all-ending final; awaiting all men. Used of Judgement Day at R3 3.1.78. Sams notes Shakespeare’s fondness for words starting with all-: cf., e.g., Luc 801, ‘all-hiding’; LLL 2.1.21, ‘All-telling’; H5 1.1.39, ‘all-admiring’.

  10 expedient hasty, speedy

  10–11 head … made force they have raised (see OED head n.1 phr. 4k(b)(i)); advance they have made (n.1 55). Cf. 3H6 2.1.139–40.

  12–39 The three-part deployment described at 4.96–102 and 5.62–8 is here extended by the French to all four sides of the English position. As in the naval battle (4.101–2) King John takes the centre. The half moon (31) configuration of the hill behind the English recalls 4.72 (see n.) with its evocation of the Spanish Armada. The description has no historical basis, but heightens the odds against Prince Edward. See LN.

  13 Vantaged with augmented by; having the advantage of. See 2.490–1n.

  14 i.e. the French King’s contingent alone outdoes the entire English force.

  battled fortified

  15–32 Melchiori notes the close echoes of 4.64–76; cf. also 2.50–2.

  15 braving boastful; ostentatious (OED a. 1; 2)

  Duke of Normandy Prince Charles

  16 trimmed … up completely adorned (OED v. 7). See 2.156n. on make up.

  mountain Rather than being itself a viewpoint, as in the play’s other panoramic descriptions at 5.54 (see n.) and 18.127–45, here it is the mountain that is being viewed.

  17 plate plate armour. Cf. 2.51–2 and n.

  aspiring rising, with suggestion of achieving distinction (OED a. 2b). Cf. Luc 548.

  18 silver quarry suggests an open-cast silver mine (OED quarry n.2 1a); in a military context quarry may evoke ‘a heap of corpses’ (n.1 2b), in an ironic forecast of French losses (cf. Cor 1.1.193–5).

  orb in general anything spherical (OED n.1 3a), particularly the heavenly bodies (n.1 2b); here the moon as ‘shining and silvery’ (Riv) seems likeliest.

  * * *

  7’twere –] Winny; twere Q; t’were Q2; ’twere, Capell

  19–29 Cf. Froissart, 364, describing the ‘order of the Frenchemen’ before the battle: ‘hit was ordayned that all maner of men shulde drawe into the felde, and every lorde to display his baner … every man mounted on horsebacke and went into the felde, wher they sawe the kynges baner wave with the wynde. There myght a been sene great nobles of fayre harnesse and riche armory of baners and penons: for there was all the flowre of France’ (not in Holinshed).

  19 banners ensigns or flags bearing heraldic devices

  bannerets small banners

  20 new-replenished freshly restored to fullness, recently refilled, i.e. with the winds (21); cf. 2.445–6, 4.86–7. Shakespeare frequently uses new- as a prefix. Cf. Luc 1357, R3 4.3.18, LLL 4.2.26; also Locrine, TLN 250–1.

  20–2 pendants … them Cf. Chester, sig. I2v, ‘His Pendants are in formall wise assign’d, / Quartred at large by well read Heraldrie: / Cuffing the ayre that struggles for to kisse, / The gaudinesse of faire King Arthurs blisse.’ The striking similarity of these lines suggests that Chester was acquainted with E3, or the author(s) of E3 with Chester (depending on when his lines were written and if they were circulated before publication). Love’s Martyr contains Shakespeare’s PT, among added poems by other writers. See 2.188–9n.

  20 pendants misused for ‘pennons’ (OED pendant n. 6a): long, narrow flags, triangular and pointed, ‘originally the ensign of a knight under the rank of banneret’ (OED pennon n. 1a). See 26n.

  cuff buffet

  21–2 winds … them The wind’s familiar association with fickleness in love or sexual promiscuity derives from its proverbial changeableness or instability (see Dent, W412). Cf. VA 1082, ‘Nor sun nor wind will ever strive to kiss you’.

  winds … Struggles See 2.134n.

