(English translation to the previous post: Jove /...

2011-12-28T19:52:51.065-05:00

(English translation to the previous post:

Jove / Jupiter, upset at the existence of the Anacreontic Society [a late 18th-century London-based men's drinking club named after a classical Greek poet who advocated "wine, women, and song"], darkly predicts that
"the yellow-haired god"[Apollo]
and "his nine fusty maids" [the Muses]
will go on a debauch to "the hill of old Lud" [London]
and that everyone else will forsake the "bi-forked hill" [Mt. Olympus/heaven]
to go carousing after these divine delinquents.

But, by Jove!, he'll fix them -- with his thunderbolts -- "for thus daring to twine/ The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine" [drinking a lot and having a lot of "naughty" fun in London].

"The yellow-haired god and his nine fusty mai...

2011-12-28T16:04:44.600-05:00

"The yellow-haired god and his nine fusty maids
To the hill of old Lud will incontinent flee;
Idalia will boast but of tenant-less shades,
And the bi-forked hill a mere desert will be.
My thunder, no fear on't, will soon do its errand,
And, damn me I'll swinge the ringleaders, I warrant
I'll trim the young dogs, for thus daring to twine
The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine."

Ralph Tomlinson, "To Anacreon in Heaven," c. 1780; sung to the tune familiar these days as "The Star-Spangled Banner."

Comments on Kim's Korner: Word Wednesday - Fusty

(English translation to the previous post: Jove /...

"The yellow-haired god and his nine fusty mai...