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.