  21 for their gaudiness attracted by their brilliance, possibly with hint of disparagement (see OED gaudy a.2 3a, citing Ham 1.3.70, ‘rich, not gaudy’). Cf. Luc 272, ‘gaudy banner’.

  23 Philip Although he did serve at Poitiers as a teenager, he was not a commander.

  24 Coating covering: possibly hints at ‘coats’ of arms and armour

  array martial order; condition; attire (OED n. 1a; 8a; 11a)

  25–8 Cf. 18.137n.

  25 gilded Cf. 3.206 (and n.).

  26 *pendants pendent leaves Q’s ‘pendant leaues’ is inadequate in sense and metre. The proposed emendation mends both, while suggesting possible sources of error, whether of misunderstanding or haplography. The tree metaphor is sustained with an appropriate pun: flags or pendants (see 20n.) like hanging leaves; pendent is an apt heraldic word, often found after the noun, as in ‘letter pendent’, i.e. letter with a seal attached (see OED pendent a. 1a). Cf. Ham 4.7.170, ‘pendent boughs’. For the use of polyptoton (which the emendation here creates), see 2.103n.

  * * *

  26 the] with Collier pendants pendent] this edn; pendant Q; pendant streamers Capell; pendants WP; pendant ensigns Oxf

  27 device emblematic heraldic design (OED 9a)

  27–8 heraldry, / Quartered Cf. 4.76 and n.

  28 colours … fruits Cf. 4.68–70.

  29 orchard … Hesperides In classical mythology the Hesperides were nymphs, daughters of Hesperus, the evening star, guarding an orchard of golden apples with the help of a dragon ‘at the western extremity of the earth’ (OED n. 1a). Hercules’ eleventh labour was to steal the golden apples by killing the dragon. The allusion here suggests extreme peril but also implies vulnerability. In the Renaissance, the orchard itself was often called the Hesperides (as at LLL 4.3.315; cf. also Per 1.1.28–9), but cf. Hero and Leander, 2.298.

  30 too For Q’s ‘two’, cf. 3.70 and n.

  doth … height i.e. looms over us; displays its eminence (its own and that of the French army)

  his the hill’s

  31 Cf. 4.72 and n. on horned moon.

  32 lodged encamped; cf. 4.102 and dislodge at 2.56.

  33 crossbows men armed with crossbows (OED 2); historically significant at Crécy, applying to the Genoese (though their weapons are not specified in Sc. 7: see 7.3n.) rather than at Poitiers (but see 18.138)

  battle body of troops

  34, 39Chatillion pronounced with four syllables. See LN.

  35 thus it stands to sum up our situation

  36 binds in secures

  37 royalized royalizèd: made royal; cf. R3 1.3.124.

  * * *

  30 too] (two) bear] rear (Collier); bare Hop2 35–7]Q2 lines in, / sonnes, /

  40–65 Prince Edward devises an argument to dispel his own fear of superior enemy numbers, with transparent sophistry and false logic; cf. Warwick’s speeches at 2.551–77 and 598–623, and also 8.50–3. The large numbers of the French are rhetorically reduced to one (eight times) and ‘only’ (but: nine times); cf. 2.206–9n.

  40 While answering Audley, this line also announces a theme which it then drops, leaving its elaboration to Audley himself at 134–49.

  41 parcelling itemizing; cf. R3 2.2.81 and Cor 1.2.32, ‘Some parcels of their power are forth already’.

  42–60 *rearranged for clarity. In Q, 54–5 come before 42, and 56–60 before 43; thus 42 in Q is rendered meaningless, and the image of counting sands is disrupted. See LN and pp. 64–7. Cf. also 6.26n.

  42 all the world Cf. 15.28.

