The Comedy of Errors

by Kent Cartwright

  host lodge (OED v. 2); a rare usage in Shakespeare; cf. 5.1.410, AW 3.5.94.

  11 dinner-time Dinner (the largest meal of the day) occurred between 11 a.m. and somewhat past noon for the better-off classes; servants and labourers dined afterwards (Breton, sig. F2r–v) (Cam1). Elizabethan merchants took dinner around noon (Harrison, 144). It is now about 11 a.m. in Ephesus (Boswell–Malone). Dinner will be a recurrent motif in CE.

  12 In Richard Edwards’s Damon and Pythias, Damon and Pythias, newly arrived in Syracuse, plan to ‘view this town’ and ‘consider the people’s manners’ after dinner (7.82–3).

  7 SD] Capell subst. 9+ SP] (Ant.) SD] Capell subst. 11–12] lines transposed in F2

  13 Peruse ‘examine or scrutinize in the course of travelling’ (OED v. 5a)

  traders suggestive of Ephesian mercantilism, as with merchants at 24

  gaze See 1.1.88n., on gazing.

  14 mine See 1.1.33n.

  15 travel F’s ‘trauaile’ means here primarily travel and secondarily ‘travail’ or ‘labour’; see 1.1.139n., on travels; 5.1.400 and n., on travail. In the 17th century, ‘travel’ and ‘travail’ became distinguished from each other in usage (Oxf1).

  weary See 7n.

  16 another speech-ending half-line, perhaps here followed by a verbal pause filled with stage action; see 1.1.60–1n.

  17–18 ‘Many a servant [man] would take literally your command to go and would abscond with the money [the mean].’ The speech suggests Dromio’s trustworthiness and, indirectly, his desire for release from servitude.

  18 mean i.e. means, instrument (OED n.3 2a); also perhaps a trick (OED 2c) or an ‘opportunity’ (Ard2, citing Luc 1045)

  19 A … sir Antipholus may be responding to a show of alarm from the Merchant at Dromio’s threat. The epithet villain means both low-born ‘rustic’ and ‘scoundrel’ (OED n. 1c), although the latter here only playfully; subsequently (e.g. 96, 2.2.169) it is used more harshly. It perpetuates a series of varying descriptors (e.g. attendant, slave, servant) for the Dromios; see 1.1.127n., on attendant. Antipholus’ mode of address to Dromio will deteriorate as his anger increases: sir (53), sir knave (72), slave (87), villain (96).

  20 dull sluggish, enervated; gloomy (Norton, citing OED adj. 4)

  21 According to ancient and medieval science, the body contains four types of fluids or humours (blood, phlegm, yellow bile and black bile) that correlate with the elements (air, water, fire and earth, respectively) and with emotional dispositions (sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric and melancholic, respectively). An excess of heavy, earthy black bile in the human system produces melancholy. Dromio’s merry jests thus infuse Antipholus with airy sanguinity and ‘lighten’ him. Shakespeare’s early plays often invoke humoural theory: see e.g. RJ 1.4.12. See also 58; 2.2.7 and 64, 69n.; 4.1.27, 57; 4.4.82. Lightens additionally suggests colour: Dromio brightens Antipholus’ countenance, which had been darkened by black bile (cf. LLL 1.1.231–4) (Ard2).

  merry jests i.e. good-natured pranks; merry occurs here and elsewhere as a convenient explanation for inexplicable behaviour; see 69, 79; also 2.2.7, 20; 3.2.183; 4.1.27; 4.3.60. Overall, merry occurs eleven times in CE. See also jest(s) at 62, 68. Practical jokes run through Renaissance comedy, but in CE characters perceive jests that never occur.

  15 travel] (trauaile) 17 SP] (Dro.) 18 mean] meanes F2 SD] (Exit Dromio.)

  23 my See 1.1.33n.

