady in making the volta is described by Thoinot Arbeau, an author already quoted, is extremely well worth transcribing, particularly as the book is seldom to be met with. "Quand vouldrez torner, laissés libre la main gaulche de la damoiselle, et gettés vostre bras gaulche sur son dos, en la prenant et serrant de vostre main gaulche par le faulx du corps au dessus de sa hanche droicte, et en mesme instant getterez vostre main droicte au dessoubz de son busq pour layder à saulter quand la pousserez devant vous avec vostre cuisse gaulche: Elle de sa part mettra sa main droicte sur vostre dos, ou sur vostre collet, et mettra sa main gaulche sur sa cuisse pour tenir ferme sa cotte ou sa robbe, affin que cueillant le vent, elle ne monstre sa chemise ou sa cuisse nue: Ce fait vous ferez par ensemble les tours de la volte, comme cy dessus a esté dit: Et après avoir tournoyé par tant de cadances qu'il vous plaira, restituerez la damoiselle en sa place, ou elle sentira (quelque bonne contenance qu'elle face) son cerveau esbranlé, plain de vertigues et tornoyements de teste, et vous n'en aurez peult estre pas moins: Je vous laisse à considerer si cest chose bien seante à une jeusne fille de faire de grands pas et ouvertures de jambes: et si en ceste volte l'honneur et la santé y sont pas hazardez et interessez." And again: "Si vous voulez une aultre fois dancer la volte à main droicte, vous fauldra mettre vostre main droicte sur le doz de la damoiselle, et la main gaulche soubz son busq, et en la poussant de la cuisse droicte soubz la fesse, torner le revers de la tabulature cy dessus. Et nottez qu'il y a dexterité à empoigner et serrer contre vous la damoiselle, car il faut ce faire en deux mesures ternaires, desmarchant sur la premiere mésure pour vous planter devant elle, et sur la fin de la deuxieme mésure, luy mettant l'une des mains sur la hanche, et l'aultre soubs le busq pour à la troisième mésure commencer à torner selon les pas contenus en la tabulature."
Scene 6. Page 379.
Pist. Die and be damn'd; and figo for thy friendship.
The practice of thrusting out the thumb between the first and second fingers to express the feelings of insult and contempt has prevailed very generally among the nations of Europe, and for many ages been denominated making the fig, or described at least by some equivalent expression. There is good reason for believing that it was known to the ancient Romans. Winckelman in his letter from Herculaneum has described a bronze satyr as actually making the fig with his fingers, and such a character is among the engravings in the king of Naples's magnificent publication on the antiquities of the above city. The upper part of a similar bronze in a private collection is here copied in the last figure below. It is more likely that making the fig was borrowed from this Roman custom, than from another with which it has been sometimes confounded. This is the infamis digitus of Persius; or the thrusting out the middle finger, on that account called verpus. In many private as well as public collections of Roman antiquities there are still preserved certain figures in bronze, ivory, coral, and other materials, of the following forms.
These however are well known to have been used as amulets against fascination in general, but more particularly against that of the evil eye. They are sometimes accompanied with the common symbol of Priapus, but often consist of it exclusively. The connexion which this phallic figure had with the above-mentioned superstition is known to every classical reader. The introduction of the crescent or moon is not so easily explained. If these amulets were borrowed from the Egyptians, as some have supposed, the crescent may denote the influence of Isis or Venus, and the two symbols united may represent nature, or what the Hindus intend by their sacred Lingam: but every thing on this subject must be conjectural, the very essence of it being mysterious.
The Italian fica seems more intimately and etymologically connected with the obscure disease known to the Romans by the name of ficus; a term, with its appendages, rather to be conceived than fully explained in this place. It has afforded matter for some of Martial's Epigrams. In one of these he thus dashes his mirth against an unlucky sinner:
"Gestari junctis nisi desinis, Ædyle, capris,
Qui modo ficus eras, jam caprificus eris."
lib. iv. ep. 52.
In another he instructs those who delight in the chase how to avoid this affliction:
"Stragula succincti venator sume veredi:
Nam solet a nudo surgere ficus equo."
lib. xiv. ep. 86.
And lastly, he thus expresses himself immediately to the present purpose:
"Ut pueros emeret Labienus, vendidit hortos:
Nil nisi ficetum nunc Labienus habet."
lib. xii. ep. 32.
No one who has lived among Italians will fail to perceive the force of these quotations as applied to the feelings excited by this most offensive gesticulation, which is justly held in the greatest abhorrence. Whether it be abstractedly a symbol of the ficus itself, and, in the use, connected with the very worst of its causes; whether it be the genuine remains of a custom actually known among the Romans; or whether a corruption of the infamis digitus, must be left to every one's own determination. The complicated ambiguity of the word fica must be likewise attended to; and whoever is at a loss on this occasion may consult the early Italian dictionaries.