  43 quarters parts of an army (OED quarter n. 13c, citing 1H6 2.1.63 and this line)

  squadrons disyllabic: cf. 2.352 and n.

  regiments sizeable bodies of troops (OED n. 8a)

  46–9 For similar play on the contrast between limbs and bodies in relation to military power, cf. 15.18; also R2 3.2.187.

  46 Comparable blazon-like lists occur at Son 106.6 (GTW) and LLL 4.3.180–3.

  hath See 2.134n.

  several individual

  47 one … strength i.e. a single power acting together and simultaneously: one self = one and the same (OED self a. 1d), and instant = now present (a. 2a). Cf. TN 1.1.36–8 and Hero and Leander, 1.361–2, ‘And like a planet, moving several ways / At one self instant’.

  50–1 Cf. LLL 5.2.186–97.

  50, 51tells … tell count(s); cf. 2.301.

  51 kills his heart proverbial: completely discourages him (OED kill v. 7c; see Dent, KK2). Cf. Massacre at Paris, 13.4, ‘thou kill’st thy mother’s heart’; common in Shakespeare. Cf. also 18.126n. on Our … dead.

  52–60 See 2.301–3n.

  52 flood violent downpour of rain (OED n. 5a)

  * * *

  41 more] Donovan; more, Q; more: Q2; more. Capell 42]Donovan; after 55 Q Than] They’re Melchiori1 and] then Donovan; om. Oxf power,] Capell subst. (power, –), WP; power: Q; power. Donovan 43–53]this edn; after 60 Q 45 power.] Collier; power, Q; power: Q2

  54–5 Sams notes the chiasmus sands, hands, handful, sands.

  55 handful See 5.33–5n.

  56 ta’en monosyllabic (Q ‘tane’): taken

  58 confound overwhelm

  59–60 hyperbolic: see 2.110n. Cf. R2 2.2.144–5.

  61–2 There … kings The focus on odds (64) leads inadvertently to implicit acceptance of John of Valois’s sole right to the title of King of France. Though this sense can hardly be intended, the lapse from consistency undercuts the dynastic certainties of the English. Cf. 17.1.

  63 puissant legion powerful army; legion also = vast multitude (OED 3a, citing Matthew, 26.53), continuing the contrast between many and one. Cf. 3H6 2.1.206, 5.2.31.

  64 apprehend perceive; fear

  65.1–123 The three heralds recall the French herald’s three visits to Henry V in Famous Victories, TLN 1175–1201, 1322–40 and 1372–1410 (developed by Shakespeare in Montjoy’s three embassies at H5 3.6.113–66, 4.3.79–127, 4.7.65–117). The heralds, here, at 87.1 and at 100.1, might enter from the different directions indicated by Audley for the armies of their lords (as in Clark’s production, where the sense of Edward’s being surrounded was visually realized).

  67–76 See LN. Cf. 10.72–8 for Edward’s offer of comparable terms to the citizens of Calais.

  * * *

  53 knowst] (knowest) 56 ta’en] (tane) 63 king –] Parfitt; king? Q; king: Q2 66 What] Q2; Pr: What Q 67+SP] this edn; He:[.] Q; Her[ald]. Q2

  69 thou familiar form of the pronoun, here, and in all the heralds’ speeches in this scene, used disparagingly (see 1.55, 57n.), representing their senders’ disdain. Cf. 18.184n.

  call forth Q yields adequate sense, but the ease of a/u confusion in secretary hand, together with other comparable usages, may recommend Collier’s conjecture of call to ‘cull’ = ‘pick out, select’ (OED v.1 1). Cf., e.g., 3H6 3.1.4, KJ 2.1.39–40 (playing on ‘call/cull’) and 2.1.391–2, H5 3.0.24.

  70 *squires See 10.49n.

  72 bloody colours Cf. 84, 98–9, 17.2; colours = banners and bloody is proleptic, threatening bloodshed. Cf. 3H6 2.2.173, 1Tam, 3.3.159, E2, 3.1.139; also A Larum for London, TLN 1611, ‘Now warre hath wrapt his bloudy colours vp’, perhaps echoing this line. Cf. 16.7n.