  25 Of from (OED prep. 9a)

  benefit ‘pecuniary advantage, profit’ (OED n. 3d)

  26 crave ‘ask earnestly’ (OED v. 2a, b)

  Soon at at nearly, at about (Boswell–Malone); see also 3.2.179; MV 2.3.5.

  five o’clock the hour set for Egeon’s execution (5.1.118); five has received emphasis in twice five leagues (1.1.100) and Five summers (1.1.32), and will reappear later, e.g. Five hundred ducats (4.4.13) (see also 1.1.27n., on evening sun, and 1.1.100n., on five). Five o’clock will be the time appointed for Ephesian Antipholus to meet Angelo (4.1.10). It corresponds to supper-time (see 3.2.179), which was five o’clock (or between five and six) for Elizabethan students, gentry and nobility (six o’clock for merchants (Harrison, 144)). The hour will ultimately mark a gossips’ feast (5.1.405). 1.2 establishes the possibility for story-lines to converge providentially (although the First Merchant will not return in the finale: the actor was probably needed for another role). On five o’clock as a possible meta-theatrical reference, see Appendix 1; on time.

  27 mart See 1.2n., 74, 2.2.6, 3.1.12; and see also 1.1.17n., on marts. The mart was a common setting for Roman comedy (although not Men.).

  28 consort ‘keep company with’ (OED v. 1); treated ironically at RJ 3.1.46. The Merchant uses refined diction.

  30, 40 lose myself get lost; submerge myself or forget myself (OED lose v.1 5d), multiple meanings relevant to the action; lose could also mean destroy (OED 2a; see Ham 3.2.195). Antipholus will fear losing himself by magical transformation (e.g. 99–100, 2.2.201–2), yet he will also wish for it from Luciana as siren (e.g. 3.2.40). See also TGV 2.6.20, AC 1.2.117.

  31 wander a key word associated with Syracusan Antipholus; see List of Roles, 3n. See also 2.2.3 and n., on wandered; 3.2.38 and n., on wander; 4.3.44 and n., on wander. His intention recalls the predicament of his father at the end of 1.1.

  24 merchants] merchants’ Oxf1

  32 commend deliver, entrust (OED v. 1)

  32, 33 content contentment. At 32 content suggests ‘pleasure’, at 33 a more inward state of ‘satisfaction’ (see OED n.2 1); also perhaps the ‘thing contained’, as in the substance of a conception (OED n.1 4).

  35–40 Antipholus likens himself to a drop of water that falls into the ocean in search of another drop but whose resulting dissolution and absorption make the quest impossible, since it erodes his sense of identity. The proverbial figure ‘As lost as a drop of water in the sea’ (Dent, D613) signifies likeness to others and, here, disintegration (35–6). Later, Adriana will use this simile to describe marriage; see 2.2.131–5 and n. The image develops from ‘Egeon’s account of his shipwreck and parallels his story of searching by sea’ (Ard2). Water references punctuate CE; see e.g. 3.2.45–52 and n. On water-dissolution, see also TGV 3.2.6–8, R2 4.1.260–2, AC 4.14.9–11. The comparison may recall Messenio’s observation on the Menaechmi’s likeness: ‘water isn’t more similar to water anywhere … than he is to you and you in turn to him’ (Men., 1089–90). For related images, see Plautus’ Miles Gloriosus (551–2), which Shakespeare knew, his Amphitruo (601), a source play for CE, and his Bacchides (Fragments v), a comedy that features twin sisters and mentions Ephesus.

  37 Who the prior drop (35); ‘who’ in Shakespeare often refers to a personified inanimate object (Ard2).

  falling Cf. ‘fall’ at 2.2.131 (see n.).

  find … forth find out (OED forth adv. 8); forth occurs likewise at 4.4.96, 98.

