Derivation of "Dine with Duke Humphrey"

[Rob]

To "dine with Duke Humphrey" is an obscure cliche in Roget's Thesaurus
(1929 edition) listed under #87.Unity, apparently meaning to dine alone
or just to be alone. It's not included in Eric Partridge's Dictionaries
of Cliches or Slang, or in James Roger's Dictionary of Cliches.

Does anyone know the derivation? Who was Duke Humphrey?

Thanks in advance,
Anne Jones
rr...@peg.apc.org

[Shakib Otaqui]

On Sunday, in article <3244FE...@peg.apc.org>
rr...@peg.apc.org "Rob" wrote:

Rob> To "dine with Duke Humphrey" is an obscure cliche in Roget's Thesaurus
Rob> (1929 edition) listed under #87.Unity, apparently meaning to dine alone
Rob> or just to be alone. It's not included in Eric Partridge's Dictionaries
Rob> of Cliches or Slang, or in James Roger's Dictionary of Cliches.
Rob>
Rob> Does anyone know the derivation? Who was Duke Humphrey?

Brewer's Concise Dictionary of Phrase & Fable has "to dine with
Sir Thomas Gresham. To go dinnerless. See HUMPHREY."

That entry says: "To have no dinner to go to. The Good Duke
Humphrey (see under GOOD) was renowned for his hospitality. At
death it was reported that a monument would be erected to him in
St Paul's, but he was buried in St Alban's. The tomb of Sir John
Beauchamp (d. 1358), on the south side of the nave of old St
Paul's was popularly supposed to be that of the Duke, and when
the promenaders left for dinner, the poor stay-behinds who had no
dinner to go to, or who feared arrest for debt if they left the
precincts, used to say, when asked by the gay sparks if they were
going, that they would "dine with Duke Humphrey" that day.

Under "Good", the Duke is identified as "Humphrey Duke of
Gloucester (1391-1447), younger son of Henry IV, said to have
been murdered by Suffolk and Cardinal Beaufort (Shakespeare,
Henry VI, Pt. II, III, ii); so called because of his devotion
to the Church."

I'm not sure where the Sir Thomas Gresham in the first entry
comes in. He was presumably Elizabeth I's financial advisor who
in 1558 promulgated Gresham's Law that can be summarised as "bad
money drives out good".

--

Money is the fruit of evil as often as the root of it.
_____________________________________________________________________
Shakib Otaqui Al-Quds Consult

[Richard N. Shrout]

Quoting from ENCYCLOPEDIA OF WORD AND PHRASE ORIGINS by Robert
Hendrickson, published by Facts On File:

"It was popularly believed in days of yore that Humphrey, Duke of
Gloucester (1391-1447) a man noted for his hospitality, was buried in
London's old St. Paul's Cathedral. For many years after his death those
poor who remained in the cathedral during dinner hours, or those debtors
afraid to leave the sanctuary for fear of imprisonment, were said to be
"dining with Duke Humphrey." Although the good duke had actually been
buried at St. Albans, the expression "to dine with Duke Humphrey" remained
linked with St. Paul's and came to mean to go without any dinner at all.
It is now solely a literary expression, often found in the novels of
Dickens and other great English authors."

--Richard