Michel de Montaigne, The Essayes, 1603 - p. A2r.

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Date:1603

Description:An translator's dedication in a Shakespeare sourcebook.

In addition to the simpler statement of dedication John Florio wrote a fulsome dedicatory letter to the Countess of Bedford and her mother, Lady Anne, in recognition of their assistance in sponsoring his work. Most serious works of Shakespeare's time are dedicated to a patron. Shakespeare's own sonnets are dedicated to 'Mr W.H.', the true identity of whom has never been established.



[This dedication page from the translator, John Florio, begins, in long-winded circuitry fashion, as follows:]

To the Right Honourable, my best-best benefactors and most honoured Ladies, Lucy, Countess of Bedford, and her best-most loved-loving mother, Lady Anne Harington.

Strange it may seem to some, whose seeming is mis-seeming, in one worthless patronage to join two so severally all-worthy ladies. But to any in the right, it would be judged wrong to disjoin them in ought, who never were nearer in kind, than ever in kindness. None dearer (dearest ladies) I have seen, and all may say, to your honorable husbands then [to] you, [or] to you then [to] your honorable husbands; and then to other, than either is to t'other. So as it [is] were I to name but the one, I should surely intend the other, but intending this dedication to two, I could not but name both. To my last birth, which I held masculine (as are all mens conceits that are their own, though by their collecting, and this was to Montaigne like Bacchus, closed in, or loosed from his great Jupiter's thigh) I the indulgent father invited two right honorable godfathers, with the one of your noble ladyships to witness. So to this defective edition (since all translations are reputed females, delivered at second-hand, and I in this serve but as Vulcan, to hatchet this Minerva from that Jupiter's big brain) I, yet at least a fondling foster-father, having transported it from France to England, put it in English clothes, taught it to talk our tongue (though many times with a jerk of the French jargon) would set it forth to be the best service I might, and to better I might not, than you that deserve the best...


Full title: Michel de Montaigne,(1533-1592) The Essayes of Lo: Michaell de Montaigne now done into English by John Florio, London, Val. Sims for Edward Blount, 1603.


Timeline

The timeline shows resources around this location over a number of years.

1570s
Henri Estienne, A mervaylous discourse upon... Katherine de Medici…, 1575 - title page
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1590s
Church of England, Booke of Common Prayer, 1596 - binding view
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1610s
William Shakespeare, Quartos, A Midsummer Night's Dream, 1600 [1619] - Theseus goes hunting, p.F4v.
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Donor ref:SR 99.3F [1,209] (32/10461)

Source: The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust - Library

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