TEXT:
HAMLET
Why, e'en so: and now my Lady Worm's; chapless, and
knocked about the mazzard with a sexton's spade:
here's fine revolution, an we had the trick to
see it. Did these bones cost no more the breeding,
but to play at loggats with 'em? mine ache to think on't.
First Clown
[Sings]
A pick-axe, and a spade, a spade,
For and a shrouding sheet:
O, a pit of clay for to be made
For such a guest is meet.
Throws up another skull
HAMLET
There's another: why may not that be the skull of a
lawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillets,
his cases, his tenures, and his tricks? Why does he
suffer this rude knave now to knock him about the
sconce with a dirty shovel, and will not tell him of
his action of battery? Hum! This fellow might be
in's time a great buyer of land, with his statutes,
his recognizances, his fines, his double vouchers,
his recoveries: is this the fine of his fines, and
the recovery of his recoveries, to have his fine
pate full of fine dirt? Will his vouchers vouch him
no more of his purchases, and double ones too, than
the length and breadth of a pair of indentures? The
very conveyances of his lands will hardly lie in
this box; and must the inheritor himself have no more, ha?
HORATIO
Not a jot more, my lord.
NOTES:
Loggats
According to Samuel Johnson’s dictionary (itself written about 150 years after the Hamlet) loggats “is the ancient name of a play or game, one of the unlawful games enumerated in the 33rd statute of Henry VIII”. No more than the Grave Digger’s antiquated song, perhaps Hamlet’s mention of this old-fashioned (and outlawed) game is Shakespeare’s means of making his audience think about how old these bones might be.
Legal Language
I promised to include definitions of the various property terms that Hamlet lists, and for balance I should probably include the legal ones too!
quiddities: from the Latin “quidditas” - the very essence of a thing. Quiddities are excessively subtle legal quibbles and technicalities. It’s almost onomatopoeic in its fussiness!
quillets: this word does double duty, since it can mean quibbles, and also a small pocket of land. Shakespeare and/or Hamlet seems to be geared up to use his language very cleverly throughout the scene. Early on he uses fine (‘fine revolution’…) and now here he prepares us for the property discussion with this little word that means small pieces of land.
tenures: property titles. Evidently the lawyer and the property owner shared much business - regardless which profession this skull came from, it would have held details of all these things!
tricks: again, the language is intricately woven here. Hamlet has earlier wished that we had the ‘trick’ to see the human experience for what it is. Now here he uses the word ‘tricks’ not quite as skill, so much as ‘legal trickery’ - ‘law-tricks’ was in common parlance when the play was written. There’s even an almost-contemporary play called Law Tricks by John Day!
Property Language
The various pieces of legal terminology all flow in such quick succession that it felt unnecessarily pedantic to explain them all within the episode. But never let it be said that I’d overlook a definition…!
statutes: these were securities, either for a mortgage or for a debt.
recognizances: bonds and securities to do with debt.
vouchers: these were certificates and guarantees from third parties.
recoveries: suits for the recovery or repossession of lands.
conveyances: deeds for the ownership of land