Fal. ... if to his men, I would curry with Master Shallow——
To curry is the same as to curry favour, to flatter, to please. To curry, in its genuine acceptation, is, as every one knows, to rub or dress leather, in French courroyer, from cuir; and in this sense it was applied to rubbing down a horse's hide, a process that conveys a sensation of pleasure to the animal. The rest of the phrase is corrupt, as will appear from the ancient orthography, which is, to curry favel. Thus in the old story How a merchande dyd hys wyfe betray, we have,
"There sche currayed favell well;"
and in the prologue to The merchant's tale of Beryn, in Urry's Chaucer, p. 597,
"As though he had lerned cury favel of some old frere."
Now the name of Favel was anciently given to yellow-coloured horses, in like manner as Bayard, Blanchard, and Lyard were to brown, white, or gray. One of Richard the First's horses was so called, as we learn from Robert of Brunne's Chronicle, p. 175:
"Sithen at Japhet [Jaffa] was slayn fauvelle his stede,
The romance tellis grete pas ther of his douhty dede:"
and see Warton's Hist. of Engl. poetry, vol. i. p. 161. It must be obvious, therefore, that the phrase to curry favel was a metaphorical expression adopted from the stable.
Puttenham informs us that moderation of words tending to flattery, or soothing, or excusing, is expressed by the figure paradiastole, "which therefore," says he, "nothing improperly we call curry favell, as when we make the best of a thing," &c.—Arte of English poesie, p. 154. There is likewise a proverb, "He that will in court dwell, must needes currie fabel;" the meaning of which was not well understood, even in the time of Elizabeth; for Taverner speaking of it says, "Ye shal understand that fabel is an olde Englishe worde, and signified as much as favour doth now a dayes."—Proverbes or adagies gathered out of the Chiliades of Erasmus, 1569, 18mo, fo. 44. Much about this time began the corruption from favel to favour, of which an example may be seen in Forrest's translation of Isocrates, 1580, 4to, fo. 23.
It is necessary to add that favel is also an old word that expresses deceit, from the French favele, fabula; and is so used by Skelton: but this will not invalidate the foregoing etymology. As to Skinner's derivation of curry favour from the French querir faveur,—if an equivalent phrase had existed in the French language, it might at least have been plausible: but there is no instance of cury, or rather curray, the proper word, being used alone in the sense of to seek; nor does it appear from ancient authority that favel ever denoted favour.