Glosses to Spenser's "Shepheardes Calender 1 ' 563 day occurred in the same locality in the Middle English period. There seems to have been, however, a considerable number of of new words or variants of old words that Spenser introduced into the language; and, as they exist in modern dialects, in the form and meaning which he used, it is a fairly safe assumption that they have come down to us in the dialect from his day, and that the dialect is the source from which he took them. The following words, I have been unable to find in literary use before 1579; they all appear in dialects; and the larger number are definitely localized in Yorkshire or at least the North of England. Busket (V), 36 cosset (XI), 37 dapper (X), in derring do (X), 38 frowye (VII), gate (V), 39 ligge so layde (X), ronts (II),
- spell (III), 40 sperre the gate (V), 41 *state (IX), *weanell waste
(IX), 42 *wimble (III). This list of unquestionable dialect words, contains only two East Anglian expressions, cosset and weanell waste; and the latter of these is used by Spenser very curiously. E. K. glosses the phrase as "a weaned youngling"; but wennell in itself means a weaned calf; and waste or waster, a thin calf: the combination therefore can hardly be said to fit either sense or syntax very well. If Spenser were composing his dialect eclogues at Cam- bridge, as Long and Higginson suggest, he would probably, in the first place, have used a much larger proportion of East Anglian, rather than so may Northern words; and, in the second place, what he did use, would probaby have been more accurate. 43 Long's argument, moreover, that he could have X N.E.D. gives only Spenser's use, and suggests an origin either in Fr. bosquet, or a compound of busk (var. of bush) +-et (demin.) ; but E.D.D. gives the exact sense and spelling in Yorks. dialect. 37 East Anglian and Southern dialect. 38 Derring is in good ME. use. N.E.D. suggests that do arose from an erroneous resolution of ado; E.D.D. , however, gives a Northern and Midland dialect do, in Spenser's sense. 39 Occurs in Scots (See Jamieson) , and is the phonological variant of goat that one would expect in any Northern dialect. 40 Appears as "verse" in ME.; as "charm" in Yorks. dialect. 41 Midland as well as Northern. 42 Spenser seems to have mistaken the East Anglian noun wennel for the participial adjective weaned. Waste is also East Anglian. 43 This suggests the parallel situation in the dialect-problem connected with the ascription of Gammar Gurtons Needle to Stevenson. See Camb. Hist., VI, 296-7 and bibliog.
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