Grim and mouldy
Jul. 13th, 2003 09:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
malsperanzaAm so in love with Rowling's use of names. Am apt to ramble on and on about her dextrous wordplay like a besotted etymologist on crack.
Anyway, here's something for you Nimbus-bound folks to find out about:
Have been trying to track down sources of the name "Grimmauld"--the address of Sirius Black's house in London. It is full of resonances, isn't it? Besides, there is the odd little fact that the number 12 keeps popping up in OOTP (August 12 is the date of Harry's judicial hearing; 12 is the street address of the Black house). One could get badly mired in numerological speculations there.
Aside from the pun on grim and old, or Grimm and mould (or mauled), it reminds me a little of grimalkin (grey malkin: an old gray she-cat, by extension a witch's familiar). Someone on another list suggested a connection with "grimoire," a book of black magic, but the word isn't in my OED and I'm a bit dubious.
There was a minor Elizabethan poet named Nicholas Grimald or Grimoald. Not terribly distinguished (known mainly for having coined the phrase "as different as chalke and chese").
In fact, this pome of his is so bad it bears posting. Elizabethan badfic! Yes!
A True Love
What sweet relief the showers to thirsty plants we see,
What dear delight the blooms to bees, my true love is to me!
As fresh and lusty Ver foul Winter doth exceed!
As morning bright, with scarlet sky, doth pass the evening’s weed!
As mellow pears above the crabs esteemàd be!
So doth my love surmount them all, whom yet I hap to see!
The oak shall olives bear, the lamb the lion fray,
The owl shall match the nightingale in tuning of her lay.
Or I my love let slip out of mine entire heart,
So deep reposàd in my breast is she for her desart!
For many blessàd gifts, O happy, happy land!
Where Mars and Pallas strive to make their glory most to stand!
Yet, land, more is thy bliss that, in this cruel age,
A Venus’imp thou hast brought forth, so steadfast and so sage.
Among the Muses Nine a tenth if Jove would make,
And to the Graces Three a fourth, her would Apollo take.
Let some for honour hunt, and hoard the massy gold:
With her so I may live and die, my weal cannot be told.
Ack.
Mind you, I esteem pears above crabs most of the time meself, but would prefer not to picture my love surmounting both at once. I mean, it's like mixing the fish course with the entremet.
Wandering farther afield in Googleland, I see that Grimoald is also the name of one of those obscure local 8th century Gaulish rulers who turn up in wars with Charlemagne: Iduberga and Odo, Munderic and Bode.
Dode.
Siegbert the Lame, who was murdered by his son, Cloderic.
You can't make this stuff up.
Yes: Grimoald, brother of Drogo, father of Theudoald. His mum's name was either Plectudis or Plectrude.
And we wonder where Tolkien got all his best ideas.
Am obviously suffering once again from Random Hilarity Syndrome. Badly need a vacation in Bad Fussing.
And while all of you are down there in Florida (O happy, happy land!), see if you can't do something about getting them to secede from the Upper 49 United States. I keep dropping hints, but so far no one has taken me up on the offer.
Anyway, here's something for you Nimbus-bound folks to find out about:
Have been trying to track down sources of the name "Grimmauld"--the address of Sirius Black's house in London. It is full of resonances, isn't it? Besides, there is the odd little fact that the number 12 keeps popping up in OOTP (August 12 is the date of Harry's judicial hearing; 12 is the street address of the Black house). One could get badly mired in numerological speculations there.
Aside from the pun on grim and old, or Grimm and mould (or mauled), it reminds me a little of grimalkin (grey malkin: an old gray she-cat, by extension a witch's familiar). Someone on another list suggested a connection with "grimoire," a book of black magic, but the word isn't in my OED and I'm a bit dubious.
There was a minor Elizabethan poet named Nicholas Grimald or Grimoald. Not terribly distinguished (known mainly for having coined the phrase "as different as chalke and chese").
In fact, this pome of his is so bad it bears posting. Elizabethan badfic! Yes!
A True Love
What sweet relief the showers to thirsty plants we see,
What dear delight the blooms to bees, my true love is to me!
As fresh and lusty Ver foul Winter doth exceed!
As morning bright, with scarlet sky, doth pass the evening’s weed!
As mellow pears above the crabs esteemàd be!
So doth my love surmount them all, whom yet I hap to see!
The oak shall olives bear, the lamb the lion fray,
The owl shall match the nightingale in tuning of her lay.
Or I my love let slip out of mine entire heart,
So deep reposàd in my breast is she for her desart!
For many blessàd gifts, O happy, happy land!
Where Mars and Pallas strive to make their glory most to stand!
Yet, land, more is thy bliss that, in this cruel age,
A Venus’imp thou hast brought forth, so steadfast and so sage.
Among the Muses Nine a tenth if Jove would make,
And to the Graces Three a fourth, her would Apollo take.
Let some for honour hunt, and hoard the massy gold:
With her so I may live and die, my weal cannot be told.
Ack.
Mind you, I esteem pears above crabs most of the time meself, but would prefer not to picture my love surmounting both at once. I mean, it's like mixing the fish course with the entremet.
Wandering farther afield in Googleland, I see that Grimoald is also the name of one of those obscure local 8th century Gaulish rulers who turn up in wars with Charlemagne: Iduberga and Odo, Munderic and Bode.
Dode.
Siegbert the Lame, who was murdered by his son, Cloderic.
You can't make this stuff up.
Yes: Grimoald, brother of Drogo, father of Theudoald. His mum's name was either Plectudis or Plectrude.
And we wonder where Tolkien got all his best ideas.
Am obviously suffering once again from Random Hilarity Syndrome. Badly need a vacation in Bad Fussing.
And while all of you are down there in Florida (O happy, happy land!), see if you can't do something about getting them to secede from the Upper 49 United States. I keep dropping hints, but so far no one has taken me up on the offer.
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no subject
Date: 2003-07-13 07:28 pm (UTC)Always had a sneaking fondness for those Merovingian names, too: Chilperic and Chloderic and Chlodomer and Gundomer and Gunderic and Guntram and Gundovald and Dagobert and Fredegund. And Chramn, who I picture as much shorter than the others. And behavior to match their names: wasn't it one of Chilperic's wives who tried to kill a rival by wedging her head in a trunk and stomping on the lid? And it took me a while to realize that Clovis = Louis, Chlodovic = Ludwig, etc., but it's still madness.
Just give me Otto. Or Odo. Or Eudo. Or Eudes . . .
no subject
Date: 2003-07-14 03:20 pm (UTC)Yah, Clovis definitely better than Louis, not to mention that his real name was apparently Chlodowech, which became Ludovic, which became...
Thurber did a nice spin on the Franks in a fairy tale called "The White Deer," which features a bluff fellow named King Clode. His court astronomer has bad eyesight and his clockmaker decorates the garden with sundials that say things like "This Brief Spark and Then the Dark" and "It Is Later Than You Think."