1. 1. 1 Hoh, hoh, etc. ‘Whalley is right in saying that this is the conventional way for the devil to make his appearance in the old morality-plays. Gifford objects on the ground that ‘it is not the roar of terror; but the boisterous expression of sarcastic merriment at the absurd petition of Pug;’ an objection, the truth of which does not necessarily invalidate Whalley’s statement. Jonson of course adapts the old conventions to his own ends. See Introduction, [p. xxiii].
1. 1. 9 Entring a Sow, to make her cast her farrow? Cf. Dekker, etc., Witch of Edmonton (Wks. 4. 423): ‘Countr. I’ll be sworn, Mr. Carter, she bewitched Gammer Washbowls sow, to cast her Pigs a day before she would have farried.’
1. 1. 11 Totnam. ‘The first notice of Tottenham Court, as a place of public entertainment, contained in the books of the parish of St. Gile’s-in-the-Fields, occurs under the year 1645 (Wh-C.). Jonson, however, as early as 1614 speaks of ‘courting it to Totnam to eat cream’ (Bart. Fair, Act 1. Sc. 1, Wks. 4. 362). George Wither, in the Britain’s Remembrancer, 1628, refers to the same thing:
And Hogsdone, Islington, and Tothnam-court, For cakes and cream had then no small resort.
Tottenham Fields were until a comparatively recent date a favorite place of entertainment.
1. 1. 13 a tonning of Ale, etc. Cf. Sad Shep., Wks. 6. 276:
The house wives tun not work, nor the milk churn.
1. 1. 15 Spight o’ the housewiues cord, or her hot spit. ‘There be twentie severall waies to make your butter come, which for brevitie I omit; as to bind your cherne with a rope, to thrust thereinto a red hot spit, &c.’—Scot, Discovery, p. 229.
1. 1. 16, 17 Or some good Ribibe ... witch. This seems to be an allusion, as Fleay suggests, to Heywood’s Wise-Woman of Hogsdon. The witch of that play declares her dwelling to be in ‘Kentstreet’ (Heywood’s Wks. 5. 294). A ribibe meant originally a musical instrument, and was synonymous with rebec. By analogy, perhaps, it was applied to a shrill-voiced old woman. This is Gifford’s explanation. The word occurs again in Skelton’s Elynour Rummyng, l. 492, and in Chaucer, The Freres Tale, l. 1377: ‘a widwe, an old ribybe.’ Skeat offers the following explanation: ‘I suspect that this old joke, for such it clearly is, arose in a very different way [from that suggested by Gifford], viz. from a pun upon rebekke, a fiddle, and Rebekke, a married woman, from the mention of Rebecca in the marriage-service. Chaucer himself notices the latter in E. 1704.’
1. 1. 16 Kentish Towne. Kentish Town, Cantelows, or Cantelupe town is the most ancient district in the parish of Pancras. It was originally a small village, and as late as the eighteenth century a lonely and somewhat dangerous spot. In later years it became noted for its Assembly Rooms. In 1809 Hughson (London 6. 369) called it ‘the most romantic hamlet in the parish of Pancras.’ It is now a part of the metropolis. See Samuel Palmer’s St. Pancras, London, 1870.