  38 Unseen, inquisitive modifying Who (37). F encloses the two adjectives in parentheses, as if qualifying the same object, necessarily Who, since inquisitive could hardly apply to fellow (37). Unseen refers to the drop-as-Antipholus rather than to the drop-as-object of the search: because he has become invisible, Antipholus cannot find his mother and brother. Unseen might also suggest ‘unknown’ or ‘unnoticed’ (Ard2), as in LLL 5.2.358, Son 118.3. For inquisitive, cf. 1.1.125.

  confounds himself both defeats and confuses himself. Various meanings of ‘confound’ pertain: (1) ‘defeat utterly, bring to ruin’ (OED v. 1a); (2) ‘throw into confusion of mind or feelings’ (OED 4); (3) ‘waste’ (OED 1e); and (4) ‘mix up or mingle so that the elements become difficult to distinguish’ (OED 6). By this last definition, confounds himself means ‘loses his sense of identity’; cf. lose myself at 30, 40. Shakespeare often uses ‘confound’ reflexively to mean ‘confuse’ (e.g. R3 4.4.262), but he employs it variously (see e.g. Tit 4.2.6, LLL 5.2.397, R2 5.3.86).

  32 SD] Rowe subst.; Ex
eunt F 37 falling] failing Oxf1 38 Unseen, inquisitive,] ((Vnseene, inquisitiue))

  40 quest associated in Arthurian romance with knights errant who undertake a journey to achieve an exploit (see OED n.1 6)

  unhappy both ‘unfortunate, ill-fated’ and ‘wretched in mind’, the first suggesting an outward, the second an inward, condition (OED adj. 2); unhappy modifies myself rather than them. It recalls the hap- words of 1.1; see 1.1.37n.

  lose myself completing the self-revelation begun with lose myself (30) and echoed in confounds himself (38). Antipholus’ self-estrangement makes him psychologically vulnerable to subsequent challenges to his sense of identity.

  41 almanac … date calendar of my own birth date (and age); see 1.1.53–5. Antipholus can identify something true about himself by looking at Dromio (here the wrong Dromio but the right inference). An almanac, commonly used for agricultural purposes, was a book of tables containing months and dates, anniversaries, seasonal information, records of previous years and astronomical and astrological calculations and predictions (see OED almanac). Cf. ‘calendars of their nativity’ (5.1.404 and n.).

  42 chance ‘does it happen that’ (see OED v. 5); cf. MW 5.5.218.

  43 ‘Returned so soon’ Dromio appropriates and re-inflects Antipholus’ phrase, a practice typical in CE (see e.g. 32–3), deriving from commedia dell’arte. ‘Mistiming’–as in so soon, too late –‘is a feature of the sequence of “errors” in the play’ (Ard2). Stage Dromios often enter this scene running and breathless (see 53, 63), launching the Roman comedy motif of the servus currens, the ‘running slave’ (e.g. 4.2.28.1; see also List of Roles, 5, 6n.).

  44–8 Dromio’s imagination conjures forth a scene of realistic, seeming-simultaneous domestic bustle; cf. 97–102 and n.

  45–6 Cf. 2.1.48 and n.

  45 strucken struck; a past participle form of ‘strike’ used in northern England and Scotland (see OED strike v.); 45–6 offers further time references.

  twelve … bell Time has elapsed with preternatural speed since the scene began (see 11n.). Productions of CE, e.g. Komisarjevsky’s in 1938, often feature a large public clock. In Shakespeare’s time, urban clock towers displayed a city’s status; elaborate public clocks might include a mechanical effigy with a hammer striking a bell at set intervals.

  40 them, unhappy,] Rowe3; them (vnhappie a) F; him (unhappie) F2; them, unhappier, Cam1 (Cam); them unhappy, Cam2; them (unhappy), ah, Riv 43+ SP] Malone subst. (Dro. E.); E.Dro. F 43 ‘Returned so soon’] this edn; Return’d so soone F

  46 one i.e. one blow and one o’clock. Beating a servant resembles the striking of a clock.