The author of these remarks, pursuing the opinions of others, had already offered another explanation, viz. the story of the Milanese revolt against the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa. This he desires to withdraw, as resting on the very weak authority of Albert Crantz, a credulous, and comparatively modern, historian; neither is it probable that an incident so local would have spread so widely throughout Europe. Again, whoever will take the trouble of comparing the Hebrew word techor with the story itself, will feel very much inclined to reject the whole as a fabrication.
The earliest Italian authority for the use of this phrase is the Inferno of Dante. In the twenty-fifth canto are the following lines:
"Al fine delle sue parole, il ladro
Le mani alzò, con ambeduo le fiche
Gridando: togli Dio, ch'a te le squadro."
The miscreant who utters this blasphemy, refines on the gesticulation, and doubles the measure of it. It is also to be found in Sacchetti's hundred and fifteenth novel, and in the Cento novelle antiche, nov. 55.
Villani, in his Chronicle, relates that in 1228 the inhabitants of Carmignano insulted the Florentines by setting up a statue on a rock with the hand making the fig, and turned towards the city of Florence. Pope Paul II. made a law against this insult, which punished the offending party by a fine of twenty soldi.
In France the use of it may be traced to a very early period. It occurs in a satire by Guyot de Provins, a poet of the twelfth century. The Spaniards, in all probability, got it from the Romans. They use the phrase higa para vos as a term of contemptuous insult and also as a spell against the consequences of satirical applause. See Menckenii dissertationes, p. 52. Amulets against fascination, or the evil eye, are still used in Spain by women and children, precisely in the same manner as formerly among the Romans. These are made of ivory, but more frequently of jet. A figure of one of the latter, from an original, is here exhibited.
It furnishes a very extraordinary combination of subjects: figures of the holy Virgin and the infant Jesus; the manus lasciva or phallic hand; and a lunar crescent. It is indeed an obvious remnant of the ancient Roman amulet, the potency of which is strengthened by the addition of a Christian mystery. These things are said to be sometimes met with in nunneries, but the use which is there made of them does not seem generally known. One of these modern hands, well carved in ivory, and converted to the purpose of a snuff-box, was lately picked up by a curious traveller in Russia.
A very learned Spaniard, Ramirez de Prado, the author of a commentary on Martial and other ingenious works, adopting the opinion of Doctor Francis Penna Castellon, has fallen into a strange error respecting the etymology of higa. Speaking of it as well known among the Spanish women and children, he derives the name from iynx, the bird called the wryneck, concerning which the ancients had certain superstitions. From the Pharmaceutria of Theocritus, it appears to have been regarded as a love philtre. The similitude of sound has doubtless contributed to this error. See Laurentij Ramirez de Prado ΠΕΝΤΗΚΟΝΤΑΡΧΟΣ, 1612, 4to, p. 248.
The Germans, the Dutch, and perhaps other Northern nations, possess equivalent terms; and it is remarkable that in those languages the signification of the Roman ficus, as a disease, has been preserved. How the phrase of making the fig first came into the English language does not appear; it may perhaps be found only in translation. The Saxons had a term for the ficus, which they called ꝼɩc-aðle. With us the expression has happily dwindled altogether into a more innocent meaning. Not to care a fig for one, literally applies to the fruit so called, according to modern acceptation. In this sense it is sometimes used by Shakspeare, who makes Pistol say, "A fico for the phrase."—M. Wives of Windsor. "And figo for thy friendship."—Henry the Fifth. Again, in the Second Part of Henry the Sixth, we have, "A fig for Peter." And in Othello, "Virtue? a fig!" In the Second Part of Henry the Fourth, Pistol says,
"When Pistol lies do this; and fig me, like
The bragging Spaniard."
Here the phrase seems accompanied by some kind of gesticulation, which might either be the thrusting out of the thumb, or the putting of it into the mouth so as to press out the cheek, another mode of insult that perhaps originally alluded to the ficus, by presenting something like its form. Thus in Lodge's Wit's miserie, "Behold I see contempt marching forth, giving mee the fico with his thombe in his mouth."
In the present play, ancient Pistol, after spurting out his "figo for thy friendship," as if he were not satisfied with the measure of the contempt expressed, more emphatically adds, "the fig of Spain." This undoubtedly alludes to the poisoned figs mentioned in Mr. Steevens's note, because the quartos read, "the fig of Spain within thy jaw," and "the fig within thy bowels and thy dirty maw." Or, as in many other instances, the allusion may be twofold; for the Spanish fig, as a term of contempt only, must have been very familiar in England in Shakspeare's time, otherwise the translator of Della Casa's Galateo would not, in the passage cited by Mr. Reed, have used such an expression, when it was neither in his original nor in Dante; a very strong circumstance in favour of Mr. Reed's opinion.
On the whole, there is no other way of extricating ourselves from the difficulties and ambiguities that attend the present subject, than by supposing some little confusion of ideas in our poet's mind, a weakness not more uncommon with him than with many of his commentators. Or, his phraseology might have been inaccurate; and it is to be feared that too much time and conjecture have been frequently expended on passages originally faulty, and which it might have been sufficient to have stated as such, to the exclusion of further comment or useless explanation.