Abdicate

Use in the book

The father’s action belongs to a satire on unequal punishment. Burton first describes corrupt courts and manipulated inheritances, then supposes an offence of fornication. The father disinherits or disowns his child and dismisses him outright. A poor offender may lose possessions, prospects and reputation and undergo severe penance, while the same conduct in a powerful person is treated as no offence and may even be boasted of. The dramatic excuses borrowed from Plautus serve that contrast: the Mostellaria passage concerns a son’s misconduct, while the next tag comes from the Asinaria’s excuse for an old man. Burton combines these materials rather than reporting a single legal proceeding.

The later imperial example again imposes deprivation from outside. Burton says that the Turks excluded Cornutus, the next heir, because he was devoted to books. His source is named as Knolles’s Turkish history, but the printed name and anecdote remain unverified. The example supports a received belief that scholarship weakens martial vigour and bodily spirits. The surrounding medical account proceeds to excessive study, isolation and lack of exercise; it is historical argument, not established evidence that learning makes an heir unfit to govern.

Voluntary withdrawal is separately attested in the poverty consolation. Kings and queens have wilfully abdicated themselves from worldly toys: wilfully means willingly, and the things relinquished include crowns, fortunes and honours. Burton praises this renunciation but immediately concedes that wealth and honour are good gifts, legitimately sought and possessed. The reflexive example therefore both differs grammatically from Cornutus’s exclusion and falls short of a universal demand to renounce rank.

The associated words extend the account of exclusion. Casheer also names the dismissal of a useful dependent once no further benefit is expected. Burton’s humane counterexample is attributed to Cato in the body, although the supplied note identifies it as Plutarch’s criticism of Cato. In the love account, a hopeful suitor may accept the risk of being cast off and disinherited: he chooses the risk, while the deprivation would still be imposed by others. Lucian’s Abdicato, meanwhile, is a cited title in the historical discussion of anger and slander. Its disowned son should not be mistaken for another ruler resigning office.

Related entries

Estate: Inheritance, property and social position

Church patronage: Patronage and exclusion from preferment

Study and reading: The historical argument about excessive study

Custom and education: Upbringing, occupation and inherited advantage

Poverty and riches: Voluntary poverty and legitimate possession

Honour and nobility: Birth, merit and the loss or renunciation of honours

Places to read

1. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 16–20imposed disowning, disinheritance and dismissal within the contrast between poor offenders and powerful ones
2. Democritus Junior to the Reader · paragraphs 24–26casheer as discarding a dependent; the Cato–Plutarch attribution is qualified
3. Subsection 9. Anger as a Cause · paragraphs 28–32Abdicato as Lucian’s The Disowned Son, cited in the attributed account of anger and madness
4. Subsection 15 Love of Learning or Excessive Study With a Digression on the Misery of Scholars and Why the Muses Are Melancholy · paragraphs 16–22Cornutus excluded from succession; the uncollated Knolles reference and surrounding claims about excessive study
5. Member 3 Against Poverty and Want and Other Such Adversities · paragraphs 31–35willing reflexive abdication, voluntary poverty, and the express permission to possess wealth and honour
6. Member 4 Subsection 1 Symptoms or Signs of Love Melancholy in Body and Mind Good and Bad Signs and So Forth · paragraphs 79–82, 1–4love’s absorption and the hopeful suitor’s willingness to risk imposed disinheritance

In this edition

“Abdicate” becomes “disown” in the father-and-child construction; “abdicated” becomes “excluded” when the Turks act upon Cornutus. The former preserves repudiation of a family relationship, the latter deprivation of succession. Neither rendering makes the child or heir resign. “Dis-inherit or abdicate his child” becomes “disinherit or disown his child,” and “quite casheer him” becomes “dismiss him outright”.

By contrast, “wilfully abdicated themselves from these so much esteemed toyes” becomes “willingly relinquished these highly prized toys.” The modern clause changes the reflexive construction into a direct relinquishing of the goods, while keeping the same voluntary agents. “In Abdicato” becomes “in The Disowned Son”: the title supplies son, whereas the printed Latin participle itself gives disowned.

abdicate

Printed “abdicate” (English; lemma).

To reject or disown someone, depriving that person of a family relationship or entitlement.

Here: The father disowns his child in the hypothetical example of punishment for fornication.