  47–50 The repetition of words or clauses, typically from one line to another (rhetorical anadiplosis), often appears in a sequence of lines that builds towards a rhetorical climax, as at 52. The comic repetition invites a speed of delivery and a change of tone that contrast to Antipholus’ preceding meditative speech. On repetition, see 1.1.57n.; also e.g. R3 5.3.193–5; AYL 5.2.32–7; Kyd’s ST, 1.3.33–8. Dromio’s anadiplosis evokes a concrete, offstage domestic world of actions and things.

  47 hot figuratively, angry; literally, overheated, from an excess of yellow bile, characteristic of the choleric humour; accordingly, hot can describe a bad-tempered person (OED adj. 8b). Cf. 21n.

  49 stomach ‘appetite or relish for food’ (OED n. 5a); perhaps also ‘courage’ (OED 8a), i.e. courage to face his wife

  50 broke your fast i.e. eaten; the phrase’s religious connotation sets up Dromio’s images in 51–2 (see OED fast n.1 1).

  51 Dromio imagines poorly fed but devout servants praying for succour. Fasting and prayer occur together only a few times in the Bible; here Shakespeare may be recalling Jesus on exorcism: ‘Howebeit, this kynde [of devil] goeth not out, but by prayer and fastyng’ (Matthew, 17.21). For two mock exorcisms, see 4.3.69 and n., on conjure; 4.4.55–8 and n. On pray, cf. 90. On prayer and fasting, cf. LLL 1.1.300–3.

  51–2 pray … today Dromio underscores his complaint with a climactic end-rhyme; it will be echoed by Antipholus to assert his own perspective: I pray (53).

  52 penitent undergoing penance; that is, fasting on behalf of, or in sorrow for, or (ironically) because of Antipholus (see OED adj. 2, 3). Dromio cannot eat until his master has dined.

  default absence; default often suggests a legal failure to act (OED n. 3a) or a culpable neglect of duty, and was sometimes used in a religious sense (see OED 4a); another meaning was ‘lack of food’ (OED 1b); fault in the sense of ‘default’ (OED 5a) occurs at 65.

  53 Stop … wind ‘stop talking’, ‘be quiet’. Stop in means ‘block up’ (OED stop v. 10); wind refers to ‘breath’ in speaking (OED wind n.1 11b). Figuratively, wind connotes vain or empty talk (see OED 15); Dromio may also be breathing heavily (see 43n.).

  your Antipholus switches from the familiar thou/thee used towards servants (as at 10, 16 and 42) to the more distant you/your, expressing his growing annoyance; see Hope, 1.3.2b.

  54 For this relationship reversed, see 4.3.13 and n.

  55–7 Dromio remembers receiving from Ephesian Antipholus, days earlier, the modest sum of sixpence to pay to the saddle-maker.

  56 crupper ‘A leathern strap buckled to the back of the saddle and passing under the horse’s tail, to prevent the saddle from slipping forwards’ (OED n. 1)

  58 sportive ‘inclined to jesting or levity’ (OED adj. 1; first cited from Thomas Nashe’s Christ’s Tears over Jerusalem, 1593)

  humour See 21n.

  60–1 trust … custody ‘give up your duty regarding such an important responsibility [as taking care of the money]’ (see OED charge n. 13a); charge also means ‘material load’ (OED 1), here the money (54) or gold (70).

  62 jest joke; amuse yourself (OED v. 4a, b); cf. jests at 21, 68.

  63 in post in haste, as a courier (OED post n.3 P4); post occurs also at 3.2.152.

  64 return i.e. return without Antipholus

  post a wooden post; esp. ‘doorpost on which the reckoning at a tavern was kept’ by scoring (OED n.1 6); figuratively, a whipping post; see 65n.