  73 i.e. payment of ransom will release those who have surrendered to the French.

  redeem See 2.373n.

  74 Cf. 1H6 2.4.133, ‘This quarrel will drink blood another day.’

  day both battle and day of battle; cf. 4.117n.

  75 Brittish Breton (see 1.133n., 133–4n.); King John threatens revenge for French losses during the Breton campaign (see 9.1–9 and Sc. 9n.).

  76 proffered offered, proposed

  76, 77mercy Epistrophe (see 2.321–9n.) links the speeches, shifting the focus from human to divine mercy; cf. 18.39–42.

  77–8 i.e. only heaven (God) could make me utter submissive prayers for mercy (Riv).

  79 base worthless; low (rather than being aimed at heaven)

  vanish … lips be wasted: prayers to anyone other than God would be ‘wasted breath’, and wasted prayers would lead in turn to ‘vanished breath’, i.e. death. Cf. Luc 1039–41.

  80 a man a mere man

  81 Lord See 1.118n.

  82–3 sarcastic: the pleas for mercy of a tongue of steel are blows. Cf. 6.99–101.

  * * *

  69 call] cull (Collier) a] an Q2 70 squires] Q2; Esquires Q 75 e’er] Capell; ere Q; e’re Q2 Brittish] (Bryttish) 76 thy] Oxf; the Q 81 the] thy Q2

  83 coward transferred epithet = cowardly (OED a. 1b, citing Son 74.11, ‘coward conquest of a wretch’s knife’)

  burgonet anachronistic: 16th-century ‘helmet with a visor’ (OED b); primarily ‘the defence for mounted men’ (Shakespeare’s England, 1.131), so appropriate to rebuff King John

  84 colours … his a retort to the threat implicit in bloody colours (see 72n.)

  86 Cf. True Trag. of R3, TLN 620, ‘I returne defiance in thy face.’

  Return him reply to him in the form of (see OED return v.1 14a)

  in his face directly

  88–100 Froissart, 374, describes the flight from the battle of Poitiers of ‘the duke of Normandyes batayle’ when they ‘sawe the prince aproche’ (cf. Holinshed, 3.389). This likely source for the passage is turned to ironic use with the Duke offering the Prince a mount on which to fly: cf. 15.11, 17.3–5; also 2.56–73.

  90 engirt surrounded

  91 nimble-jointed Cf. 2.28.

  jennet small Spanish horse

  93 therewithal on it

  95 beast Cf. 2.612 and n.

  96 sit ride (OED v. 22a, citing H8 4.2.16 (Fletcher), ‘He could not sit his mule’)

  * * *

  87 SD] Q2 87.1 Herald] Capell from Charles] Oxf subst. 89 SP] Winny; He. Q; Her. Q2 94 Death] (death)

  97 jade See 6.162n.

  98–9 i.e. I shall catch him, even if it means covering my horse and spurs with blood; cf. R3 5.3.340 and H5 4.6.6.

  98 stain See 2.100n.

  99 double-gild cover with gold: gild was often figurative for blood-smearing (OED v.1 1d, citing KJ 2.1.316); double- is intensive, but also possibly = ‘doubly’ (with blood and honour). Cf. 2H4 5.3.123.

  100 capering disyllabic: prancing. Cf. 1H4 3.2.63, ‘cap’ring fools’.

  100, 112boy applied slightingly (OED n.1 2); earlier, boy has denoted Prince Edward’s youthfulness (3.74, 80, 98) and Philip’s (4.102, 125). Charles’s age is never defined, but he is portrayed in general as Prince Edward’s equal. In fact, Philip was 14 at Poitiers, his brother Charles was 18 and engaging in his first battle, and Prince Edward 26. Cf. 17.6.