Context: The father acts and the child is acted upon; Burton then contrasts severe punishment of the poor with impunity for the socially powerful.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: the father will dis-inherit or abdicate his child

Modern rendering: A father will disinherit or disown his child

Word and construction: Abdicate contributes disown; dis-inherit separately contributes disinherit. The entire construction keeps the father as agent and child as object.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “abdicated” (English; lemma).

Citation key: abdicate.

Here: Cornutus, named as next heir, is excluded from imperial succession because of devotion to study.

Context: The Turks are the agents and Cornutus the object. Burton cites Knolles, but the name and succession anecdote remain uncollated.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: The Turks abdicated Cornutus the next heir, from the Empire

Modern rendering: The Turks excluded Cornutus, the next heir, from the empire

Word and construction: Complete agent–verb–object construction; abdicated means excluded, not resigned. The causal clause about his books follows in both columns.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

abdicate oneself

Printed “abdicated themselves” (English; phrase).

To withdraw oneself or relinquish one’s own position or possessions; the reflexive themselves makes the agents also the people withdrawing.

Here: Kings and queens willingly renounce crowns, fortunes and honours; wilfully means willingly or deliberately.

Context: Burton praises voluntary renunciation, then expressly allows wealth and honours to be legitimately sought and possessed.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: wilfully abdicated themselves from these so much esteemed toyes

Modern rendering: willingly relinquished these highly prized toys

Word and construction: The full reflexive construction is recast as relinquished with the goods as direct object. The modern wording preserves voluntary agency rather than reproducing themselves separately.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Abdicatus

Printed “Abdicato” (Latin; lemma).

Latin abdicatus means disowned or disinherited; Abdicato is the inflected form used after in in the title citation.

Here: The title is rendered The Disowned Son; son identifies the work’s protagonist rather than translating a separately printed filius.

Context: Burton invokes Lucian’s rhetorical speech in an attributed historical account of anger, slander and madness. The original margin names Gilbert Cousin as Latin translator; the complete speech and intermediary remain uncollated.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: in Abdicato

Modern rendering: in The Disowned Son

Word and construction: Abdicato supplies disowned; Son is supplied to identify the figure and title. This is a work title, not an assertion that a ruler resigned.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

cashier

Printed “casheer” (English; lemma).

To dismiss or turn someone away.

Here: The father’s outright dismissal reinforces the child’s disowning.

Context: The quoted command expels the child from the father’s sight; it is the father’s action.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: quite casheer him

Modern rendering: dismiss him outright

Word and construction: Quite contributes outright; casheer contributes dismiss; him refers to the child. The modern and gives coordination from the wider sentence.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “casheer” (English; lemma).

Citation key: cashier.

Here: People are discarded when no further usefulness is expected, in a satire on self-interested friendship and service.

Context: Burton’s comparison with an old dog describes the powerful dismissing the dependent. The humane speech he assigns to Cato actually belongs to Plutarch’s criticism of Cato, as the supplied note explains.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: hang him up or casheer him

Modern rendering: hang a man or dismiss him

Word and construction: The coordinated alternatives align; casheer contributes dismiss. Modern a man makes explicit the person treated like an old dog in the original comparison.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

disinherit

Printed “dis-inherit” (English; lemma).

To deprive someone of an inheritance.

Here: Paired with abdicate, the word specifies loss of inheritance while abdicate names disowning.

Context: A hypothetical father acts against his child; the subsequent losses, disgrace and penance are not one uniform legal procedure.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: dis-inherit or abdicate his child

Modern rendering: disinherit or disown his child

Word and construction: The two coordinated verbs retain their distinct objects of deprivation; child is the grammatical object of both.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.

Further local use

Printed “disinherited” (English; lemma).

Citation key: disinherit.

Here: The lover is willing to risk being cast off and disinherited in pursuing the beloved.

Context: The willingness is to face another person’s sanction, not to perform disinheritance himself; Burton conditions the pursuit on some hope of succeeding.

Source: original body

Source wording and original alignment: be threatned, be cast off, and disinherited

Modern rendering: is threatened, cast off and disinherited

Word and construction: Matched passive predicates; the shared subject is the lover in the wider sentence. Both columns place the threatened losses within an even-though concession.

Alignment conventions: Alignment convention.