  65 score Although F’s ‘scoure’ could mean ‘scour’, its primary meaning here is score, because it completes the image of scoring on a post (64); that is, recording a debt by making marks or grooves upon a wooden piece used for a tally (OED v. 10a); cf. 1H4 2.4.27–8. Dromio fears that Adriana will record Antipholus’ debt (his fault, or default; see 52n., on default) by striking Dromio upon his pate (the crown of the head: OED n.1 1a); she has already ‘made it one upon [his] cheek’ (46); cf. 82, 2.1.77, 2.2.72, 1H4 5.3.31. Dromio complains that he must pay for Antipholus’ transgressions. Additionally, score can refer to inflicting marks, cuts or bruises to the skin (OED v. 1a); Dromio elaborates the tally upon him at 82–4 (Adriana makes specific threats of pate-breaking at 2.1.77, 2.2.224). Secondarily, F’s ‘scour’ suggests (1) cleansing by means of abrasion (OED v.2 1a), as in ‘scouring’ or cleaning away a fault; and (2) beating or scourging (OED 9); cf. H5 2.1.56–7.

  55 o’Wednesday] Capell subst.; a wensday F 56 crupper?] F4; crupper: F 65 score] Rowe; scoure F

  66–7 *maw … messenger i.e. you should, like me, tell time by your hunger, which will draw you home for dinner without requiring a messenger. The maw is the jaws or mouth of an ‘insatiably hungry person’ (OED n.1 3a). Dromio, like other servants, is associated with hunger and eating; cf. Launcelot, MV 2.5.46. Dromio’s speech recapitulates the struck clock-bell image from 45–6.

  67 strike you home The general idea is proverbial: ‘The belly is the truest clock’ (Tilley, B287a); and ‘My stomach has struck twelve’ (Dent, S872) (Ard2). In his transitive strike Dromio combines intransitive uses: (1) to strike the hour (OED v. 41); (2) to make one’s way (OED 1); and (3) to strike home, ‘to make an effective thrust with a weapon or tool’ (OED 80, as in Tit 2.3.117, MM 1.3.41), all contributing to Dromio’s urgency about hunger.


  68 jests anticipated in 21 (see n., on merry jests); cf. 62 and n.

  out of season untimely, inopportune, inappropriate (OED season n. 16a); cf. 2.2.47 and n., 4.2.57 and n.; perhaps with a pun on season as ‘seasoning’ (OED 19).

  69 merrier See 21n., on merry jests.

  70 gave … thee entrusted to you (OED charge n. 13b); charge recurs at 73, 74 (see n.).

  72 knave ‘base and crafty rogue’, here used playfully but condescendingly (OED n. 3; see also 19n.)

  73, 74 charge See 61, and 60–1n.; Dromio uses charge to mean a task (OED n. 12); cf. 70 and n.

  74 mart See 27n.

  75, 88 the Phoenix Ephesian Antipholus’ house is named after the red- and gold-plumed, eagle-like bird of classical mythology (see Ovid, Met., 15.391–407), which, after living five or six hundred years in the Arabian deserts, burns itself to ashes on a funeral pyre and then rises, reincarnated, with renewed youth to repeat the cycle (OED n. 1). It symbolized constant love, as in PT (1601). Phoenix suggests Adriana’s fidelity and perhaps the rich beauty of her home (OED 2). More distantly, Phoenix may recall the near-death history of Egeon’s family. In London, a ‘Phoenix in the pelican’s nest’ was the sign for a Lombard Street shop referred to in Heywood’s The First Part of King Edward IV (1599) (17.29; see Sugden, 409). The shop sign Phoenix may indicate that Ephesian Antipholus is a merchant (Cam1). The scene’s second mythological animal place-name (cf. 9 and n., on the Centaur), Phoenix occurs again at 2.2.11; see also e.g. 3H6 1.4.35, Son 19.4, PT.

  66 your clock] Pope; your cooke F; you cooke F2

  76 sister casually introducing the woman with whom Antipholus will fall in love (Oxf1)

  stays See 1.1.10n.

  77 as … Christian To promise ‘as a Christian’ to beat someone sounds ironic; see 92 SDn.

  79 break … sconce ‘crack your merry head’; sconce is a jocular synonym for head (OED n.2), possibly derived from sconce as a lantern (OED n.1) or a small fortification (OED n.3 1a); cf. 65 and n., 2.2.34–8 and n., 3.1.77 and n.