[240] [‘Devest’ was still in use till the end of the eighteenth century, but ‘divest’ is already found in King Lear, 1605, i, 1, 50.]
[241] Pygmæi, quasi cubitales (Augustine).
[242] First so used by Theophrastus in Greek, and by Pliny in Latin.—The real identity of the two words explains Milton’s use of ‘diamond’ in Paradise Lost, b. 7; and also in that sublime passage in his Apology for Smectymnuus: “Then zeal, whose substance is ethereal, arming in complete diamond”.—Diez (Wörterbuch d. Roman. Sprachen, p. 123) supposes, not very probably, that it was under a certain influence of ‘diafano’, the translucent, that ‘adamante’ was in the Italian, whence we have derived the word, changed into ‘diamante’.
[243] [Similarly jowl for chowl or chavel.]
[244] Richard III, Act iv, Sc. 4.
[245] [For another account of this word, approved by Dr. Murray, see The Folk and their Word-Lore, p. 156.]
[246] [‘Bliss’ representing the old English bliths or blidhs, blitheness, is really a quite distinct word from ‘bless’, standing for blets, old English blétsian (=blóedsian, to consecrate with blood, blód), although the latter was by a folk-etymology very frequently spelt ‘bliss’.]
[247] [But ‘afraied’ is the earliest form of the word (1350), the verb itself being at first spelt ‘afray’ (1325). N.E.D.]
[248] How close this relationship was once, not merely in respect of etymology, but also of significance, a passage like this will prove: “Perchance, as vultures are said to smell the earthiness of a dying corpse; so this bird of prey [the evil spirit which personated Samuel, 1 Sam. xxviii. 41] resented a worse than earthly savor in the soul of Saul, as evidence of his death at hand”. (Fuller, The Profane State, b. 5, c. 4.)
[249] [There is an unfortunate confusion here between ‘heal’ to make ‘hale’ or ‘[w]hole’ (Anglo-Saxon hælan) and the old (and Provincial) English hill, to cover, hilling, covering, hellier, a slater, akin to ‘hell’, the covered place, ‘helm’; Icelandic hylja, to cover.]