What 's meant by the following sentence?
Jack Lee
"of small reatch,I stretcheth no further that this iland of ours,naie not
htere over all"
stretcheth?
reatch?
iland?
naie?
Robert Lieblich
>
> What 's meant by the following sentence?
>
> "of small reatch,I stretcheth no further that this iland of ours,naie not
> htere over all"
>
> stretcheth?
stretches
> reatch?
reach
> iland?
island
> naie?
nay or no
It looks like an attempt to write the English of several centuries
ago, but it contains errors. The most obvious is using the wrong
present tense of "stretch"; with "I" it has never been stretches (or
"stretcheth"), but always simply "stretch." This particular error,
using a verb form ending in -eth with a pronoun not in the third
person singular, indicates that the text is of recent origin. There
are also some typographical errors; I don't know whether you
committed them or they are in the original.
Modernized, the sentence would read: "Of small reach, I stretch no
farther than this island or ours, no not there over all." It still
doesn't make much sense. That is the author's fault. I'd try for a
clearer version except that I'm not at all sure what he wants to
say.
Lars Eighner
the lovely and talented Jack Lee
broadcast on alt.usage.english:
JL> What 's meant by the following sentence? "of small reatch,I
JL> stretcheth no further that this iland of ours,naie not htere over
JL> all"
In all this means, "My powers do not extend beyond this island and not
even to all of it." This might be the saying of an early English
monarch, but as another poster as pointed out, it is either inauthentic
or very badly transcribed.
JL> stretcheth? reatch? iland? naie?
I would guess this might be attributed to Elizabeth I. The language
is supposed to be early Modern English. Elizbeth did not control
all of Britain, for the Stuarts ruled Scotland. So, Elizabeth might
have said something like this in declining some proposal or request.
If so, it was also somewhat disingenous, perhaps. Elizabeth was
often modest, or more than modest, in her estimates of her powers,
abilities, and strengths.
--
Lars Eighner eig...@io.com http://www.io.com/~eighner/
OLE users: My reader discards html and all multipart news and email unread
"Creative minds have always been known to survive any kind of bad training."
--Anna Freud
Peter Moylan
>What 's meant by the following sentence?
>
>"of small reatch,I stretcheth no further that this iland of ours,naie not
>htere over all"
This is an attempt to use an older version of English, but the author
has done a sloppy job.
reatch = reach
stretcheth = stretch, but this is the old 3rd person form, so it
shouldn't have been used with 'I'
iland = an older spelling of 'island'
naie = probably 'nay', which means 'no'
To translate the whole sentence, I'd have to know a bit more about
the context.
--
Peter Moylan pe...@ee.newcastle.edu.au
http://eepjm.newcastle.edu.au
Evan Kirshenbaum
> Jack Lee wrote:
> >What 's meant by the following sentence?
> >
> >"of small reatch,I stretcheth no further that this iland of ours,naie not
> >htere over all"
>
> This is an attempt to use an older version of English, but the author
> has done a sloppy job.
It's authentic. The "I" should be "it":
Nearly a thousand years later, at the end of the sixteenth
century, when William Shakespeare was in his prime, English was
the native speech of between five and seven million Englishmen and
it was, in the words of a contemporary, of small reatch, it
stretcheth no further than this iland of ours, naie not there over
all.
http://www.scut.edu.cn/cwis/publish/try/aesw.htm
In other words, "It (the English language) is confined to this one
island, and it doesn't even cover all of that." Unfortunately, that's
the only hit I got, so I don't know who the sixteenth century author
was.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |You gotta know when to code,
1501 Page Mill Road, Building 1U | Know when to log out,
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |Know when to single step,
| Know when you're through.
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com |You don't write your program
(650)857-7572 | When you're sittin' at the term'nal.
|There'll be time enough for writin'
| When you're in the queue.
Robert Lieblich
>
> pe...@PJM2.newcastle.edu.au (Peter Moylan) writes:
>
> > Jack Lee wrote:
> > >What 's meant by the following sentence?
> > >
> > >"of small reatch,I stretcheth no further that this iland of ours,naie not
> > >htere over all"
> >
> > This is an attempt to use an older version of English, but the author
> > has done a sloppy job.
>
> It's authentic. The "I" should be "it":
>
> Nearly a thousand years later, at the end of the sixteenth
> century, when William Shakespeare was in his prime, English was
> the native speech of between five and seven million Englishmen and
> it was, in the words of a contemporary, of small reatch, it
> stretcheth no further than this iland of ours, naie not there over
> all.
>
> http://www.scut.edu.cn/cwis/publish/try/aesw.htm
>
> In other words, "It (the English language) is confined to this one
> island, and it doesn't even cover all of that." Unfortunately, that's
> the only hit I got, so I don't know who the sixteenth century author
> was.
Nicely done, Evan. The others (me included) who commented on this
were thrown off by the typo and lack of context. I wonder if we
ought to tinker with Intro A to add some handy hints for posters
with inquiries like this. Then again, the people who most need to
read them wouldn't.