  101 The symmetry of the heralds’ appearances is varied by having 3 Herald speak first.

  102 most … France ‘Most Christian King’ or ‘Rex Christianissimus’ was a title specifically used by the kings of France, denoting France’s ‘special relationship’ with the papacy and the Catholic Church. Cf. 1TR, 1.29–30.

  103 The image is of expiry of a lease, here the body’s lease of life. Cf. RJ 1.4.109–10, Arden of Faversham, 8.163.

  living date lifetime

  105 full-fraught laden

  106 hour of life i.e. the single hour now apparently left him (Riv)

  108 long journey i.e. up to heaven (Riv)

  towards imminent, at hand (OED adv. 1, citing RJ 1.5.121); see 2.116n.

  * * *

  100 capering] (capring); carping Q2 gone.] gone. / SECOND HERALD I go. Exit / Oxf 100 SD] Capell (Exit Her.), Winny 100.1 Herald] Capell from Philip] Oxf subst. 101+SP] Winny; He:[.] Q; Herald. Q2 105 book] holy book Donovan prayers] holy prayers Capell 108 SD] Oxf subst., after 104

  109 SD] this edn

  112 unadvised unadvisèd: rash

  113 tendering being solicitous towards (OED v.2 3a); cf. R2 1.1.32. See 2.475, 480n.

  115 divine extemporal a clergyman opposed to set forms of prayer, who prays extempore, i.e. without a prayer book

  116 render back return (tautological); cf. 2.475, 480n.

  commonplace of prayer collection of prayers; commonplace implies either the randomness of the collection, as in a commonplace book, or, derogatively, a book of platitudes or truisms (OED n. 4, 5a).

  118 *my sins’ quality the nature of my sins; given the Prince’s modesty, plural sins seems likelier than singular, though the singular could carry a collective sense.

  119 avail benefit; help (OED n. 1a; 2)

  121 hear his prayer i.e. grant him mercy

  122 wanton pampered child; Prince Edward returns the French King’s insult at 6.156 (see n.). Cf. KJ 5.1.69–70.

  124 confident used at 2.75 by the Countess of the Scots after their ignominious flight

  strength and number ‘This doublet comes close to hendiadys’ (GTW).

  makes See 2.134n.

  125 sound search (OED v.2 6b)

  125–6 silver … Time Both silver wings and milk-white messengers refer to Audley’s white hair, reflecting the wealth of experience whose benefits Edward expects from him in the present crisis. Cf. 2H6 5.2.47.

  * * *

  113 thus] Q2; this Q 114 Haply] (Happily) 116 SD] this edn 118 sins’] Winny; sinnes Q; sin’s Capell 123 SD] Q2 125 wings] strings Delius 126 Time] (time)

  126, 127Time age and experience; passage of time as the medium for the process of ageing; moment of crisis

  128 *bruised Capell’s emendation fits the context and idiom exactly. Q’s ‘busie’ is explicable as a misreading of copy ‘brusd’. Cf. MA 5.1.65 and Cor 4.1.45–7.

  bit wounded, stabbed (OED bite v. 8b). ‘Bite’ is used by Shakespeare of a sword at MW 2.1.118–19, or dagger at WT 1.2.156–7; cf. also 2.33, biting whinyards.

  with by, in consequence of

  129–30 Cf. 6.126–7, 194–6, 17.20 and nn.; also 2.231–3n.

  129 stratagems forepast past military exploits; cf. 6.195.

  iron pens weapons of war (iron conveys the indelible nature of the scars); proverbial: cf. 6.194–6n.

  130 texted inscribed (OED v. 1a, first e.g. from Nashe, Lenten Stuff (1599)). The scars on Audley’s face chronicle his military history.

  131–2 War is again sexualized (cf. 6.27–33 and see 2.188–9n.); Audley’s long experience has familiarized him with danger. The Prince’s claim to be a blushing maid forgets his loss of military virginity at Crécy, but the play repeats the rite of initiation here, with new emphasis on contemplating defeat and death.