The Anatomy of Melancholy

The word. Aurum potabile literally means drinkable gold. Here the phrase supplies a joke about wealth consumed in drinking.

In Burton. Burton describes people who have shipwrecked their fortunes through wine and turned all their substance into aurum potabile. The surrounding losses of rank, property and security give the phrase its satirical force: what might have sustained a prosperous life has been swallowed away.

The places. The drinking of a fortune becomes the conversion of property into drinkable gold. (p. 120; DJR-045-05.)

In this edition. “aurum potabile” → “drinkable gold” (DJR-045-05). The literal English phrase preserves the play between gold as wealth and something made drinkable.

See also. Aqua vitae.

Baffle

Source forms: baffled; bafled

The word. Baffle can mean to humiliate, disgrace or treat contemptuously. The attested spellings baffled and bafled describe treatment suffered at another person’s hands.

In Burton. Burton applies the word to his own disappointment with patrons, to the insults endured by poor dependants, and to a time-server who dominates in one place but submits elsewhere. The repeated contrast concerns power and humiliation. Bewilderment is not the central experience named by these examples.

The places. Burton recalls contemptuous treatment by patrons. (p. 136; DJR-048-10.) A poor dependant suffers humiliation from the powerful. (p. 159; DJR-053-27.) A changeable opportunist tyrannizes here and is humiliated there. (p. 36; DJR-010-29.)

In this edition. “baffled” → “treated me with contempt” (DJR-048-10); “bafled” → “humiliated” (DJR-053-27); “be baffled” → “being humiliated” (DJR-010-29). The modern equivalents make the social injury explicit while preserving the different grammatical settings.

See also. Explode.

Bawd

Source forms: bawd

The word. A bawd is a procurer: someone who facilitates sexual encounters. The noun need not denote a woman, despite some familiar later associations.

In Burton. In Burton’s attack on a Jesuit, professions of poverty, fasting and chastity are set against accusations of wealth, gluttony and sexual misconduct. Bawd is paired with fornicator, distinguishing procurement from participation in the sexual act. Its force here is an accusation of hypocrisy within religious polemic.

The places. The term appears in an accusation against a professedly chaste religious figure. (p. 29; DJR-009-13.)

In this edition. “notorious Bawd” → “notorious procurer” (DJR-009-13). “Procurer” preserves the role named by the insult and its application to the male figure being attacked.

See also. Quean and slut.

Bewray

Source forms: bewray

The word. Bewray here means to soil or befoul. Its sense is determined by the sustained language of excrement surrounding it.

In Burton. Burton attacks annotators who disfigure good authors with absurd commentary. His Latin abuse, the accompanying verb dawb, and the later images of dungheaps and dung-dwelling beetles make the meaning concrete. The word participates in a deliberately coarse satire on textual interference.

The places. Annotators are accused of fouling the books they comment on. (p. 71–72; DJR-018-10.)

In this edition. “bewray and dawb” → “soil and smear” (DJR-018-10). The English pair follows the local image. A sense such as reveal or betray would not convey the action described here.

See also. Fact; Privy.

Bile and boil

Source forms: bile

The word. The spelling bile needs particular care. In a Latin title, atra bile refers to black bile; in the English list of discharging sores, bile means a boil.

In Burton. Burton cites a work On Black Bile in discussing bodily disturbance. A few passages later, he lists a bile with an ulcer and an issue as a source of discharge whose closure is thought harmful. Much later black choler supplies a metaphorical bath or bait for evil spirits. These contexts distinguish a humour, a skin sore, and figurative use of the humour’s name.