—— _quene of the Grekis londe_]—_londe_, i. e. land: qy. does any writer except Skelton call her a queen?
_Thamer also wrought with her goodly honde_ _Many diuisis passynge curyously_]
It is plain that Skelton, while writing these complimentary stanzas, consulted Boccaccio _De Claris Mulieribus_: there this lady is called _Thamyris_ (see, in that work, “De _Thamyri_ Pictrice,” cap. liiii. ed. 1539). Her name is properly _Timarete_; she was daughter to Mycon the painter; vide Plinii _Nat. Hist.: honde_, i. e. hand: _diuisis_, i. e. devices.
v. 860. _corage ... perfight_] i. e. heart, affection ... perfect.
—— _lady Elisabeth Howarde_] Was the third daughter of the second Duke of Norfolk by his second wife, Agnes Tylney, daughter of Sir Hugh Tylney, and sister and heir to Sir Philip Tylney of Boston, Lincolnshire, knight (I follow Howard’s _Memorials of the Howard Family_, &c.; Collins says “daughter of Hugh Tilney”). Lady Elizabeth married Henry Ratcliff, Earl of Sussex.
v. 865. _Aryna_] i. e. perhaps—Irene. In the work of Boccaccio just referred to is a portion “De _Hyrene_ C[r]atini filia,” cap. lvii.; and Pliny notices her together with the above-mentioned Timarete.
v. 870. _lusty ... loke_] i. e. pleasant ... look.
v. 871. _Creisseid_] See Chaucer’s _Troilus and Creseide_.
—— _Polexene_] i. e. Polyxena, the daughter of Priam.
v. 872. _enuyue_] i. e. envive, enliven, excite.
—— _lady Mirriell Howarde_] Could not have been Muriel, daughter of the second Duke of Norfolk; for she, after having been twice married, died in 1512, anterior to the composition of the present poem. Qy. was the Muriel here celebrated the Duke’s grandchild,—one of those children of the Earl and Countess of Surrey, whose names, as they died early, have not been recorded? Though Skelton compares her to Cidippe, and terms her “madame,” he begins by calling her “mi _litell_ lady.”
v. 881. _Whome fortune and fate playnly haue discust_]—_discust_, i. e. determined. So again our author in _Why come ye nat to Courte_;
“Allmyghty God, I trust, Hath for him _dyscust_,” &c.
“But if thou iudge amisse, then shall Eacus (As Poetes saith) hell thy iust rewarde _discusse_.”
v. 882. _plesure, delyght, and lust_] One of Skelton’s pleonastic expressions.