Of a boke, which called is Troyle,
In Lumbardes tonge, as men may rede and se,
And in our vulgar, long or that he deyde,
Gave it the name of Troylous and Cres-eyde."
The book called Troyle is Boccaccio's Troilo, or Filostrato.
M.C.
Oxford, March 11. 1850.
Emerald (No. 14. p. 217.).—Before we puzzle ourselves with the meaning of a thing, it is well to consider whether the authority may not be very loose and inaccurate. This emerald cross, even if it was made of emeralds, might have been in several pieces. But we are told generally, in Phillips's Mineralogy, that "the large emeralds spoken of by various writers, such as that in the Abbey of Richenau, of the weight of 28 lbs., and which formerly belonged to Charlemagne, are believed to be either green fluor, or prase. The most magnificent specimen of genuine emeralds was presented to the Church of Loretto by one of the Spanish kings. It consists of a mass of white quartz, thickly implanted with emeralds, more than an inch in diameter."
The note to the above exemplifies what I have just said. It is called emerald, he says, because it is green, from the Greek. I might make a query of this; but it is clearly a mistake of some half-learned or ill-understood informant. The name has nothing to do with green. Emerald, in Italian smeraldo, is, I dare say, from the Greek smaragdus. It is derived, according to the Oxford Lexicon, from μαιρω, to shine, whence μαρμαρυγη. In looking for this, I find another Greek word, smirix, which is the origin of emery, having the same meaning. It is derived from σμαω, to rub, or make bright. I cannot help suspecting that the two radical verbs are connected.